Arghierenia Kyrimi

This is a true story – except for the made-up bits.

Thalia

12:47. Thirteen minutes to an undeserved lunch break. The sun is nearing its peak, bouncing off the neighbour’s skylight then filtering through my gossamer blinds to land just above my eyelids. The slightest tilt gets the rays in my eyes; I should have gone for the more opaque fabric, all this one offers is privacy, no sun protection whatsoever. Beyond the windowpane, a bird is chirping. My cat is eyeing it, bundled in a threadbare wicker basket, surrounded by splinters, black and white hairs, and shed claw sheaths. I clean up the mess as often as I can, but the more I sweep the more he sheds and the more he sharpens his claws on the wicker. I’m surprised there even is a basket left, I wonder how long before only the metal skeleton remains.

My other cat is meowing outside the kitchen. He must have heard the sharp sound of a knife being lifted from the knife block and chopping up what he hopes is cucumber. They always get cucumber – it is a right, not a privilege, they think. I have no means nor any reason to correct them.

It’s June. Five days until the summer solstice. I thought this might be the year I go to Stonehenge for it, but I have work in the morning and anyway there’s always next year.

The focus clock chimes. My time is up. I must take a break.

It is an undeserved break because I have not been productive. I don’t remember the last time I was productive. I am not quite sure what being productive even is anymore – does producing anything count, or must it be something useful? Which in turn would require defining what is useful. And to whom. And – ideally – why.

The urge to copy-paste from an old document is strong. No matter how many times I’ve been caught in this cycle, I don’t seem to learn. A sudden urge overtakes me to ‘just write,’ create, produce but I hold my wrists in imagined restraints, fingers hovering over my keyboard – is it the muse of inspiration or hyperfocus that’s possessed me? Are they one and the same? I want to call her Thalia – I know the name is already taken by the muse of comedy, but I don’t care, I like it. I watch her watch me, wild brown curls framing her face, a gold circlet gracing her crown, and her body clad in a translucent mauve chiton. She doesn’t speak, only stares. Now she picks up a breathing necklace, its gilded chain wrapped around her right wrist like an elegant, layered cuff and brings it to her thin lips to puff on it as if it were a cigarette. A rollie. ‘Are you alright?’ I ask her, and one side of her mouth quirks up into some sort of wonky, sardonic smile as she blows out invisible smoke.

She is so beautiful. I want to cut myself on her chiselled cheekbones, so wonderfully androgynous she is. She glances towards the sun and its radiance turns her cocoa brown eyes amber. I want to swim in them. ‘What can I do to be you?’ I ask, pleadingly. Her lips press tightly together, though the upper one is naturally curved and so they don’t quite make a line – her mouth is almost duck-like, I realise, but I don’t find this unappealing. I still want to kiss it.

‘Write,’ she commands, tapping her breathing necklace as if it needs ashing.

‘Why do you do that?’ I ask. ‘It’s just a metal tube you’re blowing on.’

Her head tilts, one bushy eyebrow arching. Her posture is perfect, there is no roundness to her shoulders, no unevenness. I bet she carries no pain in her joints either; her muscles must be as strong as steel, and yet as light as air. While I observe her, the seconds tumble, any sense of time slips me. I’ve forgotten I’ve even asked a question she’s left unanswered. I only realise when she further pronounces the arch in her brow and juts her face forward, fingers clicking to alert me.

‘Sorry. Right.’

To appease her, my fingers start tapping keys speedily but what appears on the screen is utter nonsense. Flat, incoherent, flowery words. Meaningless. There is so much noise. The world seems so loud, and it only ever gets louder. I put on swimming ear plugs hoping to dampen it, then realise the noise has already seeped in. I pull a scrap of paper out of a drawer and try to dump it all upon it, manically scribbling with a handwriting akin to a child’s – a boy’s, specifically, a boisterous one’s. Quickly, I run out of space and though I have many more scraps, I can’t be bothered to pull out another one.

Thalia clears her throat over my shoulder; she’s offering me her necklace to take a measured inhale; the chain still wrapped round her wrist. Before I can reach for it, her hand claws my hair and pulls my neck back, our gazes catch and before she forces the aid to my mouth she smiles. This time widely, teeth showing.

After a few good breaths that lower my heartrate, I blow and spit the necklace out, staring into her magnetic gaze. ‘Is this sapphism or narcissism?’ I ask, suddenly fully aware she is wearing my face. She doesn’t answer that. It’s a stupid question.

‘I want to write about the fig tree,’ I tell her, as she settles back on the windowsill, where she first appeared.

‘The fig tree?’

‘In Eretria. It’s all I can think about. The big fat purple figs that stained my little hands with milky sap—’

‘Fig latex.’

‘Fix latex, whatever.’

‘Fig latex.’

‘That’s what I meant. I miswrote, mistyped, misspoke. I want to write about the fig tree. The lower part of its trunk was painted white. And I wonder… the fig tree in The Bell Jar. Plath doesn’t mention its trunk at all, but do you think… do you think she imagined it with a half white trunk, too?’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Thalia says gravely. A warning glimmers in her eyes.

