Mrs Diomedes loved her walks, but never took one on a Sunday. On Sunday she slowly climbed the steep cobbled streets to the blue-shuttered, white chapel above the village. In her hands she carried a bunch of wild flowers which she picked the day before on the path around the cliffs where she and her husband used to stroll together. She was born in a cold grey suburb of Derby, England.
Then the Sixties brought free thought, free love and cheap flights to Corfu. Dimitri seemed just another opportunistic, medallion-wearing, hairy-armed local Casanova the night he tried to "pull her" at the hotel disco.
Only later, on the narrow cobbled streets of his village where every body nodded to him, their eyes lighting up to see him, did she realise he would be worthy of her love. Though she would forever doubt if she had been worthy of his.
Six years! That's all the pitiless Olympian gods had given them. A lifetime packed into six summers. Then he was gone, another accident statistic on Europe's most dangerous roads. She thought of return - there were no children to tie her there. Besides, she had never fully grasped the language, nor had she ever felt fully accepted; she still sensed the eyes following her from behind olive green blinds whenever she walked down the main street. But he had lived here - every street corner, every bench in every tiny square had contained him. He had left her without willing it and she had no will left to leave.
So, on Sunday she carried her posy up to the chapel at the side of the cemetery, kissed his photo on the niche and after clearing away the remains of last week's flowers, placed the fresh ones in the rusting ring at the foot of the cross. The insurance would run out one day, she knew. But when it did, she doubted if she would care.
Sudden grey skies and a cold wind from the Aegean lifted the petals as she prayed. But Zeus was sending his thunderbolts elsewhere that morning and the smell of some sacrificial lamb roasting high up on the hillside behind her would never reach her.
Rellenars 2/05/99
copyright 1999 by Berni Armstrong