Chapter Text
Almost four years ago, the olive grove looked entirely different. It was August then; the olives were the size of her nails, the sun had scorched the earth beneath the trees, and the air lacked the fragrance of olive blossoms that fills it now.
Dany watches the olive trees pass by, row after row, with a patchy blanket of grass beneath their crowns. She thinks she's in the right place, vaguely recalling the road she had taken from her hostel to the farmer’s market in the middle of nowhere. She had walked for miles that day, alone, in the heat and the dust. On her way back, she felt an irresistible pull, as if she were a piece of scrap metal and the grove, a magnet.
“Are we trespassing on someone’s property in a foreign country?” Jorah asks, looking concerned as he gets out of the car.
They’ve driven deep into the grove on a bumpy dirt road until the rented convertible groaned in protest.
“No, of course not!” Dany says, dead serious as she closes the passenger door. “I own this entire olive grove and the oil factory past that hill.” She waves a hand at her imaginary domain, a smirk over her lips.
“You think you’re funny, don’t you?” he says, shaking his head as he walks around the car.
“I know I am.” her words drip with smugness.
“You’ll need that sense of humor when they lock you up, smartass.” He says giving her a quick smack on the butt right before wrapping his arms around her waist.
Dany’s jaw slacks, “Did you just—?”
"I...uhm…I believe I did.”
Her mouth curls upwards. “Do it again.” The first time took her by surprise, she’ll be ready for the next one.
Jorah’s hands fall to her ass, he cups it as he says, “You’re not being a smartass now.”
“Is that what it takes?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
She grins up at him, “Then, you’ve opened Pandora’s box, mister.”
“Did I?” his lips tickle hers.
“And you might just live to regret this decision.”
“Doubt it.” he says before taking her mouth.
Her hands fall to his butt too, grabbing it and pulling him closer to her.
Dany had once read the most peculiar tale in Plato’s Symposium. Aristophanes said that humans were once a creature of two faces, four arms and four legs, and that Zeus had split them apart in his jealousy. But after the split, those halves still desired the other, throwing their arms around each other, longing to grow back into one. To her, it had been utter nonsense thought up by men with too much time on their hands.
It seems a lot less silly now.
With a final peck on her lips, Jorah takes her hand in his, “Let’s go look for that magic.”
“Let’s!”
As Helios begins to ride his carriage back to Okeanos, they walk hand in hand through the olive trees.
“These things are ancient.” Jorah says, his brows furrowed. He points to a rather particularly gnarled and twisted one, whose roots have split open a boulder, “That one looks like Father Time itself.”
It is an impressive tree, with a large canopy, its branches low to the ground, as if wanting to kiss the earth, or return fully to it.
“It might just be, olive trees can live for centuries, some even millennia.”
“If only they could tell us what they’ve seen.”
She smiles up at him. That had been one of her first thoughts when she’d seen these trees, really seen them, years ago. “I bet they’d have a lot to tell. Maybe they’ve seen the gods themselves.”
“The god of olive oil?”
Who’s a smartass now? “Goddess, actually,” she corrects him, “Elais, one of the Oenotropae.”
He does a double take. “There’s an olive oil goddess? You are kidding.”
“I’m not. She and her two sisters, Spermo and Oeno had the power to change water into wine, grass into wheat, and berries into olives.”
He cocks an eyebrow. “Spermo? Now I know you’re messing with me.”
A smile spreads over her lips. “Tell me a word and I’ll tell you it’s Greek origin: stars, cosmos, democracy, Europe, theater, music, hero.” She pulls him to her, “You’ve even given me some of them: ecstasy, orgasm. Magic!”
His arms wrap around her. “I have?”
“You know you have.”
“Even magic?”
“You brought me here, so… yes, even that.”
“We haven’t found it yet.”
“We will. We will!” God, she hopes they will. Hopes he feels what she had felt all those years ago.
“Then, we will.” He kisses her again, pressing her to him.
Dany pulls him closer still, thinking that maybe that long-ago-dead Greek man was onto something.
She is the first to break from their kiss. “Come, I want to show you something.”
