by Nadia Marks
‘I didn’t realize you were so provincial, Liebling,’ he told her.
The news that Anita was pregnant was the motivation Sonia needed to get away and return home, see her family and decide what she and Nicos were going to do about their future.
Anita suited being pregnant. After her miscarriages, she had wilted like the pots of basil on the veranda when Katerina forgot to water them for a day or two. She had never been particularly robust – her complexion was pale and her slender body was thin like a young girl’s – but pregnancy was now transforming her into a feminine earth mother.
She was nearly five months gone by the time Sonia arrived home, and her return couldn’t have been better timed, coinciding as it did with Costas’s job transfer to Nicosia. Petros, his goumbaros, best man, who worked for the same insurance company in the capital had put in a good word for his friend and ensured him a transfer and a promotion. This meant that the two men travelled daily to work in Petros’s desirable car. They would leave early in the morning and arrive home late, some nights after the women had gone to bed. Petros had taken lodgings in Nicosia so Costas would often stay in the capital overnight with him. No one could say they were upset with the arrangement. Anita had got what she most wanted from him.
The five women were delighted to be united once again; it felt very much like old times. With her sister by her side Anita started to blossom. In just a couple of weeks, the lustre returned to her hair, the hollows in her cheeks filled up and her belly was growing at a steady pace.
‘I feel like an oyster harbouring a precious pearl,’ she told Sonia. ‘My body has never felt more useful than right now.’
That year, the Easter celebrations for the Linser family were the best they had ever known. There was much to celebrate. Anita was with child, and Sonia and Nicos had finally announced their engagement.
Before lunch on Good Friday, after paying their customary respects to the epitaph at St Lazarus, the two sweethearts took themselves to their favourite beach where they had said their goodbyes the evening before Sonia left for Vienna.
Although Sonia was brought up as a Catholic she and the whole family loved to celebrate Easter the Greek Orthodox way. The evening service of the Epitaphios on Good Friday was Sonia’s favourite Easter service. The epitaph, an intricately carved wooden structure, was positioned every Good Friday in front of the altar and then decorated with fragrant spring flowers. Whereas the Catholic ritual of commemorating the entombing and passion of Christ was a macabre and sombre affair, the Orthodox one, even if eminently mournful, she found more reflective, more hopeful – as well as visually pleasing.
The epitaph structure consisted of four posts holding up a canopy roof above a catafalque or flat dais. An icon of Christ was placed on the dais, symbolically recreating the burial, and once the decoration was complete, the faithful gathered to kiss the icon in turn and pay their respects.
As children, both Anita and Sonia would go to St Lazarus with Katerina early in the morning with armfuls of flowers from their garden, as was required from every home in the neighbourhood, in order to help with the decoration. Each household would supply whatever flowers were in bloom in their gardens and take them to their local church, and since Easter always falls in the spring, every church in town smelled like a spring garden.
Women and children would set to work to cover the bare canopy. Freesias of all colours, lilies and roses, carnations and pinks, lemon and orange blossom, jasmine and branches of green myrtle would sit in buckets of water while the children handed the required flower to an adult who would then set about twisting and turning, tying and threading the stems until the entire structure, with not an inch of wood visible, was covered in a spectacular floral arrangement. Delicate white gypsophila would invariably be used at the edges to create a lace-like effect. Rose petals and orange blossom would be scattered on the icon of Christ and finally sprinkled with rose water for added aroma. Each year something of a competition took place on Good Friday between the various churches wanting to produce the most dazzling display.
That year, neither Sonia nor Anita participated in the decorating ritual, but Katerina, as always, was at St Lazarus helping from early morning with her floral tribute.
‘Let’s pop in and light a candle and see how they are getting on,’ Sonia had said to Nicos on their way to the beach, eager to inspect the women’s handiwork before going to the evening service.
‘Remember what we told each other last time we were here?’ Nicos said, taking Sonia’s hand as they sat on the pebbly beach looking at the perfect line of the horizon.
‘We said we’d have our fun and when I returned we would be together,’ she replied.
