Spiti Hans

      I am where I ought to be.  Surrounded by windows, I sit in an upstairs room of a house that is not my home.  To my right is the sheltered bay of a Greek island.  The light has gone from the harbour, but further out the sun shines on open water.  I stayed here for a while ten years ago and used to walk to the rocks on the headland and ask myself questions from a Tahitian painting.  Sometimes I met Yiannis, the village drunk on his way to the bar.  His mother had died that year so he was worse than ever.  I didn’t speak enough Greek for a lucid conversation, so except for a passing nod and "hello", we had no way to exchange stories.  He drank to kill his pain.  For reasons of my own I did the same.
        In those days I was friends with an English rose named Melissa who lived with her American lover, a laconic Vietnam veteran writing his book.  He jokingly called her by the nickname Hole and she seemed to go along with it.  One day we met as she walked home with an armload of anemones.  “Sometimes,” she said. “When we let a person into our garden they trample on the flowers."
    There is a temple in a castle on a monolith above the village.  When I look up I marvel at the masons who put it there.  It has seen pillage and plunder from land and sea but its stones, admittedly the worse for wear after a few millennia, have resisted time.  I was not that strong.  The woman I loved was like the sea, undermining my ground with her subtle persistence.  I was at her mercy.                     
    From my tower room I look up the coast to a barren mountain.  Silhouetted on the summit is a monastery.  Unable to surrender to love, I fled to such a mountain in Canada.  For a while my cowboy hermitage gave me the stillness I craved and I believed that my needs were met, but troubling cracks appeared in my solitude and I heard a voice calling, "Desperado," telling me to come down from my fences, open the gate.  
    Before I left my hometown I visited an uncle who was dying.  He asked me if I owned a watch.  I told him no, and I wondered if he might give me his Rolex.
     "Damn," he said.  "I gave my watch to your sister."  He fretted because he had nothing left for me and I assured him it was all right.  I didn't tell him that he had been my hero since I was a child.  I had wanted him to be my father.  He died and I was glad he didn't suffer, but driving back to my mountain retreat I broke down and cried.  We had not been close as adults so I wouldn’t miss him much, but I had short-changed my hero.  I should have been braver.
To my left, the village is coming alive for the evening.  There will be a wedding tonight.  The groom may be like me.  “We are gathered here together in the presence of our friends.”  I was prepared to die for her if necessary.  Chasing our dreams, we bought a house and two cars for the drive.  It took years for the illusion to crumble, although the cracks were there from the start.  Partnership became a battle for independent ground.  Compromise, and one diluted solution after another were finally unpalatable to both parties.  Passion turned to duty, domestic harmony became an invisible prison.  An ax hung in our ceiling.  We found self-serving distractions to ignore problems, I found satisfaction outside the  home, lied about my pleasures, and punished myself by picking fights.  After one too many bloodbaths, I pulled the plug, but I was not prepared for the chill of being alone.
    Up at the ranch, the snow landed on me like soft fallout from an atomic war.  I was the only survivor in a blizzard where no man should go, standing naked in the wind and howling at the storm.  I cried out in pain and frustration because I did not want to be buried alive. “I am here!” I shouted.  
    Curious about my empty future, I visited a tarot reader and drew the skeleton reaper, La Mort. She assured it meant a new start and the promise that there would be life after death. I sold what possessions I had and bought a ticket to the destination where I had first stepped on the wheel.  I sit tonight at a desk in the tower room, its surface cluttered with vain scribblings and think about how an eternal flame could burn down to cold ash.
    The sun has truly set and the hills up the coast fade into violet shades.  The street lights in the village have been switched on, and the church tower is    a tiered wedding cake with its draped strands of bare lightbulbs.  A fiddle begins a lively song and the wail of a clarinet twists around the melody.  A Vespa whines to a halt outside my gate and a man calls my name.  I wave from the terrace and Niko lets himself in through the courtyard door.  On nights when he doesn't work in the restaurant he visits me.  Tonight everyone is at the wedding.
     "Hello! Good evening!" he calls.  "I saw that your lights were on.  I hope you do not mind.  I have brought some wine.  My cousin made it.  He says it is good so I must share it with a friend."
     "Of course," I say.  "I am pleased that you have chosen me.  Come inside and I'll pour us a glass."
     Niko follows me, and though I cannot see him, I see in my mind his swaggering walk, his short legs, and strong body.  His hair is wet, curly, and black; he hasn't bothered to shave for several days.  It is the beginning of winter and a bit of stubble isn't out of order.  He will probably grow a short beard, be teased for looking like a priest, and shave it off.  I know he is too vain to hide his face.  His mouth forms a perpetual sardonic smile.
    "Did you miss me when I was not here?" he teases.  Not waiting for an answer, he feels it necessary to explain himself.  "My mother is in a bad way since my father died.  She has no man, and I am her only son.  Still she asks me every day when I will find a woman.  Because I did not marry a Greek girl, she thinks I am a free man.  Does your mother do the same?"
    "Not quite.  My father is alive so she has him to worry about."
In the kitchen I set two tumblers on the table.  Niko uncorks the bottle and pours us each a glass.
      "Your health." we say, and drink a good measure.  The wine is like muscatel, sweet and strong.
     "I have some things my mother asks me to bring you.," he says.  "These olives that she picked and prepared herself, this cheese from a cousin in Plimiri, and here is some bread they made special today for the wedding."
     I am impressed by the pride with which he presents his gifts.  I am a lucky man to receive them.
     He turns on the radio.  With a cigarette in his mouth he claps his hands and dances a few steps to the bouzouki music.  As he dances he fixes me with his special look of devilish laughter.  We sit at the kitchen table to talk, to pick at the olives and cheese with our fingers, and tear off chunks of village bread to make it an official meal.  When half the wine is finished, he brings out the backgammon board.  During play the room fills with veiled insults, idle threats, and faint praise.  As the dice roll and the pieces clash against each other, the music from the wedding breaks at the shore of the open windows.  There may be a curving dance in progress led by the groom and his bride.  Its sinuous line is near to a closed circle but never quite links up.  Dancers join the ranks at any point and others drop away.  The leader may imperceptibly switch to the end of the line and leave his position to the best man.  The dance curves on as long as the music plays.  Our dice roll and the pieces move.
    Between the two of us there is no need for conversation.  We understand each other; know our mutual histories.  His wife left him as I left mine.  We follow parallel roads. Finding me no challenge because he always wins, Niko tips up the board so all pieces scatter to my tables before he bangs the game closed. He drinks a glass of wine in one swallow, rises unsteadily to his feet, and turns up the radio.  With arms held out to the sides for balance, he moves in syncopated step to the music.  Though scripted, his dance looks like a spontaneous drunken celebration.  I drop down on one knee and clap my hands to the beat.  He knows that I am with him, but he dances for himself.