After about five minutes of walking, the previously flat ground begins to slope upwards, and the dirt beneath their feet turns rocky. As they continue, Dany feels the incline straining her calves. The trees, once standing in orderly rows, now appear scattered in a more natural, wild arrangement. Here and there, rocks as big as Jorah’s fist or his head are gathered into straight, thick lines.
“Be careful with the thistle and the nettle, it’s gonna hurt if you touch it.” She says pointing them out.
Jorah frowns at her.
“What?”
“How sheltered do you think my life has been?”
“Uhm…quite?”
“You saw where I grew up and you met my father—somewhat. Do you think we spent our weekends at some fancy members' club, or tended to the house and the land?”
It’s her turn to frown. “But you grew up with money…he could have hired someone to do that.”
“Yes, I did and yes, he could have. He didn’t. He put me to work.”
“Oh.” She had imagined his childhood a lot more pampered, though she doesn’t think that having to help his father had been that much of an ordeal. “Did you hate it?”
“Not when I was a kid, I was quite happy to spend time with my father then. Hated it quite a bit when I was a teenager, when I had other things on my mind.” He’s pensive for a moment. “I know now what he was trying to do, and looking back, I don’t blame him one bit.” A puff of air leaves his lips, “I guess I am who I am because of him.”
Dany squeezes his hand, “I’m glad, then, because I really like who you are now.”
A smile spreads on his lips, “The question is how do you know about thistle and nettle, you’re the city girl?”
“Hey! Everyone knows about thistle!” She makes a face, “Learned about nettle the hard way. Right here, actually.”
“I’m sorry,” he says, but she can tell that he’s trying to hold back a smile.
“Thistle looks like a thistle, nettle just looks like grass,” she protests.
Jorah lifts her hand to his mouth and kisses it, “Aye, a city girl.”
"Okay, country boy , I can assure you, nettle doesn't look like plain grass to me anymore. That's one mistake I won't be making again. But what I was going to say, before you so rudely interrupted, is that I wonder what these lines of rocks are." She tilts her chin toward them. "Were they terraces? Maybe the remains of someone's house? A village long lost to time?"
Most of them seem to be just plain terraces, there for soil preservation, but some are peculiar, reminiscent of floor plans.
Jorah moves from wall to wall, tracing over the rock contours smoothed over by time and the elements.
She watches as he assesses them, almost seeing the wheels spinning inside his head. Her lips press together as her eyes crinkle.
“Maybe all three, but I’m not an archaeologist.”
“I wanted to be one so badly when I was a girl. Maybe I’ll be one, in another life.”
“Why not this one?”
“That fig already grew black and plopped down at my feet.”
He frowns again.
“The Bell Jar.”
“Ah, yes.”
“I wanted to do so many contrasting, opposing things. I guess I still do, but I can’t, no one can, and isn’t that just…” She trails off, unable to find the right adjective.
Jorah leans on one of the taller walls. “Tell me the names of your figs.”
She leans next to him. Well, two figs: archaeologist times two, because most archaeologists specialize in a time period or at least a culture. Besides my passion for Greece, I've also been fascinated by Ancient Egypt. A third would be a world traveler—I’d go everywhere, see everything there is to see. Fourth, fifth, sixth would be making a life for myself in Greece, Paris, or New York. I’d have a husband and children in one of those figs, two or three—children, not husbands, just one of those. Two girls, and maybe a boy too. I’d live with the pharaohs in another, or see humanity’s future three thousand years from now. Or I’d be right here, back when these walls were newly built, so I would know their true purpose. And there are other figs too, ones I can’t quite make out.
A smile spreads across his lips.
“Tell me about your figs. The attainable ones, the fantasy ones. What do little boys want to be when they grow up, an astronaut, a doctor? Would you have wished to be born long ago, sail the seas as a pirate, or be a king instead? A knight?”
He pushes off the wall and stands before her, his legs between hers, his arms draped around her shoulders.
