A Small Blue Bottle (Part 2 of 2: Ένα μικρό μπλε μπουκάλι (Éna mikró ble boukáli))

I was amazed at how much my daughter had blossomed like a rare flower over a year’s time. She was a smart kid and her beauty was admired by everyone, to my own pride. Although she was already a young woman, to me she was still that little girl who dreamed of dragons… and she meant everything to me.

We had agreed that we would come back to that same place at the beginning of the following summer. She talked about the trip almost every day of the few weeks before our departure date, always full of detailed plans... and they were not just a few.

It was not yet noon when we reached the beach. As expected, she ran barefoot towards the sea, kicking the salty and fresh water. She was back to being my little girl, who had a huge fascination with the sea. I followed her, slowly, for I had no desire to run. On the shore, what I really liked was walking very slowly. I lost sight of her when she won the curve of the bay, but I knew where she was heading to. Before long I spotted the familiar silhouette, moving slowly ahead of me. I wondered why she was walking so slowly, but I soon realized the reason.

There was a young man sitting on a log on the beach. His eyes were as blue as the sky that opened above our heads and he was staring, very seriously, at a point beyond the horizon. His black straight hair was misaligned by the wind. He wore a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows and his old jeans were wet up to the knees. The man, who had surely past his twenties, but was far from his thirty years of age, noticed our approaching, but did not move. My daughter clenched my hand when she realized that he was holding a small blue bottle in his left hand.

***

- Late last summer, I found it on the other side of the bay. I was hoping to find the owner, but did not know how to. I decided I should throw it back to the sea, where it belonged, anyway. I was sorry, but had no right to keep it with me. Maybe another one would be luckier than me somehow. But the poem was so beautiful, I hesitated...

- Poem?

- Yes.

I noticed the young woman’s cheeks blush as she looked away. I knew her quite well. That kind of reaction could only mean one thing. He could not disguise satisfactorily the interest he felt for her either. The conversation went on easily as if we were long-time acquaintances. We were sitting on the terrace of a small restaurant facing the sea and not far from our kitchenette, relaxing and sipping some drinks, while waiting for the food to be served. On the corner of the table, a blue bottle with an old piece of paper, rolled up inside, was the witness of that unpretentious encounter. I had invited him to have lunch with us, something I would never do if we were in a big city. There, in that small town, however, where everyone seemed to know each other, I believed that should be the most polite and harmless thing to do.

- I came back here after my University graduation. My father, a widower and old aged man, needed help and I decided to settle down around here for now, working in an office on the island. One day I will have my own, but I need experience and money to invest... This week-end we will have a Greek festival. The community maintains certain traditions. It will be fun – to say the least. You should come.

My daughter looked at me, smiling. It was evident that she had already made her decision. I smiled back. I winked and she smiled broadly. A Greek event... I thought of people dancing in the streets, broken dishes, good wine and lots of seafood...

- We will come.

He smiled in approval. She was radiant.

***

Songs by Nikos Vertis and Nikos Oikonomopoulos, Antonis Remos, Vasilis Karras, Paola, Giorgos Mazonakis, Pantelis Pantelidis, Melisses and many other Modern Greek singers played the night away in the main square speakers. The restaurants were open and the tables were placed outside. People were dressed in white and danced in the streets, which were closed to traffic. When they put Natasa Theodoridou’s most poignant song to play, the young man took my girl by the hand and asked her to dance right there in the middle of the street. Other couples did the same. I remembered that her mom loved that song.

"Να 'Σουν Θάλασσα, να μην σ'άλλαζα" (Na soun Thálassa, na min s' állaza) ... 'If you were the ocean, I would never change you'... said the singer, in a duet with Sarbel, with his deep voice and in perfect contrast with hers.

I felt a huge nostalgia and my eyes flooded with tears, remembering the last time we danced, exactly to that same song. I swallowed hard, trying to untie that knot that tightened my throat, but I could not. I sat down at an empty table, with my thoughts floating far away from there.

- They make such a beautiful couple...

I turned around to see who had spoken. A woman a little beyond her middle age, owner of one of the taverns attending the festival, was staring, dreamily, at the couples dancing in the street. Her attention was more focused on the young black haired man with tanned skin who was dancing with the pale faced brown-haired girl with the expressive green eyes.

