Head Over Heels

by Felicity Price

  ‘Because men wake up as good looking as when we went to bed. But women somehow deteriorate during the night.’

  The men laughed while the women rolled their eyes, used to Ray’s sexist jokes.

  But the question had thrown me. Had Simon been talking to these people about never wanting to live with a woman again? And why did that worry me? I didn’t want to live with Simon … did I?

  ‘Please come to my restaurant tonight,’ said Reçep the restaurant owner, breaking into my thoughts as he brought us our coffees. ‘I have wild boar. Very special.’ Small, dark and wiry, he was grey-haired, unlike most older Turkish men I’d met so far, with a deeply lined face, weathered by the storms of life and at sea.

  We’d need to book soon, he added, because several people from the ship had already put their names down.

  Simon promptly made a reservation. Reçep beamed with pleasure then indicated we should follow him.

  ‘I show you how I shoot the boar,’ he said. From a bench at the back of his kitchen he proudly produced a twelve-bore pump-action shotgun. He was off shortly to find another boar for tonight’s meal, he said, going through the motions with his rifle, pretending to shoot a moving target.

  He led us back to the café, sat us down and, while we sipped a second cup of his strong coffee, told us the history of the place.

  Did we know, he asked, that the Turkish name for the bay was Hamam — meaning bath?

  No, we said.

  In 32BC, he explained, Cleopatra and her lover Mark Anthony had honeymooned at this tiny, secluded bay, which was then not far from the ancient city of Lydae. She had brought him five barges filled with objects from the Egyptian treasury to fund his army and navy; he was on the way to Actium, where his armed forces would suffer further crushing defeats. But first, they lived like the royalty they were.

  Cleopatra bathed at her leisure in the bay’s extensive Roman bath — this very bath, he claimed, pointing to a semi-submerged ruin next to his jetty. The bath was heated by a hot spring bubbling out of the seabed, fed from a nearby crater lake. The calcium and magnesium-filled mineral waters, it was said, were good for her flawless skin and served to make her even more beautiful. After her bath, she dined at a nearby house on local delicacies of wild boar, wine and freshly baked Turkish flatbread.

  I couldn’t help but be awestruck. Here I was, nearly two thousand years later, retracing her path. I too could live like Cleopatra! That night, thanks to Reçep’s twelve-bore gun, I would be eating wild boar and drinking the local white wine. That afternoon, I determined, I would lie in her bath in the warm Mediterranean.

  But as I swam the short distance from the jetty to bathe in the ancient ruin of Cleopatra’s bath, half submerged on the rocky shoreline, I realised we were indeed millennia apart, Cleo and I. Instead of flowing robes, gold ornaments and myriad attendants, I was clad in Lycra, and rather skimpy at that. Instead of bringing barges filled with Egyptian treasure to my Mark Anthony, I’d arrived with a small suitcase, grubby after a long journey through innumerable baggage carousels, filled with nothing more valuable than shorts and T-shirts and a barrel or two of anti-ageing cream. Instead of taking the waters of her luxurious bath lying back in comfort while handmaidens delivered me goblets of wine and peeled me a few grapes, I had donned a rubber snorkel and mask. While she came from the delta of the Nile and was a mythic beauty, I came from the arse end of the world and had a monolithic booty.

  And I’m not a total sucker. I knew perfectly well that the Cleopatra connection of Ruin Bay was more likely to be myth than reality. But it sure made a good yarn. And who knows? It could have happened. The bathhouse was supposed to have been built around 1000BC, it had definitely used naturally heated water from the nearby crater lake, and it could have still been there when Cleopatra stopped by on her way to Ephesus and Rome. Or so I told myself. Floating in the warm water amid the ruins of her bathing room, it was easy to believe it was true.

  I forgot about the snorkel, forgot about the Lycra, ignored the last couple of thousand years of human history and let my mind drift back to Ancient Roman times. For a moment, I imagined I was Cleopatra, preparing myself to dazzle Mark Anthony. I had taken the waters in my private Roman bath, I had been pampered and preened by my handmaidens, and I was on my way. In my vision, I was dressed as Venus, sailing on a barge with a gilded stern, purple sails and silver oars, my handmaidens dressed as sea nymphs, feeding me grapes as I lay under a golden canopy. I am beautiful. My skin is soft and smooth, from copious bathing in asses’ milk. I have womanly curves but not excessively so. I am incredibly clever, witty, charming. I can achieve anything I want.