“A knight, long ago, when I didn’t know any better. But I’m happy to be here, in the present. I don’t want to live in the past; I’ve spent too much time there already.” His hands comb through her hair, smoothing it down her back. “I think we fantasize about it because it is the past, and we often view it through rose-tinted glasses. I’ll take a world with running water and airplanes, with modern safety and medicine. And I think you’re much better suited for the present than the past.”
“How pragmatic of you. And do tell, why wouldn’t I be suited for the past?”
“Maybe I see this tree differently than you do. I think it’s been there since the world began. It started as a sapling, bearing no fruits, then spread its branches as time went on, figs finally growing. Few at first: peasants, tradesmen, servants, royalty. Over time, more blossomed. Men had their pick of it, then handed off to their daughters and wives whatever they saw fit, if anything at all. I don’t think you would have liked that, though I do believe you would have thrown the rotten fig at their feet and climbed up the tree in search of your perfect one.” He runs two fingers across her jaw, a little smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. “What I’m saying is, there are more options now than ever before, so why limit yourself to just one or two? Pick some more!” His fingers fall to the hem of her blue linen blouse. “Make yourself a pouch and fill it with them. Gorge yourself on them. Be all the things you wish to be, do all the things you wish to do, Daenerys.”
She pictures that tree, ancient, its branches like a hundred arms. She sees a version of herself climbing to the top, picking the largest, prettiest fig.
She sees herself now too, the pouch bulging over her belly, the figs staining the linen. She can almost taste the sweetness, feel the juice running down her chin. Maybe her figs are obtainable, not just fantasies.
“You could do it all. Well, not the time travel, obviously.” His eyes crinkle; she loves the sight.
“You still haven’t told me any of your figs, not really.”
He cups her cheek, “I already have the ones I want.” The tip of his fingers tickle her neck; his thumb caresses its way down from cheekbone to jaw, to chin; it settles there, “Almost all.”
“Oh.” She can feel herself breathing now, can see her chest going up and down and up and down just inches from his.
Jorah leans in and kisses her, long and sweet and deep. As he presses her to him, she melts like one of her overripe figs.
This time, he pulls from the kiss first. ‘Tell me again about this magic. What should I be expecting?’
God! He couldn’t have picked a worse time. Her mind is still flooded with hormones from their kiss. She pulls herself together. ‘I don’t know how to describe it.’
Her teeth graze her lip as she reminisces. She had been sitting somewhere in this grove, her back pressed to an olive tree, sheltered from the sun, content to let time pass over her like a river over a rock, when she felt something deeply.
“Otherworldly? she ventures. “Maybe like that moment just before a storm, when the air buzzes with electricity, so much so that you can almost touch it, and everything else quiets down. But I wasn’t afraid, I was… elated, and filled with awe and hope—no, not hope, but certainty that everything was going to be alright and that the world is a marvelous place and—Huh!” She stops.
Back then, she lived in a dorm room with three awful roommates. Her friendship with Doreah was just budding, and she hadn’t yet met Missandei. She had classmates but no real friends. Almost everyone she knew was away for the summer, on vacation or back home with their families. She didn’t have a home to return to. She’d been so alone. And on top of everything, the one family member she had informed her that he’d be in town for a week. Instead of waiting for Viserys and the misery he’d bring, she had gathered all her savings and his money, and booked herself the cheapest trip she could find, knowing full well she’d face his wrath later.
It had been such an utterly miserable time.
Tears well up in her eyes. “Maybe there’s no magic here. Maybe here I felt, for the very first time, that everything would be alright. That I could be happy, that whatever life throws at me, I would be alright in the end.” Her forehead presses to his chest. “I think I’ve been kidding myself all along. This place isn’t special. I could have realized it anywhere, even in a parking lot back home.”
Jorah lifts her chin and wipes away her tears. “But it wasn’t. It was here. Out of all the places it could have happened, it happened here. Maybe that Goddess of magic lifted the veil from your eyes and let you see yourself for who you are.”
“And who’s that, a cry-baby?” More tears gather.
His voice is soft, yet confident. “No, a strong woman who doesn’t let life take her down. Someone who can walk through fire and emerge unscathed at the other end.”
“I wouldn’t go that far. I have my share of burns.”