Ignoring her, I start picturing myself as an eight-year-old in an oversized white t-shirt and freshly washed knickers that I picked from the clothesline less than an hour ago. The sun burns but I’m shielded beneath the awning of the veranda and the tiles I stand on are nice and cool. My hair is so much curlier than it will be in a few years, proper ringlets bounce on my forehead when I run – and I do that a lot. I’m in my late grandmother’s back yard in Eretria, a coastal town in Evia, the second largest island of the Aegean Sea. It’s downtime. We’ve changed into our bikinis, my aunt’s washed our knickers in the sink with green soap, we’ve cycled to the beach, swam, sunbathed, cycled back, showered outdoors, put our sun-parched knickers back on, ate lunch my grandmother had prepared with abundant amounts of olive oil, and now we get to watch telly. But I don’t want to watch telly, I want the time to pass fast so I can go and meet my friends. We’ll play pretend and card games and make up stories that we’ll try to convince each other are absolutely true – especially the horror ones.

The soil beneath the fig tree’s canopy is spotted with red, purple, and black. Figs in Greece don’t cost one pound a pop. Figs in Greece stain tiles because you cannot eat them fast enough. They wrinkle and fall off the branches, splattering without warning. You cannot offer them to your neighbours, either. They have their own fig tree to deal with. These days everyone is so worried about their blood sugar spiking, too, they avoid figs altogether, though I never see them show the same concern when they indulge into French-inspired cream-filled pastries from the local bakery and tubs of ice-cream from the abundant gelaterias.  

Thalia cuts me a sidelong glance. I’ve gone off-track. I could edit the above section out or trim it but that’d be a lie. This piece is no edits allowed. I don’t know why. There was a reason, but I’ve forgotten it.

There is so much noise.

Before I approach, I look at my naked feet. I should be wearing flip flops, but I hate that plastic thing between the big and second toes, it never fits right. I’d rather have dirty feet. My aunt is sleeping, anyway. She has no idea what filthy naughtiness I’m up to. I’ll wash my soles well with the hose before she’s up – and maybe form a rainbow or two by pressing my thumb on its mouth beneath direct sunlight – and she’ll be none the wiser. I step on the rotting figs and pick a juicy one from one of the lower branches. It comes off so easy that I feel a pang of pride for saving it, that’s how close it was to joining the mass grave on the ground. I peel back its skin, and my little hands immediately start to itch, the sticky milky sap – fig latex – irritating them.

‘Wait. I have a latex allergy?’

Thalia shrugs.

Whatever.

There aren’t many good figs left on the lower branches, but the weekend’s just round the corner. My father’s pearlescent blue sportscar will pull up in front of the house’s rusty sliding gate, rock music blasting through half-open windows, and I will rush to greet him and ask that he picks some good figs for me from the higher branches that I can’t reach. I’ll point at exactly the ones I want, directing him with mathematical precision, and he will pluck them all out for me. Even the ones he can’t reach himself, he’ll find a way.

‘When we say “no edits allowed” … I’ve left some xx placeholders further up to replace later with words I couldn’t quite think of in the moment but didn’t want to lose my trail of thought searching for them – can I do that?’

‘Depends,’ Thalia says coolly, taking another puff.

‘On what?’

‘On whether you want to be a liar.’

I scowl. ‘Aren’t you here to help me?’

Her face tells me everything I need to know. She doesn’t know why she’s here.

She looks ugly now. I don’t like her. I don’t want to do this anymore. Painting Eretria has made me crave the sea. I want to succumb; float in teal blue waters beneath clear skies, an egg yolk sun, and a ghostly daytime moon.

I want the water to be cold. Freezing.

I want it to prickle my skin, to sting, to numb me

I want to taste the salt and iodine on my lips, then fall asleep, never to—

My head drops to my hands, fingers raking my hair. My nose hovers above my mug, smelling cocoa and oat, and a hint of caramel. ‘Thalia, I don’t want to do this.’

‘Write?’

My throat’s arid, blocked. I can’t speak.

‘Tell me about the fig tree.’ Her voice is prompting, tentative, as if I’m strapped with explosives threatening to blow us both up.

‘I don’t want to talk about the fucking fig tree!’

The fact she doesn’t flinch sucks the anger out of me. I feel absurd. While she waits, my heartrate slows and matches hers. I give up. I return to Eretria.

An immaculate naked fig is staring back at me, yellowish white with some blushing. I have done a fantastic job peeling it and now I’m considering how best to eat it. Do I bite it like an apple? Do I chomp off its peak first? Or do I spread it open? And if I do spread it open, do I do so from the bottom or the top? Or… the side! Like a savage. Like the kind of person that bites into a grided chocolate bar instead of snapping off the number of squares they want. Wait – I love doing that. It’s like a tame act of violence; a cushy rebellion. Perhaps that’s what I’ll do to the fig.