  In reality, I thought, why should my everyday life be so different?

  There was nothing holding me back from being like Cleopatra except myself — and a few extra kilos.

  Maybe I could soak up something of Cleopatra’s loveliness. Maybe the waters of her spa would have a magical effect. Maybe …

  Being weightless underwater made it seem perfectly achievable. And the vision didn’t leave me when I reached the shore. Even the sight of myself in a maillot didn’t destroy the dream, which lingered on to haunt me throughout the shipboard journey.

  I couldn’t have had a better introduction to the Mediterranean. I decided to forget about the nightmare of Marmaris and Simon’s brush with death. Life was precious.

  Carpe diem, make the most of every day, I told myself, before it’s too late. My holiday started here!

  Chapter 21

  That heavenly smell of baking bread greeted me again the next morning when I awoke. I’d been jolted out of dreamland by the piercing blasts of the ship’s horn telling me we were about to leave Cleopatra’s cathartic bay. I swung out of bed to have one last look through the open window before closing it, ready for the sea voyage.

  It was a sight I will always remember: the yellow-brown hills tumbling down to the deep teal green water with its occasional lighter patches of brilliant aqua. Over on the port side I could imagine Reçep busying himself on his jetty, or on his houseboat moored alongside, preparing his twelve-bore to deal to another hapless beast for tonight’s patrons. I wished Icould have been among them.

  But ahead lay new adventures, the challenge of the open sea — or as open as you can get in the coastal Mediterranean. A landlubber all my life, this was my first experience of shipboard life. How would I cope with a net full of squirming tuna? I’m not usually a wuss, but how I’d react to the realities of what was in essence a fishing expedition, with all the dramaof catch, tag and release, would undoubtedly be an indication to Simon of just what sort of mettle I was made of.

  My watch told me it was just before eight. Simon’s bed was empty again, the sheets still rumpled. I gathered my toiletries and towel and headed for the shower, running into Simon returning from his, beard neatly trimmed. The cuts on his arms and neck had started to fade and I noticed his arm had been freshly bandaged.

  ‘Morning, darling,’ I said.

  ‘Morning.’ He gave me a kiss on the cheek and I breathed in his linen-scented aftershave.

  ‘You must have been up early.’

  ‘Just the usual,’ he grinned. ‘We’ve got a job to do, you know. We’re not all here on holiday.’

  ‘Touché.’

  ‘I’d better head up for breakfast now. I’ve got to be in the lab at eight-thirty. Will you be okay for the morning?’

  We’d discussed the night before what I might do while he was working. I’d planned a morning on deck reading and keeping out of the way. After lunch, Simon’s team leader had invited me to the aft deck viewing platform to observe the trawling activity and he’d freed Simon for an hour or two to explain to me what was going on.

  ‘You bet. I’m really looking forward to doing nothing after the frenetic activity of the last few days.’

  To avoid the self-service overload I’m prone to when confronted by too many food choices, I gave myself a severe talking to before going into breakfast: ‘Just because every
thing is laid out in front of you doesn’t mean you have to eat the lot!’ I said aloud, just to make sure I’d heard myself properly.

  It seemed to work. I chose the scrambled eggs, which had a slightly spicy taste, followed by Greek honey yoghurt with sultanas. I eschewed the Turkish coffee for a filter cup, which proved almost as strong but at least drinkable. I’m sure my heart rate rose a little, but nowhere near as much as when I’d tried Reçep’s Turkish brew, so thick you almost had to consume it with a knife and fork. I was sure it was still stuck somewhere in my veins trying to glug its way through.

  Back in our room, I pottered around for a while, unable to believe I actually had a whole morning to myself with nothing to do except relax. I tidied my things and made the bed then put on my swimsuit, gathered my towel, sunhat, sunscreen and book and headed up on the small forward deck where I’d been told there was a recreation area and a couple of sun loungers.