“We all do, Daenerys. What matters is how we carry them, and you carry them well.”
“Do I?”
“I think you do.”
“Even after…” She trails off, unable to bring herself to utter her brother’s name and what had happened Sunday.
“Yes.” She sees in his eyes that she didn’t have to say more.
Jorah presses his lips to her hairline, then wraps her in his arms. They’ve become one of her favorite places.
“Now I feel slightly embarrassed. You brought me over here for nothing.”
“Better here than some damn parking lot, and don’t say that, ‘cause I’ve had the time of my life—”
She cuts him off, the words bursting out of her mouth as if prompted by some software bug in her brain, “And I owe it all to you,” she doesn’t say them, she sings them, a smile spreading over her lips.
He chuckles as he pulls out of the embrace and looks at her, “I’m surprised you know that song.”
“Pff, Dirty Dancing is a classic!”
“A classic ? God! I was nine when that came out.”
It makes no difference to her that she wasn’t even around back then. Dany’s hips sway like the characters’ did in the movie. “Shall we dirty dance ?” She quirks her brows, the smile turning cheeky.
“There will be absolutely no dirty dancing out here, in a foreign country, on someone else’s property. We’re not adding indecent exposure to that transpassing charge!”
Dany snorts a laugh, then acquiesces, “Fine!”
Looking up into his eyes, her hips still swaying against his, she finds it strange how her mood changed so easily; how he changed it. But then again, he’s been quite good at that, usually for the better, only once for the worst. All in all, not a bad track record.
Jorah's arm wraps around her back and pulls her to him; his hips begin to move too. There’s no music, but they slow dance in place, together.
Yeah, not a bad track record at all , she thinks before planting her lips over his.
*
“Good morning.” Jorah says in her ear, then places a kiss on her neck.
Dany groans and opens one eye, she closes it with a grimace just a blink later, the morning sun is too bright, and she’s too tired for the day to start. “What time is it?”
“Nine thirty.”
She covers her head with a pillow, trying to keep the sun away. “It’s too early, we’re on vacation. Come back in an hour,” she mumbles.
“Come on, I have a surprise for you.”
That is intriguing, but the possibility of going back to sleep is much sweeter. “If you wanted me to get up early, then you shouldn’t have kept me up half the night.” The pillow muffles her voice.
His hand digs into her left calf as he moves it up her leg; a moan leaves her mouth.
“Interesting choice of words coming from the woman that straddled and rode me well past 1AM, plus I've been awake since six this morning.”
“Six?” She lifts the pillow off her head and opens an eye again. Jorah’s standing at the side of the bed, fully dressed. “Have you been out?”
His hand moves under the sheet, up her thigh, kneading the flesh. “I have.”
She can feel his fingers digging into the meat of her ass and another moan leaves her lips. “Where?”
“It’s a surprise.” His hand goes down her right leg. “Come on, get up!”
She lets out a groan for the meandering has stopped.
Dany arches her ass, “What if, instead of getting up, you resume that massage, starting with my butt this time.”
He peels the sheet off her body, then his hands grab ahold of her thighs, fingers digging in again. A moan grows in her throat—it turns into a squeals as he pulls her down towards the foot of the bed and bites down on an asscheek.
“Later.”
She feels his lips over the bite, then on the small of her back, spine, rib cage, right shoulder blade, her neck.
“Let’s go, honey.”
That does the trick, she’s fully awake now; all it took was one word.
*
Daenerys looks at the boat, then at Jorah. She tries her absolute best to keep the smile from her voice as she says, “So you really are into water sports, huh?”
“Yes, I lived half my life on an island, they’re second nature to me.”
Her lips pull themselves into a wicked grin, betraying her. She can see the exact moment he catches her drift.
“You’re hilarious, Daenerys,” his tone is as flat as a board.
A snort bursts out her mouth.
“Glad one of us is amused.”
“You have no idea,” she says, chuckling.
“Smartass!”
“Oh, smartass? Does this mean I should be expecting your hand to make its way towards my ass?”
“No. There are people around.”
She turns her head towards them, she can see four people on the dock, quite a ways away, tending to their boats.