- It is true...

I could have felt some sort of jealousy or any protective instinct, but it was not what was happening in my head at that moment. I looked at them and saw other people, from a nearly recent past. I was not delusional. It was like a strange haze that mingled nostalgia, memories, dreams and real life. In my view, she seemed to change into her mother, dancing with a man I knew very well... and he was not the same one I was watching at that moment. I had changed... and quite a lot... Basically, I was afraid that history somehow repeated itself...

In the Sirtaki, both the slow (argo) and the fast (grígoro) forms of the hassápiko are danced. The hassápiko is one of the best-known popular demonstrations in street festivals. At both ends of the long line of dancers, as they do not form a closed circle, the coryphées spin handkerchiefs in their free hands. According to the tradition, it is important not to let a hand be free, so to avoid it to be clasped by some tricky demon.

Typically, a large cluster is formed at the hottest hour of the evening, when the first chords of the Sirtaki of Zorba are heard, exactly as it was happening at that moment.

A young man with very light hair popped up from nowhere and pulled my daughter by the hand, followed by a stream of other hands, which began to form a long line of dancers in the middle of the avenue. Another string of people holding one another’s arms side by side was formed opposite to the first one. Our friend was at the end of that, but as he was a little distracted and let the handkerchief be taken by someone else, an older man hastened to take his place and the party continued as if nothing had happened. Our young friend frowned at first, but soon returned to his normal, once he was closer to the place where my girl was dancing and he apparently forgot what happened few seconds before. The crowd was rehearsing the steps popularized by Anthony Quinn, in the famous movie released in 1964. In a short time, everyone had followed perfectly, the traditional sequence, as a large group of ballet artists. Although for some of them it was the first time, for others it was another... and it was fun for both...

- Give food, drink and music to the Greeks and they will dance, happily, all night long.

- I see that is very true...

I agreed with the lady, who was still watching the crowd playing, with her eyes slightly distant, as if full of nostalgia. I wondered how much history would be hiding behind that tired and nostalgic look...

When the dance was over, my daughter dashed to meet me, panting and laughing, with her cheeks as rosy as a child’s. It was evident that she was enjoying herself so much. She sat down beside me and put her arm in mine, leaning her head on my shoulder. I rested mine over hers as we watched people passing by. Shortly after we saw the young man coming closer with two glasses of some drink in his hands. He sat down and offered one to the girl, who accepted, smiling. He also had his cheeks flushed by the heat and the dance.

- Let’s go to the Zorbás. There is live music and it is less hectic than the streets.

I was not too excited to be in a closed place, but given that my daughter was so excited to agree, I decided to join them. The Zorbás was located in one of the streets outside the hubbub of the festivity and, therefore, less crowded. I thought that would give us a momentary bit of peace. When we got in, however, the place was packed with people laughing and drinking. Some were dancing merrily, but most were only drinking and talking. There was a group on stage, playing modern music. I glanced around us trying to capture the details of the place. The décor was simple but quite interesting. Small framed pictures of landscapes and typical Greek themes hung upon the bare stone walls. Despite the low light, some strategic points over the tables and the bar, as well as on the stage, could be seen clearly enough. We were standing in the middle of the room, watching people moving about, dancing and drinking. The young man excused himself and left us. I assumed he had gone to fetch some other drink.

To my surprise, however, he, instead, sat on a tall stool in the centre of the stage and started to sing the first few bars of Thelo na me niosis. The song, originally played by Nikos Vertis, was being very well interpreted by our newest friend. I did not expect him to be so in tune and to have such a clear voice. The other musicians seemed to know him well by the way they treated him. He could not take his eyes off my daughter, while singing, as if doing it only for her.

- Να 'ξερες τα βράδια πως μισώ

Που με τιμωρούν που σε 'χω χάσει

Θέλω να σε δω το ομολογώ

Άλλη τέτοια νύχτα ας μη περάσει

*(Na 'xeres ta vrádia po̱s misó̱

Pou me timo̱roún pou se 'cho̱ chásei

Thélo̱ na se do̱ to omologó̱

Álli̱ tétoia nýchta as mi̱ perásei)*

- Do you know the meaning of those verses?

- Not really. It seems to be a very sad song, but nonetheless very beautiful and touching...