It’s not easy to skin one so well. Usually, it turns into a messy mush in my hands, and I have to eat it however I can. Now I have options. And while I consider the options, I hear another fig plop on the ground behind me. I ignore it. It means nothing. It happens all the time; it doesn’t symbolise anything, it’s just another fig that ripened and heavied and its weakened stem could no longer hold its wrinkly weight.

I lean back and take my eyes off the screen. ‘What age do you want carved on your tombstone?’

Thalia doesn’t look impressed.

‘Sorry. Etched on your urn.’

‘You’re a liar.’

‘Shamelessly.’ My fingers rap my desk. ‘Will you answer me?’

Her eyes press like daggers.

‘It’s a stupid question.’ / ‘It’s a fair question.’

‘How many figs are left?’

The question startles me, her urgency even more; I pause halfway through shutting down my laptop. ‘What?’

‘Still on the branches. How many figs are there still hanging?’

I look at my screen as if the answer’s there, but it isn’t. ‘I’ve no idea,’ I say. ‘One of them. None of them. All of them. I don’t know, it doesn’t matter. They’ll all be rotting on the ground soon enough.’

She goes to oppose me, but I have had enough. ‘Thalia,’ I snap. ‘I cannot bear to watch them fall. The sound they make, the way their guts spatter when they hit the ground… it’s abhorrent. I’d rather set the tree on fire. Be done with it once and for all. I want to go back to the sea.’

I sound angry, fed up, but the tear that glides down my cheek is hot and burning with something other than anger.

There is so much noise.

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. When I open them, Thalia’s gone.

I’m in the outdoor loo in Eretria, washing the fig residue off my hands with lavender soap in a tinted porcelain basin next to an orange wringer washer that’s always fascinated me. I don’t remember how I chose to eat the fruit in the end, but I know I’ve had it because I can taste its sticky sweetness in my mouth. When I walk out, it takes me a while to recognise my surroundings; the sky’s overcast and the garden barren. The fig tree pruned. I glance behind me and confirm what I fear: the loo I’ve just walked out of is gone. The little workshop behind it demolished. The outdoor shower with the orange curtain… it’s all gone. The vined hex mesh… My grandmother’s been dead for ten years. The house sold, after flooding. My father is dead, too. I’m not even really in Eretria – I haven’t been there in over a decade, this is nothing but a worn illusion, a cheap film set left to rot. Something whooshes past me. At first, too fast for my eyes to catch – a flurry of brown and white. A running child.

‘Wait!’

I try to run after her, but my movement appears limited to a sphere no larger than a shower cubicle. I think I lost her and then she whooshes past me again – she is running laps around the house! I get ready for her next one; this time I will catch her. Knees slightly bent and feet staggered for balance, I extend my arms, fingers at the ready but though my skin grazes her, she manages to slip right through my grip like smoke.

‘Wait!’ I shout. ‘Come back. Wait!’

She won’t stop. She won’t listen. She never listened!

‘I’m trying to help you!’

I get ready again. She won’t tire – I know her. Even when she runs on empty, she’s unstoppable. The moment I see her disappear around the corner, I know it’s a matter of seconds before I hear her little feet slamming the paved stone looping her back here.

Each time, I try a new method, and getting somewhere, too. Each time we graze, it lasts slightly longer. Then I manage a pinch, a weak grip. I grab her properly, establishing a firm hold round her upper arm but she’s so fast, she yanks me forward and the boundaries of my invisible prison sever us. I need to catch her and stop her in one go. I need to outsmart her, I need to—

When I finally get hold of her, I yank her to face me, impatient. ‘If you could just—’

My words fizzle. This isn’t a kid in my grip. This is—

‘Thalia?’

‘Who the fuck is Thalia?’

My captive jerks her arm free, annoyed. ‘Why’d you stop me?’ she demands.

Oh no.

Every lap around the house was a trip around the sun. Every time I failed to catch her and warn her was a year lost, a year wasted. I’m staring at my own face now, this is useless, I’m too late.

I shut my eyes, shutting her out. I drop to my knees and start crying. My tears fall heavy and thick; they pool under me and lift me. Buoyed, I hear the whisper of a soft breeze caressing water, while in the distance, gentle waves froth the shore. The odd birdcall – gulls and sparrows – jolts me just enough to keep me awake. I’m where I want to be, I think.

There’s no egg-yolk sun nor daytime moon, but the grey sky means I’m the only one here. Soon, I’ll swim to shore, wrap myself in my towel, which now hangs from a straw council umbrella that’s seen better days on the beach, and dry before heading home. I’ll wonder why I can’t just burrow here, amongst the seashells and cuttlebones, to rest my body, eyes, and mind until the final lap. But it will be a fleeting thought, because then I’ll hear my stomach rumble and since I have no food with me, I’ll have to go find some.

The focus clock chimes. Automatically, I grab my phone and open a notification. Pictures of those who made it to Stonehenge to welcome in the solstice sunrise flood my screen. Good for them, I think.

The focus clock chimes. I must take a break.

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