An eyebrow quirks upwards. “Is the ass smacking an in-private-only activity?”
“Of course.”
This pleases her tremendously, though they could probably get away with it here too, those people seem to be minding their own business, paying no attention to them. A different thought births in her mind. “That means that I can be an absolute menace in public.” She already has about eleven ways in which to playfully torment him running through her mind. Her lips curl upwards, Let the games begin!
“I have a good memory, I can keep track, add them up for later, in private.” He smirks.
“Oooh, threatening me with a good time.” She lifts her chin up at him and bats her eyelashes, “I am quivering in my boots, sir.”
His playful tone turns dead-serious. “I would never actually threaten you, Daenerys.”
A sigh leaves her mouth, she was quite enjoying the banter up until now.
“Tell me you know this is just a silly game.” He takes her hand in his, “I… care for you, Daenerys. I would never cause you any harm.”
Warmth bursts like a water balloon inside her. He cares for me. It does not come as a surprise, or a shock, it feels as natural a thing as breath. She wonders if maybe, this time around, Hecate took another veil off her eyes, the one that made her question his affections at every turn. And maybe she loosened his tongue too. Either way, it feels so damn good to hear him say it.
Her eyes fall to her hand in his. “Do you remember our first date? When you took me down that dark, ominous staircase?”
“Yes…”
“I was a little scared then—”
“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to—”
“Let me finish. You were a stranger, but as soon as I put my hand in yours, I felt safe… with you . It was so odd, and it hasn’t stopped.” She squeezes his hand, then lifts her eyes to his, “I’ve always felt safe with you, that’s why I don’t mind this game, not at all, or the one in which you tied me up, I know I’m safe.”
He swallows. “Good, because you are. Always have been. Always will be!”
She smiles up at him, “Then I hope your memory and mental arithmetics are as good as you said, because as I said, you have opened Pandora’s box!”
He pulls her to him. “We could just end the game now.”
“Not a chance, buddy!”
“Buddy?”
“Would you prefer something else?”
“So many, many other things.”
“Such as?”
He doesn’t answer, he busies his mouth with hers. She would have preferred hearing those many things , but she’s gotten one confession out of him. It will do, for now.
Once their lips part, Jorah turns her around in his arms, until she’s facing the boat. It’s a bright white shiny thing that looks like it came out of a factory a blink ago. It’s not a huge boat, but not that small either, maybe around 30 feet long, and it's not wind powered, for she sees no sails. That's about all she knows about boats, and she's not in a hurry to learn more either, though something tells her she might.
“There are thousands of islands in Greece, a little over two hundred inhabited. I thought we could see a couple.”
“You did some research.”
“I have. And I hope you don’t get seasick, but I got you a patch, a band, medicine and ginger ale, just in case.”
Another flash of warmth fills her belly. “I also hope I don’t, but I wouldn’t know, this would be my first time on a boat.”
“Well, it’s going to be a short trip, if you do.”
She tries to peek inside it. “Who’s gonna drive this thing?”
“I will.”
“You?” She side-eyes him with a frown.
An exasperated sounding huff leaves his mouth, “Yes. Again, islander!”
Islander with means , she thinks as Jorah lets her out of his arms and picks up their luggage off the dock.
“After you,” he says.
“Is that a…waterproof mattress ?” It’s the first thing that catches her eyes as she steps onto the boat, and she knows ‘mattress’ is wrong, but it’s the closest description she can come up with.
“That's a sun deck pad, at the stern. There’s some seating at the bow, too.”
“I’ve heard some of those words before.”
“Back and front of the boat. And starboard side is right, and port side is left.”
“Aye, aye, captain.”
She purposely tarries by the pad unsure what to do with herself. Jorah takes the lead and makes his way to the cockpit, then descends a short flight of stairs.
“There’s another level?!” She follows, feeling like a kid on Christmas morning.
On one side of the cabin, there’s a bathroom as small as the ones on airplanes, on the other a shower, and a few feet up ahead a bed large enough for two. Her eyes widen, “Is this a yacht? Am I on a yacht?”