- It's a love song, stating the agony two lovers feel when they leave each other, especially when the night comes. You are right. It's romantic and sad at the same time.

- Yeah...

***

* If you knew how I hate the night

  Because I am punished for losing you

  I admit I want to see you

  And I do not want to spend another night like this...

***

Apparently she had all her attention directed to the singer and smiled, blushing lightly. I had the impression that my vacation that summer would be in some ways more solitary that it had been in years. I realized that I was not really worried when that thought formed in my mind. When the performance ended, he joined us again, smiling. My girl greeted him with a hug and, consequently, with a tender kiss. I saw that I was being one too much into that scene and decided it was my time to leave. She looked radiant and, strange as it may seem, it made me happy. I apologized and left. At the exit door, I bumped into a guy with very fair hair, who rushed in visibly drunk.

***

A few hours later, I woke up in the middle of the night, totally confused by the sounds of sirens and people outcry, outside the condominium where the kitchenette was. I only realized what was happening when my daughter came in, sobbing and with her blouse covered by a large stain of blood. I panicked immediately, but she was not hurt. The blood wasn't hers.

A policeman, who brought her in, told me what had happened, since the girl seemed to be in a complete state of shock. A young man with very light hair and visibly drunk entered the Zorbás and tried to pull the girl to dance, but she had refused, being defended by her partner at that moment. The other did not take rejection well and tried to fight with our friend, who punched him and left, before causing a worse damage. At the door, he called the security guards to take control of the situation, while the other man screamed for revenge.

When they were coming back home some hours later, the blond boy, who had followed them, unseen, pulled a knife and stabbed the back of my son-in-law to be, a couple of times. He ran away when my daughter cried, desperately, for help. The wounds were so deep, he could not resist until the arrival of the ambulance and died on the spot, with his lungs pierced by the long and sharp blade. It was all very quick. A real tragedy, on a day that was so special for the young couple. We were all absolutely horrified and disgusted.

***

- Why, Dad? Why can life be so cruel?

- I don’t know, my sweetie...I don't really know...

We both cried like two children, holding each other and getting comfort for the happenings both in the recent and the distant past. The story, which had repeated itself, had the malice of demons who take our hands when the handkerchiefs inadvertently are dropped off of them.

***

We avoided coming back to that place for more than three years after the tragic accident. At her insistence, however, we decided to go back there in the early summer of the fourth year.

As soon as I stopped the car on the beach, already known to us, the dark haired little boy, who had fair skin and eyes as blue as the sky that opened above our heads, leaped off impatiently, running barefoot on the beach, like the son of a fisherman. He was about three years old and it was his first contact with the sea. Upon reaching the edge of the water, he stopped, stepped a little backwards, turned around, looked at us and then ran towards the waves breaking nearby. He laughed happily while jumping over the waves, soaking his whole outfit without any concerns. His mother smiled, completely amused, in spite of the sad look in her eyes.

- That is definitely my son...

- Without a doubt. My grandson has a very strong affinity with the great dragon...

She smiled, but I realized that a stubborn tear slipped down her cheek, from the corner of her eye.

The boy ran around the edge of the water and disappeared in the curve of the bay. Minutes later, he came back bringing a blue bottle in one hand and an old parchment, tied with a red line, in the other. He said he had found the bottle on the beach, half buried in the sand, near a fallen log. The manuscript contained a little poem handwritten in a calligraphy we both knew very well.

"When you see me,

You will know who I am,

Just by the way I look at you.
If you hesitate
To approach me,
Think I have waited
Too long
For this meeting
And I can wait no longer
Anymore...
If you embrace me,
Make it entirely,
As if our bodies

Were just one.

And when you kiss me,
Then,

Do it as if it is a last one,
Even if it is the first,
For the first,
May well be,
Also,
The very last one. "

A Small Blue Bottle (Part 1 of 2)

- Tell me more about the sea. I like to hear the stories and imagine how immense it must be... maybe even scary...

- It is like an enormous lake, but its waters are always wild, even when they seem calm. It is salty, deep... and cold... In the middle of the night when all the noises disappear, you can hear its roar, like the one of a restless dragon, claiming ownership of something that had always been his, but which had been stolen by some cruel and unfair god...

- I want to go and see it… and feel it... Will you take me there one day?