‘And … ?’ Nicos asked. ‘I’ve had my fun, I’m ready to get serious! How about you? Do you want to come back now and marry me?’
‘Yes, Nico mou, I do!’ she replied. ‘But I don’t want to come back just yet. I’m new to teaching and I want to continue for a little longer.’ She searched his face for a reaction. He stayed silent for a while and reached in his pocket for his cigarettes and flask of whisky. He took a sip, and handed her the flask.
‘But do you want to marry me or not?’ he finally asked.
‘I do, but I don’t want to come back … not yet.’
‘That’s fine by me,’ he told her, inhaling deeply and reaching for the flask. ‘Let’s get married anyway and I’ll come to Vienna with you.’
‘What? Will your father agree?’ she asked in disbelief.
‘My father agrees to everything I ask him, so long as I agree with him,’ Nicos replied with a mischievous smile and pulled her close for a kiss.
The lunchtime celebrations on Easter Sunday had continued well into the evening. Under the two orange trees in the garden a long trestle table had been laid out with all the usual festive fineries – swathes of blossom and scented roses and lilies, which Katerina had been cultivating with tender care. If the kitchen had been Katerina’s and the padre’s favourite place to drink coffee in the winter, then the garden with its two dozen pots of basil and a profusion of fragrant flowers was their place of choice in the spring.
Katerina had made her legendary soupa avgolemono, the customary first course on Easter Sunday, and Olga prepared her famous kleftiko lamb, which she seasoned with lemon and oregano and oven-cooked for hours in her earthenware pot. As a token of her Austrian heritage she also made her grandmother Eva’s Sauerkraut dish. But Olga’s roast potatoes, grown in the famed Cypriot red soil, were her pièce de résistance, and according to her two girls were the best in the world.
‘I will never learn to cook potatoes like Mama,’ Sonia announced, taking yet another mouthful and washing it down with red wine.
‘There are no cooks that are as skilled as Mama and Katerina,’ Anita added, then glanced at her grandmother apologetically. ‘Nonna, of course, is also a master cook – your torta pasqualina, Nonna, is the best!’ she quickly hastened to add to avoid offence, and raised her glass at Ernestina. Old and unwell by now, her grandmother insisted on taking part in the preparations by issuing instructions from her armchair.
‘The Zuppa Inglese has to be made to the exact recipe of my mother,’ Ernestina told Olga. ‘Make sure you use plenty of liqueur.’ The essential ingredient, she insisted, was Alchermes, the aromatic Italian herb liqueur which she took care to have always in the drinks cabinet. If she heard of anyone about to visit Italy, that was the first thing she would request to be brought back for her.
Besides the lamb and soup of course there were flaounes, the traditional savoury pastry parcels filled with special Cyprus cheese, herbs and sultanas, a variety of salads and pastas and the festive dyed red eggs that had to be cracked in a competitive Easter game. Before the meal started a wicker basket full of red eggs was passed around the table so each guest could choose their egg. The egg-smashing ritual required two people: one person held their egg pointing upwards while the other person held their egg pointing down. The person pointing down the
n hit their competitor’s egg from above, aiming at the pointy end of the egg in the hope it would crack. Of course, this didn’t always work because very often the egg underneath could damage the egg above depending on its strength. In any case, whoever’s egg cracked first was out of the game. The winner went on to smash the next person’s intact egg until only one final victorious egg remained whose owner was then declared, among much festive bonhomie, the winner of the party.
There was a big crowd on that Easter Sunday. Apart from the immediate family, which included Padre Bernardino and Nicos’s parents, Costas had also invited his goumbaros, Petros, whose arrival he announced at the last minute, to Katerina’s irritation.
‘It’s fine, dear,’ Olga had told her, sensing her impatience, ‘it’s the festive season, one more person doesn’t matter.’ Katerina was as hospitable as any Greek, but Costas didn’t have to do a lot to irritate her and she didn’t much like the types that he fraternized with. She had met this Petros at the wedding but she’d been too busy to pay any attention to him. Observing him now fleetingly over lunch Katerina found him a banal and arrogant young man who drunk copious amounts of wine and talked animatedly nonstop about nothing in particular. She found him particularly irksome.