“Technically it’s not large enough to be a yacht.”
“OHMYGOD, I am on a baby yacht!” She squeals. “This is amazing!”
Jorah puts the luggage down by the foot of the bed. “I take it you like it?”
“I love it!” She says, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Love it!”
His lips pull into a smile, “Good, because you’re going to be my first mate.”
She makes a point to look around. “I am your only mate.”
“Yes, you are.”
*
“Could you please put on a life jacket before you jump in?”
“Nope,” Dany says, cannonballing into the Aegean.
Without hesitation, Jorah dives in after her.
“Stop being such a worrywart!” she says, surfacing and treading water.
“Unlikely,” he replies, swimming toward her. "And why are you cannonballing now when you wouldn’t go past the buoy on the beach?”
She wraps her arms around his neck. “Well, for one, I have you. Two, I’m about ten feet from the boat, and there’s not much of a current to fight against.” She places her feet on his thighs and uses him as leverage to push herself out of his arms, floating on her back. "Much easier here.”
“Much deeper too.”
“I’ll wear a life jacket if you decide to go for a proper swim. How’s that?” she says, squinting up at him.
“Since I don’t think I’ll get anything better out of you, deal.”
A smirk spreads across her lips. “You know me so well.”
Jorah tickles her right foot, making her shriek. As soon as she loses her balance, his arms wrap around her waist, keeping her afloat.
“Rude!”
“So rude.”
“Come here!” she says, beckoning his lips to hers.
“Yes, ma’am.”
They play together for a while, splashing water at each other, laughing and squealing, exchanging a hundred embraces and salty kisses, with only Helios as their witness.
“Tired yet?” He asks, as she drapes herself around him.
“And pruny, and hungry.”
“Let’s fix that.”
On the boat, Dany’s eyes light up as she discovers the fully stocked mini fridge she had missed in her rush to get to the cabin. She’d missed the sink too, and the grill and the table that folds out of a secret compartment. A smile blooms over her lips as she realizes that they could live on this boat for weeks at a time, island hopping through the Aegean then the Mediterranean. They could go up to Croatia, then down the boot of Italy, Monaco, France, Spain, though the strait of Gibraltar, Portugal, then Spain and France again, and finally, back home.
Or they could venture south from here, to Crete and then Alexandria. They could rent a car and drive to Cairo, to Luxor. But that’s just a dream. There’s no time for any of that; she has to be back on Monday and beg her professors to let her take her exams. She can’t even fake an illness—they’ll take one look at her tan and call her out on it. That’s a thought for later, though. Right now, food is more important.
Lunch is flatbread and tzatziki and olives and cold keftedes and halloumi. And it's smiles, and jokes and plans for the day.
“I saw this in a gift shop window this morning,” Jorah says, presenting her with a small paper bag.
“What is it?” she asks out of habit, finding the answer in less than ten seconds. '24 Hours in Ancient Athens: A Day in the Life of People Who Lived There.'
“That’s the closest thing to time travel I can offer you, and I know it’s not that olive grove near Afitos, but…” He sounds almost apologetic.
She looks at the book. It’s just a book, worth 15 euros according to the sticker, but to her, it’s worth so much more. She had mentioned an outlandish desire in passing, never expecting anything to come of it, yet here it is—a book that could take her back in time in a realistic way.
She lifts her eyes to his. There he is, the man who gifted it, looking straight back into her soul. She could drown in his blues so much easier than in the Aegean.
“That’s very thoughtful, thank you.” A knot grows in her throat.
He smiles. “There’s an Egyptian version too. Won’t find that one in a Greek gift shop, but I’ve ordered it. It should be at my place by the time we’re back.”
Dany presses her lips together until they hurt, just so she wouldn’t let out the three words knocking at the back of her teeth.
After lunch, he gives her the helm and lets her steer the boat, which she finds a lot of fun. He also shows her the GPS maps and the depth gauge, which isn’t as exciting, but she picks it up quickly and guides them to shallower waters near the mainland, where they stop again to snorkel together.