  I was in luck; I was alone. Simon had said I ought to be as there were no other partners or spouses on board. I was a special case, he said, laughing and adding ‘special nutcase’. I slathered myself in sunscreen and stretched out on the lounger, letting my book lie on my chest. And for a very long time I just lay there, staring up at the sky — perfect blue, with not a cloud in sight — mulling over the events of the last few days.

  The heat of the Mediterranean sun eventually got to me so I shifted my lounger into a patch of shade and picked up my book. Disturbingly, I was starting to feel a bit queasy. Not sick, exactly; I didn’t feel like actually throwing up. But I figured I’d probably give lunch a miss.

  The next thing I knew, Simon was standing over me, saying my name.

  ‘Penny? Penny? Are you coming down for lunch?’

  ‘Cripes. What time is it?’ I hoped my chin wasn’t covered in dribble or that I hadn’t been snoring.

  ‘Lunchtime. It’s not like you to miss lunch, Penny. I thought I’d better come and fetch you.’

  ‘Oh, thanks. I must have dropped off.’

  ‘I’ll say you did. You were completely out to it.’

  ‘Must be the heat. I’ll be right down. Though I can’t say I’m feeling all that hungry.’ I pulled a face.

  ‘Don’t tell me you’re feeling a bit seasick?’

  ‘Not really. Just a bit queasy, that’s all.’

  ‘Do you want me to ask for some of those seasickness tablets?’

  ‘No, it’s not as bad as that. I’ll be fine. I’ll just take it easy on the food though.’

  ‘Can I carry anything?’

  ‘No, I’ll be fine.’

  I followed him down below, detoured to our cabin to make myself presentable and joined him for lunch — calamari salad and Turkish flatbread, just like Reçep made. In fact, I recognised it as his.‘Yes,’ Simon chuckled at my question. ‘The quartermaster bought a job lot from Ruin Bay, under captain’s orders. Apparently it’s his favourite treat. That’s why he visits Ruin Bay whenever he can.’

  I picked up the chunk of bread on my plate and plunged my teeth into it.

  ‘It’s delicious.’

  ‘Make the most of it. The ship’s bread isn’t a patch on this, apparently.’

  I gave the calamari a miss. I wasn’t quite ready for anything more than bread on my first day at sea.

  After lunch, I followed Simon up to the aft deck where we could see the enormous net dragging behind the boat. It was gradually being winched up, revealing a bulging bundle of big silvery-grey shapes, writhing and wriggling around. Some of them, Simon explained, were the tuna they wanted.

  ‘We want to see if any of them have been tagged already. Then we’ll be measuring and weighing them, tagging them again and returning them all to the sea.’

  ‘So what’s the big deal about tuna? I mean, I know they taste good and everything, but why are you doing this?’

  ‘Tuna are one of the ocean’s most magnificent fish,’ he said. ‘But if stocks keep on being depleted at the rate they are now, there won’t be any left in a few years’ time.’

  ‘But how can your project stop that?’

  ‘We can’t, not on our own. But we can help make a good scientific case to stop overfishing. It’s working already. The EU is cutting back the harvest every year and making it illegal to catch juveniles.’ I followed his gaze to the big net which was being emptied onto the deck, awash with sea water and churning with fish of all shapes and sizes. ‘There are expeditions like ours doing this in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans, where most of the tuna are found. It’s quite a big project worldwide.’

  ‘You’ve been doing your bit in the Pacific,’ Harriet threw in. She’d come through the big double door onto the deck and joined us at the rail overlooking the hive of activity below. ‘Did Simon tell you? Eight Pacific Island countries have signed a treaty to stop foreign fishing fleets taking their tuna. The Pacific tuna fishery is worth three billion dollars a year. It’s vital that it’s protected or you’ll lose it.’

  ‘I had no idea. Is this how they’re caught?’ I pointed at the big trawling net, now empty, hanging from its frame above the fish. I could see two teams of researchers working flat out at low stainless steel benches, weighing and measuring and tagging as fast as they could before pushing the tuna towards the end of the bench, where a flap opened at the touch of a button to return them to the sea.

  ‘Sometimes they trawl like this,’ Simon said. ‘Sometimes they use longlines with hooks.’

  ‘At the height of the season there are likely to be well over a billion longline hooks in use around the world,’ Harriet added. ‘That’s way too many.’

