They walk into the garden, and it strikes Rike that the space seems more intimate in the softer afternoon light than at any other time: a small walled arbour with orange trees, branches heavy with fruit. A deep mottled shade just broad enough for the two of them. A dry heat hits her shoulders as soon as she steps onto the patio.
‘Do me a favour and pick some more.’ Isa points at the branches. ‘They fruit so much they break their own branches. You wouldn’t think anything would do that, would you?’
Rike agrees, it does seem strange. She walks behind the fig tree, careful where she’s treading to avoid the cats or any cat mess. Except there are none. Not one cat. ‘There’s something about the sun here,’ she says. ‘It just doesn’t feel Mediterranean.’
She reaches into tree, holds the branch as she plucks the fruit, and aims to keep her voice uninflected as she asks her sister if she has seen any of the cats.
Isa holds one hand to her forehead, the other on her hip. ‘You know what? I haven’t. There’s food here as well. Do you think something’s happened?’
They look to each other, disturbed by the possibility.
‘I’ll go look.’
‘No.’ Isa waves her hand. ‘You know what? Don’t. It’s better not to know. If we think about this too much it will become something upsetting.’ And then, decisive, ‘Let’s go out instead.’
Rike tucks three oranges into the cleft of her arm. She can smell the cats, cat urine and rotting lemons, and makes her way cautiously back to the path.
4.3
Within the hour Rike sits with her sister in the quadrangle in front of the Palestinian café. In the square behind them students begin to gather. Isa doesn’t quite understand why Rike has become so agitated. Rike doesn’t quite understand herself. The conversation with Tomas has changed in her mind, and mulling through the bare facts the causal tone of the conversation has become lost to the single idea that Tomas is learning English because he doesn’t know what he wants. The man, in a word, is lost.
‘So he tells you stories about his neighbours? If you ask me it sounds boring.’
Rike shakes her head and sinks forward. That isn’t it. Not quite. ‘He does everything I ask, and that’s the problem. Everything is practised. Everything he says. He keeps a notebook and he writes everything down, word for word.’
Isa shrugs. ‘Surely that’s what you want a student to do?’
‘But everything. He writes out the conversations. The sessions are one long monologue.’
‘And you correct him?’
‘There’s nothing to correct. Tiny, tiny, small things, maybe. But he writes himself a script.’ She shakes her head. ‘I asked him why he’s taking the lessons, and what he wants from them, from me. I told him that everything he needs he could find in an advanced class with other students. But he said that he doesn’t like to go out.’
‘He doesn’t like going out?’ Confused, Isa shakes her head. ‘I don’t follow. He’s uncomfortable going out? Or he doesn’t like speaking English in front of other people?’
‘He said he doesn’t go out — he avoids going out. He gets his food downstairs at the café. Otherwise he stays in, he watches people from his balcony early in the morning, then works on what he wants to say until the lesson.’
‘I don’t get it. What’s he doing in Cyprus?’
Rike shifts uneasily in her seat. ‘He works for the UN.’
‘But where? What does he do?’
Rike shrugs. ‘That’s the other thing. I don’t think this is a holiday exactly. He’s learning a language because he’s taking time off work.’
‘But what’s he doing here? And what’s the problem?’
Rike looks to Isa with an expression meaning take this seriously.
‘So, why is he taking time off work?’
‘Stress.’
‘Stress?’
‘Stress. I think it’s stress.’
‘He’s suffering from stress?’ Isa pulls a face and turns away, actively uninterested.
‘What’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing’s wrong with it. People have trouble with work all the time. But stress? It’s a little unimaginative. Why would you learn a language if you’re stressed? If you’re stressed you take a holiday, you get away from everything.’
‘Maybe he doesn’t have a choice?’
‘It still doesn’t make sense.’
‘Maybe,’ Rike breathes in to summon patience, ‘he doesn’t know how to relax? Maybe that’s why he’s so stressed?’
‘Seriously? Rike, everybody knows how to relax. Men especially.’
Rike gives a small groan of frustration.
Isa looks hard at her sister. ‘I’m just asking questions. Is he comfortable when he’s talking with you?’
‘Why?’
‘I’m just asking. I’m making conversation.’
‘He can be funny. He notices things. He has a good eye. He’s sympathetic. He isn’t like most men, he doesn’t have an instant opinion on everything.’
‘So he isn’t shy?’
‘Not especially, after three lessons he seems very confident. And he talks with his neighbours.’
Isa nods. ‘But he’s been here for a month already so maybe he feels they are familiar.’
‘Are you going to tell me he’s crazy and that I shouldn’t be alone with him?’
‘No. I don’t understand really why he’s here? You said he works for the UN?’
Now Rike has doubts. ‘He said he isn’t sure he wants to do this kind of work now.’
‘Maybe it isn’t stress per se, maybe it’s anxiety, and maybe he wants to work on this. People tend to develop coping mechanisms for anxiety. With stress people shut down. Perhaps this is why he’s having lessons, so that for at least part of the day he’s forced to socialize.’ Isa looks out across the road, caught on a thought.
‘What?’
‘Nothing.’
‘You’re frowning. Why?’
‘It’s nothing.’
‘But nothing about what?’
‘Seriously, nothing. I’m just wondering how you got him to talk so much?’
‘It’s a language lesson. You talk.’
‘But yesterday I asked about the lesson and how he was and you knew nothing. Today you know everything. Why is he talking so much about this? In one day?’
‘I asked him why he was learning English and it all came out.’ Rike is suddenly upset. Frustrated, she leans forward and covers her face. She shakes her head, a little surprised at her reaction. ‘I don’t know why it’s so complicated. I don’t understand why anyone would learn a language they are already fluent in, and I don’t understand why they would stay only in one room. And I feel stupid because I should know what to do.’ Rike wipes her eyes and sits back in her chair. ‘That’s it,’ she says, sweeping her hands out. ‘I will never make a good teacher.’
‘I don’t understand why you’re upset. It sounds like you’re helping him. It’s not going to help if you’re getting upset.’
‘Because it shouldn’t be so difficult. It should be easy. And straight-forward. And simple.’
‘But you’re the best person he could be working with.’ Isa says this as an inarguable fact. ‘I’m serious. He needs to talk with someone he can trust. You did a good thing challenging him today. Now he has to consider the next step. Isn’t this more interesting than a boring language lesson? Anyway.’ Isa pushes forward her glass. ‘You can probably really help him. You know what’s good for anxiety? Sex.’
Isa laughs and Rike laughs with her.
‘I gave him an assignment. He said he would go out if I gave him a reason.’