She looked at me with dreamy pleading eyes, full of a strange and extremely sweet anticipation.

- ...Please?

- I will, yes. One day...

And her green eyes looked to a distant point, longing for the trip... imagining a large auburn dragon, lying on a vast sandy beach, stuck in the anxiety of an unexplained emptiness, roaring restless and helpless, tormented by dreams of freedom and always regretting a great loss.

I was born on the island, on an autumn Friday. Perhaps for this reason, I had always had a close and intimate contact with the sea and the winds, throughout my whole life. They had always been as much a part of me as the blood running through my veins. When I was a boy, the first thing I used to do in the morning was to open my window and look at the sea, to see which side the wind was blowing to. Grandson of a fisherman, I learned how to read the signs of nature and have a rough idea of the weather forecast.

My grandfather used to get up very early in the morning and go to the sea, to collect the net he had placed the night before. I recall seeing him from afar, standing on the boat and bringing the net up full of fishes, at the time they abounded in the bay calm waters. He used to send us some for lunch. I was a child but I knew we had an affinity with the sea and the fishes. My mother said his ancestors were Spaniards.

He was a tall man, but walked half bent by the weight of the years. He had a hooked nose and wore dark rimmed glasses. His bald head was almost always covered with a classic grey felt hat. He wore white shirts with rolled up sleeves and grey pants. On special days or Sundays, he used to wear a pinstriped black suit and matched hat, kept for those occasions. It was quite funny seeing my grandfather all lined up, when on most days, he seemed to wear the same old and dull clothes. He lived on the mainland, to where we moved over when I was five years old.

The island was always in our sight when we opened the windows facing east.

My father taught me how to swim in the sea. I loved spending hours in the warm waters of the bay, swimming and learning how to hold my breath under water. In the summer, the waters were always green except on days with southerly winds, when they were blurred and drab. On clear days in the winter the ocean looked like an oversized mirror. On windy days it always had the same brownish tone, with the waves breaking up, violent, against the rocks and walls of houses built too close to the tide line. I used to spend hours looking at the sea with my thoughts far away, being lulled by the distinctive sound of the waves that constantly and insistently lapped the shore. I loved to walk along the beach with my feet in the water, treading the soft white sands. The sea was my most natural element. It was where I felt more comfortable, quieter and more secure within the boundaries of the respect I had for its greatness and its untamed power.

She had never been confronted with such a powerful and misunderstood force like that dark green vastness, speckled with short white lines in the distance.

When we got to the place I loved as a child and I stopped the car, we jumped off and walked side by side, to the edge of the cliff. I could feel the apprehension and anxiety emanating from her as she tried to control the pace of her steps. She then opened a huge smile and breathed the salty air in, with both her nose and mouth. She seemed hungry for the sea and that moment was a major milestone in her life, when she would finally meet the great, restless, roaring and fearless dragon way down the cliff.

She then put her hand into her bag and rescued a small blue bottle out. There was a small rolled piece of paper tied up with a fine red thread. A small detail, however, called my attention for the exceptional refined element she remembered to implement: the cork was sealed with wax. She thought of everything, incredible as it might have seemed to me. The intention of maintaining the message protected, dry and intact with that subtle detail surprised me to the point of amusement for her cleverness. I would not have thought of that... ever...

- What have you got there?

- It's a message I wrote. My thing... it is not worth bothering yourself with it.

She flung the bottle into the sea, before I could even think on doing anything about that.

Standing at the top of the cliff, we both watched the sea roaring down there with its unrestrained fury, its arms of waves and hands of foam, welcoming and carrying away the bottle that contained an innocent secret message. She raised her hand, but stopped halfway, when she realized that I had noticed her almost involuntary gesture.

- Who were you going to greet? Neptune? Or were you going to wave goodbye to the bottle? I do not believe that at your age you still believe in sea gods and secret messages. You gotta be kidding me...

She blushed, showing an almost feigned irritation. She looked at me and murmured an expletive. Then she told me in a loud voice:

- There’s no use in talking to you about some things. You are very rational... you have no imagination. When I was young you were much more... acceptable... You know what? You lack imagination. This is why your life is so predictable and colourless.

- Well, it's true. At least I know exactly where I’m stepping on. Don’t you think it is better?