At one point in the middle of the meal, Olga stood up – putting a rather abrupt end to Petros’s pontifications – and raised her glass.
‘Christos Anesti, everyone!’ Christ has risen, she bellowed joyfully.
‘Christos Anesti,’ they chorused in return, in the customary Easter greeting, and raised their glasses to each other.
‘Today, dear friends,’ Olga carried on cheerfully, turning to look at Nicos’s parents, ‘we have many reasons to celebrate. To begin with, let us all drink to our children’s union, and wish them a long and fruitful life together.’
‘Na mas zisous,’ Long life to them, everyone shouted and raised their glasses to the happy couple.
Glancing at her eldest daughter Olga raised her glass higher. ‘And,’ she said smiling broadly, ‘let us also wish our Anita a safe delivery of my first grandchild!’
‘Isygia!’ To health, they all shouted and the joyful clinking of glasses echoed all around the garden.
‘Also,’ Olga said before sitting down and looking around at everyone, ‘let’s not forget to drink to peace, and to our island’s independence!’
‘To peace,’ they all chimed again and drained their glasses.
There was indeed much to be hopeful about on that Easter Sunday.
Lunch had been a lively and jovial affair; the food was more delicious than ever and the wine flowed plentifully. No one was in any rush to put an end to the day, and everyone ate, drank and chatted over each other noisily.
After the meal had finally ended, Sonia brought her guitar out into the garden and the singing and dancing commenced as the drinking continued. Greek and Italian songs were sung, Ernestina happy to hear her favourite tarantella tunes, and even Anita joined in with a little dancing. As the day progressed more food appeared on the table, this time the customary Easter desserts. Olga had prepared her grandmother’s apple strudel and Ernestina’s Italian panna cotta. Katerina had made her baklava and galaktoboureko, much to Sonia’s delight.
‘I can have apple strudel any time of the year in Vienna,’ she said, helping herself to the other desserts.
‘Bravo, Katerina, this galaktoboureko is good!’ she heard Petros say, his mouth overflowing with custard cream, as he stood up to dive across Ernestina for more. He’s got the manners of a gorilla and the hairy arms of a chimp, Katerina thought to herself and tried to ignore him.
Putting her irritation aside, she looked around the table and her heart filled with joy at the good fortune of being surrounded by these people. She glanced at the padre who smiled and raised his glass in a private toast to her. How fortunate she felt to have such a good and loyal friend. Then looking at Anita, with her swelling belly, she rejoiced in her friend’s good fortune, despite her trying husband. Her dear Sonia had finally decided to settle down, and Katerina hoped that she would also at some point soon bring to the world a blessed child. Everything seemed well on that holy day; life was finally feeling good again.
The big cuckoo clock in the saloni struck midnight when Katerina finished putting the last few dishes away. It had been a long day and clearing up after the day’s festivities – despite willing helpers she always liked to put the final touches to her kitchen herself – had taken her longer than she’d expected. It was way past midnight by the time she sank into bed and she stayed awake for a good while, unable to sleep, reflecting on the day’s events which she decided had been full of joy.
She was in that blissful state between sleep and consciousness, when the body gives in to fatigue and the brain drifts into unconstructed random thought, when her bedroom door burst open, snapping her back to wakefulness.
‘Katerina, wake up,’ she heard Costas’s brusque voice as he advanced towards her bed. ‘She is bleeding all over the sheets,’ he shouted in panic, ‘I don’t know what to do.’
Within seconds Katerina was up and running to Anita.
This time Anita’s miscarriage, if it could be so called, hit the Linser women like a sudden mountain avalanche. No one had expected it. By the time Doctor Elias arrived, Anita was howling with the pain. She had gone into premature labour and for three hours she screamed in agony, her mother, sister, grandmother and Katerina by her side. Finally, she gave birth to a baby girl, beautiful as a rosebud. She was already dead on arrival. There was no hope of survival.
