Tales of Sin & Fury, Part 1 Read Online Free PDF

school friend. The envelope had a Swiss stamp. I was hoping for a letter from someone else, Hayden of course, but he didn’t know where I was. And he didn’t want to write to me. The man behind the counter noticed my face and smiled behind his moustache.
    â€˜â€œYou want more than one? I have not even one letter for one month. When you go back to England, you send me a letter…”
    â€˜I tucked the letter into my bag and went down to the sea to read it. The narrow streets were shady. The white houses had little courtyards edged with old tin cans overflowing with trailing plants and red geraniums. On the way I bought bread from the bakers. It was so hot from the oven, you could hardly eat it. It had a scent of herbs. And I bought cheese, creamy white feta, fresh as a kiss. I could almost kid myself that life tasted good again.’
    Some hope. But as I sit here talking about it, I notice the story’s beginning to tell itself. The sentences are coming easier, picking me up off the floor and carrying me along.
    I tell them: ‘I stepped out from the houses into glaring sun. At the near end of the beach there were people. Bronzed Greek youths hanging around in close-cut bathing trunks. Plump mothers feeding their children at the little café. Flabby middle-aged men drying themselves after a swim. I walked along the beach. Some of the local youths were playing ball and shouting to each other: “Plato!” “Pass over here, Pericles!” It sounded like an ancient Greek discusthrowing contest. I didn’t know how they had the energy to run around in that heat. And it was only the beginning of April. I kept walking until the beach was empty. It opened out into a quiet desert of crumbly sand that stretched in front of me littered with a few bits of driftwood and sea urchins. It scorched my feet. I was alone.
    â€˜I lowered myself onto my towel and turned my face up to the sun. Now I could hear the sea. I felt the sand. It burned my fingers, but when I burrowed into it there was cooler sand below. I stripped off to my bikini. I got out my friend’s letter. She was the only person who knew where I was. She said she’d been back to London but because I wasn’t there she didn’t have anywhere to stay. She had the address of a Brazilian musician, the friend of someone she worked with in Zurich. He wasn’t there either, but a friend of his said she could crash for a few days. It was a squat in Hackney.’
    Debs interrupts me: ‘Here, I thought you was in Greece.’
    â€˜I was, it was my school friend who was in Hackney.’
    â€˜What’s she got to do with it?’ Debs asks.
    â€˜She had a great time with the Brazilian musician’s friend. It’s a good story.’
    â€˜How many stories you telling at a time?’
    â€˜Her story came into my story. Stories overlap.’
    â€˜Later, babe,’ says Debs. ‘I want to hear about the two blokes sleeping on the beach.’
    â€˜OK,’ I resume. ‘So there I was lying on the beach reading my friend’s letter. After I’d read about her and the Brazilian musician’s friend, I lay back and shut my eyes. I could feel the sun through my eyelids lulling my mind into a haze. The hot air wrapped itself round me. It made my skin tingle. I fell asleep.
    â€˜When I woke up my mouth was dry. I sat up and felt the front of my thighs. They were burnt red.
    â€˜â€œForty five minutes you sleep.” It was a lilting voice with a bit of an accent.
    â€˜I turned my head sharply and saw a Greek boy sitting cross-legged in the sand behind me. I stared at him. “What?”
    â€˜â€œYou are from England?” he asked.
    â€˜I nodded.
    â€˜â€œYour Prime Minister the Mr. Edward Heath he knows it, that he must give back to Greece the Marbles that the thief Elgin stole?” His face was serious.
    â€˜I shrugged, “I’m sorry. But I don’t think