  I nodded. It seemed inconceivable.

  ‘There’s a whole lot of stuff going on that shouldn’t be allowed,’ Simon said.

  ‘Some of my friends in Greenpeace have been involved in protests targeting Japanese tuna fishing boats,’ Harriet said. ‘They’ve fished out their own waters so they go and raid the rest of the Pacific.’

  ‘I have a new respect for you, Mr Simon Wakefield,’ I said, taking his arm. ‘I didn’t know your work was so important for future generations.’

  ‘If you want to eat tuna in twenty years time, it is,’ he grinned. ‘We’re not exactly saving the world. But I like to think I’m doing my bit for environmental sustainability.’

  ‘Just don’t you go joining Greenpeace. I don’t think I’m ready to have a greenie activist in the family.’

  ‘If that’s what it takes to be a member of your family, Ms Rushmore,’ he said, squeezing my arm and giving me a highly suggestive grin, ‘then I shall cancel my Greenpeace membership immediately!’

  ‘You don’t belong to Greenpeace!’

  ‘I might.’

  ‘Really?’ He shrugged and grinned disarmingly. ‘I might have known you were a closet activist.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I won’t be chaining myself to a Japanese whaling boat any time soon.’

  ‘But a Japanese tuna boat?’

  ‘Hmmm, now that’s a possibility. Would you mind?’

  I punched his arm. ‘You’re impossible.’ I wasn’t sure if he was just teasing or if he really meant it. I suspected the latter, but reckoned it wouldn’t be a good idea to push it. I was learning a lot about Simon this week.

  Later, back in the cabin, I was still thinking about it. When he returned from the bathroom, I asked him again about Greenpeace.

  ‘It’s bugging you, isn’t it?’ he teased.

  ‘But I want to know. Do you belong to Greenpeace?’

  ‘Yes, I do. I’ve been a member for about ten years. Why do you want to know?’

  ‘I just do, I don’t know why.’

  ‘Doesn’t it go with your PR image?’

  ‘Don’t be silly — it’s nothing to do with PR. In fact, Greenpeace has one of the best PR programmes in the world. They’re always in the news.’

  ‘So what are you worried about then? Don’t you approve of Greenpeace?’

  ‘I like what they believe in, in saving the planet and all
that,’ I said carefully. ‘I’m just not sure I agree with how they go about it.’

  ‘Like …’

  ‘Well, like some of the things they do to make their point are really dangerous — to themselves and to the people they’re protesting against.’

  ‘But surely that’s the sort of risk you have to take to change the world.’

  ‘I don’t think they need to go that far. People get hurt.’

  ‘But in the end, it works. You must see that?’

  ‘I think you can bring about change without having to risk your life, or someone else’s.’

  ‘But that’s the only thing that works. You can go to conferences and talk to politicians until you’re blue in the face, but it doesn’t make any difference. The only tactics that have worked are the risky ones, and because they’re risky, they make headline news. That’s how we can bring about change.’

  ‘So you believe in the sort of dangerous protests they do?’

  ‘Yes, I do. Sadly, if that’s what it takes, then that’s what has to be done.’

  ‘My God, you’ve done it yourself, haven’t you? You’ve been one of those Greenpeace protesters.’

  ‘I couldn’t possibly say, Penny.’

  ‘What? You can’t tell me? Or you don’t want to?’

  ‘I can’t tell you. And besides, you don’t really want to know, do you?’ He gave me one of those winning smiles that usually make my knees knock. It almost worked. But it was enough to make me realise that we were entering dangerous territory. I could pursue my argument and in no time we’d be having an unholy row. And being stuck in a cabin with him for the next eight days on a boat in the middle of the ocean was no place to have a major falling-out.

  ‘I guess not.’ I smiled ruefully. ‘My mother used to say it’s always best to leave a bit of mystery about a man if you want to stay in love with him.’

  ‘So you’re admitting you’re in love with me, then? Even though I’m one of those awful Greenpeace greenies?’

  ‘I didn’t say that!’ I gulped.

  Was I in love with him? I’d landed myself right in it, and I didn’t know the answer. Or at least I wasn’t admitting it.