Below the surface, they watch fish swim by in schools, or on their own, searching for food, or maybe a mate, unimpressed by the spying humans. When she tires, she puts on a life jacket and floats on her belly, watching the sea life from above, while he dives into the depths, never straying too far or staying gone for long.
Once the island of Skiathos comes into view, it doesn’t seem that appealing, so they decide to go east towards Skopelos.
Helios has traded places with Selene by the time they've showered and changed—she in a white summer dress, he in a forest green henley and khaki pants—ready to find a port or even a dock.
“There!” Dany says, spotting some lights in the distance and hearing the sound of music trickling into her ears, “Let's go there!”
“As long as there’s a dock, otherwise we’ll have to swim to shore.”
“I’ll swim to shore.”
“You will absolutely not be swimming to shore.”
Dany rolls her eyes.
As it turns out, there is a dock, albeit a small one. Their boat stands out like a sore thumb among the three anchored fishing vessels. For the first time since they set off, Dany has a first mate duty: tying the boat to the dock with a knot called a cleat hitch. It barely looks like a knot to her, but she double, then triple checks it, because if it unravels, it's ‘bye bye boat,’ and she will be damned if that’s on her.
“Great job, first mate,” he says, extending his hand to her, a smile spreading across his lips.
“Thanks, Captain!” She takes his hand in hers, and together they walk the length of the dock.
This isn’t the Greece of postcards and Instagram; it’s the working man’s Greece. The taverna is a little shabby, the whitewash peeling off its walls in places, weathered by time in others. But the six tables outside are covered in crisp white linen, the food at the four occupied tables smells delicious, and the music is old and just right.
“I hope you have cash on you,” Dany says, looking at the single-page, laminated menu. “I doubt they’ll take cards here.”
“I always do.” Jorah turns the Greek menu over, then back again. “Well… looks like you’re ordering.”
“Oh!” She leans over and quirks her brows. “You know, you could always learn the language.”
“I’m not going to learn it in time to order.”
“Obviously,” she scoffs, “but you could, in time. I could teach you.”
“I’m sure you’d be an amazing teacher, but I am not learning another alphabet. I tried, and it is not sticking.” He points to the letters on her menu. “This looks like a ‘P’; my brain wants to say it’s a ‘P’, but it’s a darn ‘R’. And this, how is this a ‘g’ when it looks like a ‘y’? And this ‘w’ is an ‘o’?! I prefer the other letters, the ones that look nothing like the English ones; I don’t have to fight my brain on them.”
“You’ve tried?”
“I looked up the alphabet before the trip.”
“This trip?”
His eyes go to the menu she knows he can’t read. “Yes.”
A little smile pulls at the corners of her mouth. Why hadn’t he looked it up before now? It’s far from his first time in this country. “You know that saying—verse, whatever, ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega, I am the beginning and the end’? Well, I think it loses a bit of its grandeur once you know that Omega just means big ‘O’, as opposed to Omicron which is little ‘o’.”
“Really?”
“Yup! I am the Alpha and the big O.”
He chuckles, shaking his head; his eyes crinkle again, and she lets out a little sigh.
“What does alpha mean?”
“Nothing now, but about three thousand years ago, probably ox.”
“Ox?”
“Good evening,” the waiter says as if not liking the taste of English in his mouth. “Can take order?” He looks about sixty and eight months pregnant.
“Good evening. Yes, please!” Dany responds in Greek.
“Αχ ελληνικά!” he exclaims, a wide smile spreading across his face.
“Are you Greek?” “You don’t look Greek.” “How did you learn it?” “Why did you learn it?” he asks in rapid succession as he jots down their order.
Dany answers each question with the same enthusiasm, happy to practice the language she loves.
“Very good order, and I’ll add two ouzos, on the house, for the beautiful lady and her date,” he says before departing.
The Greek word he used can mean date, friend, companion, or boyfriend. She turns to Jorah, wondering once again what they are to each other. He feels like all of them: her date for tonight, a caring friend with whom she’s had a lot of fun and soul bearing conversations, her companion throughout this trip, and a boyfriend she desires again and again who never leaves her wanting. Instead of dwelling on it, she pushes the thought to the back of her mind. “I think the waiter is trying to get us drunk.”