She turned away impatiently and walked back to the car. She did not have many arguments against my sad reality. I laughed out loud. My eyes followed the young woman walking away from me, while my thoughts unfurled the threads of time, trying to find a reference point. I turned back to the cliff, overlooking the vast and endless sea and said to myself, in a low voice:

- Where have I lost the ability to dream and fantasize, anyway? When have I stopped hearing the dragon roar on the sands of the beach, chained in its own fears and anxieties? When have my own problems blinded me to the beauty of imagination and my ability to dream?

- Let's go!

She was sitting at the car wheel, honking impatiently. She had an urgent need to get to the beach. She wanted to have her feet drenched in the fresh salty water. I hurried into the car beside her. She looked like a child on her birthday, rushing to the site of the party. I laughed at her. She simply drove to the end of the road and almost without ensuring that the car had stopped, she jumped out, got rid of her shoes and ran on the soft sand that squeaked at every step she took.

She stopped when she reached the edge of the water line. I watched her from afar, studying her reactions. She stepped ahead, then walked a step back, turned around, looked at me and then ran towards the waves breaking nearby. She laughed and jumped the waves, soaking her clothes without any worry. I saw the same child who used to hear the stories about dragons and the great and wide sea, facing fearlessly her initial shock and behaving as if she had always been as close to it as I had since my boyish days.

***

- Do you hear it?

- Uh-huh... It's calm... It seems like it is purring...

Lying on the couch at the porch, she had her eyes closed and her head leaning on my legs. She smiled, then she jumped up, wide-eyed, looking at me as if she had had the gleam of a brilliant idea.

- I wonder where the bottle is. Do you think anyone has found it?

- It must be on the other side of the beach. The tides usually carry the pieces of wood from one side to the other... the bottle must not be far away...

She was serious and seemed disappointed.

- Oh. I thought it was going so much further away...

- Sometimes ... it will depend on the force of the tides...

I tried to keep her hopeful, but I was not even sure of what I had said. She laid her head on my legs again and listened to the silence of the night and to the dragon snoring softly... She fell asleep right there. I took her in my arms and laid her on the bed that she had prepared, after dinner. I had to sleep in the living room because the small kitchenette that we rented for a week had one room only.

Every morning, we strode along the beach, holding each other, while we washed our feet in the water. We used to have lunch in the village and hike nearby, but the sea was our most frequent point. We used to spend hours and hours watching the waves break or the seagulls fly, feeling the stillness of life and without saying anything.

In the morning of the day we were prepared to travel back to our normal lives, I did not see her when I got up. The door was unlocked. It was still early in the morning. She had gone out for a walk... alone. I prepared a fresh coffee and waited a little, but there was no sign of her. Before I got too worried, I put a sweatshirt on and went out looking for her at the beach. I followed a track of footprints left in the sand by a pair of small feet I assumed were hers. I found her sitting on a fallen log and watching the skyline, with the dreamiest expression I had ever seen on her face.

She looked different. I got closer and sat beside her, saying nothing. We were both looking at the horizon. She sighed.

- I have never found the bottle. It must have been taken too further away from here... This is good.... I think...

I wrapped my arm around her and pulled her closer to me. She leaned her head on my chest and fell silent.

- Do you wanna talk about it?

- No.

I respected her privacy and secrecy. She probably did not believe that I could understand the fantasy she created around the message which I could never come to know the content. I stood up and invited her to walk back to our quarters and eat something.

- Can we stay a day longer? I want to be sure that I will not find the bottle smashed somewhere on the beach.

I raised an eyebrow. She scowled.

- Please...

- This was not the plan but that's okay. We have to see if we can stay in the kitchenette for one night longer.

She jumped up and smiled, hugging me and kissing my cheek.

- Thank you.

I tried to be a lenient father ever since she lost her mother. There was no harm in indulging once in a while, as she was not very demanding on her requests. The sea was a separate issue, however. It was a fascination she had since childhood, when she still believed both in fantasies and in dragons.

I admitted that I did not want to come back either. I felt so good, there at the beach. She behaved definitely like a legitimate daughter, demonstrating an enormous affinity with an element with which she came into contact for the first time that summer. The sea was our natural element. It was in our blood, undoubtedly.

My grandfather would be proud of his great-granddaughter.