She was barely five months’ gestation and although externally she looked perfect, she was incomplete. Her internal organs were unable to sustain life.
They gave her to Anita to hold. They laid her in her arms, wrapped in a cotton sheet, and she cradled the tiny bundle till the first sun-rays crept through the wooden shutters and onto her bed. Her delirium lasted for weeks and a fever raged for days due to an infection. The penicillin fought the infection but her mind remained in great confusion for a long while.
‘They took my baby away,’ she would lament in a low mournful murmur.
‘Where is my baby, what have you all done with her?’ she kept asking, and then she would wail and cry, begging them to bring back her baby girl. All that Olga, Ernestina, Katerina and Sonia could do was to keep vigil in turn by her side, follow Doctor Elias’s orders and pray for her recovery. Costas offered little support, which surprised no one; besides, he was out of the house all day and by then he had taken lodgings in a house in Nicosia to use from time to time when his workload was heavy.
Sonia and Nicos had planned to marry during the week commencing with Easter and return to Vienna together, but of course there was no question of that under the circumstances.
‘My sister is fighting for her life,’ Sonia told Nicos when he suggested that perhaps they could still go ahead once Anita was out of danger.
‘There has been a death in our family, we are in mourning,’ Sonia replied, astonished at his suggestion. ‘This is no time for celebration. Besides, when Anita is out of danger I must return to the Academy.’
‘No matter, I’ll come with you,’ Nicos was quick to suggest. ‘I can’t see there would be any objection from anyone; we are engaged now.’
‘You know my mother,’ Sonia replied, ‘she won’t object, but my grandmother will. But then again, when did we ever listen to poor old Nonna?’
Larnaka, 2010
Eleni wiped her eyes and took a sip of mountain tea, now cold in her mug. The cuckoo clock on the wall reminded them all once again that the hour was late and a long day was awaiting them, but no one wanted to break the spell of Anita’s story. Eleni looked at her cousin sitting across the room from her and was flooded with love and gratitude for his existence, not only for her poor aunt but for herself too.
She was the only one in the room able to empathize with what her aunt had gone through. Eleni too had had a miscarriage early on in her marriage, and even thou
gh she was able to go on and have two healthy pregnancies and two beautiful babies, the pain of it always lingered. She looked at Adonis again and thanked God that her aunt had managed to finally get the baby she longed for, but knew all too well that the scars of losing a child never heal.
Adonis, who for years had regarded his mother with criticism, was gradually able to start making some sense of what he considered to be Anita’s inadequacies. Her bouts of depression, her inability to be fully present, had, he now realized, had much to do with the numerous misfortunes of her life.
‘It took me a very long time to recover,’ Anita said, looking around the room at the three faces staring expectantly at her. ‘The period that followed, after losing my baby and Sonia returning to Vienna, was the time that Katerina and I became closer than ever. She was my saviour.’ Anita closed her eyes, took a deep breath and let out a mournful sigh with the memory. ‘No one could have asked for a more loving, caring friend. Now, she too has gone forever.’
As much as all three wanted to continue listening to Anita they could see that the old lady was beginning to fade; the late hour and emotion had taken their toll. The new day which was about to break would be a demanding one, and they needed to have a few hours’ sleep before facing it.
‘I don’t want to go to bed, but I feel we must,’ Adonis said, and walking towards his mother, took her arm and guided her to her room.
There would be plenty of time later for Anita to carry on with her story, after they had put their beloved Tante to rest.
Katerina had been a popular woman and much loved in the neighbourhood. St Lazarus was packed with people coming to pay their final respects to her. Adonis held his mother’s arm as they made their way to the front of the church, while Eleni and Marianna followed behind.
The atmosphere in the church was laden with emotion, intensified further by the perfumed smoke drifting from the incense burner to hover heavily in the air. A long procession of mourners passed by the open coffin to pay their last respects. Each person stopped for a second to glance at Katerina, made the sign of the cross, kissed the crucifix on the coffin and then moved on to take their place at a pew.