Jorah looks around at the other tables. “Seems to be doing the same to all his patrons.”
Empty shot glasses and half-drunk beers clutter the tables where fifteen men and women speak loudly amongst themselves.
“Then it would be rude not to join them, don’t you think?”
“I’m driving.”
“A boat! In the vastness of the Aegean, and we’re anchored.”
“One of us should be somewhat sober.”
Her hand reaches for her pragmatic date, “Fine, you can be the somewhat sober, I will be the tipsy one.”
“That works,” he squeezes her hand. “What are we having?”
“Ouzo!”
He chuckles, “To eat.”
“Oh, seafood. They have chtapodi sti schara! I bet it’s gonna be fresh and amazing.”
“And that is?”
“A surprise.”
Two shots of ouzo in, Dany’s eyes roll back in bliss as she chews on a tentacle so tender it almost melts in her mouth. This might be the best grilled octopus she’s had in all of Greece. Then again, she’s only had it a few times, since it’s much pricier than gyros or souvlaki; but that is no longer a concern.
“You’re adorable,” Jorah says, watching her shove another tentacle into her mouth, the tip curling out the corner of her lips.
Her cheeks flush as she chews and swallows. “How come?”
“You just are, absolutely adorable.”
She leans in. “Just adorable?”
“Gorgeous too. Even the sun couldn’t help himself from kissing your skin,” he says, his eyes tracing the deepening bronze from her shoulders to her arms and the bit of her legs exposed by her dress.
“Maybe Helios thought I was a nymph. He’s got quite the record with them. And by the looks of it, he’s been kissing yours too.” His eyes look so much bluer surrounded by his golden tan.
He laughs. “And of course, a smartass.”
She grins at him. “Pandora’s box, mister.”
“Determined too, and brilliant, and—”
“Metaxa for the gentleman, rakomelo for the lady,” Panos, the waiter, announces, setting a glass of brandy in front of Jorah and a warm drink of raki and honey in front of Dany. “To get the party going,” he adds, nodding toward the other diners who have started dancing to the music.
A smile spreads across her lips. Back home, people don’t usually start dancing when drunk; they might start fighting, but not dancing. She much prefers this. She’d seen it happen several times during her last visit and had even joined in, dancing until she was utterly exhausted.
“I think I’ll need the whole bottle to get this one dancing,” she says tilting her head at Jorah, “or maybe two.”
“I’ll bring the bottle of Metaxa,” Panos says and leaves before Dany can stop him.
“Yup, our waiter is definitely trying to get us drunk,” she says in English.
A puzzled look crosses Jorah's features.
“Nothing nefarious, he wants us to join the dance.”
He looks at the diners holding hands, singing and dancing in a tightening and widening circle. “That’s not happening.”
“I figured. That would be too much fun for you,” she teases.
“I don’t dance.”
“You kinda did yesterday.”
“I might slow dance once in a blue moon.”
“The sun was still up.”
He lets out a sigh.
Dany downs her drink in one go, feeling the burn all the way to her belly. As Panos returns with the bottle of Metaxa, she lifts her empty glass to him, and he fills it.
Soon enough, they’re the only ones seated, everyone else having joined in the dance. Dany moves her feet under the table in time with the music, itching to join them.
“Go ahead,” Jorah says, “I’ll stay here and watch.”
“Come with me!”
He shakes his head.
Dany pouts, but just for a moment, then pours herself another shot of brandy, kicks it back and bolts off her chair filled with liquid courage.
She’s greeted as a friend, not as some stranger, the circle breaking for a second as she joins hands with two men. It takes her half a minute to find the steps: three left, right kick, three right, left kick, three steps forward, three steps back, rinse and repeat. From time to time, people break from the circle to dance together in the middle of it—men with women, women with women, men with men—it doesn’t matter. Everyone is dancing and singing and shouting out their joy. The world is spinning and she’s fucking happy.
As the circle goes round and round she catches sight of her date, and the way his right foot taps with the rhythm, how he’s clapping to it, and above all how he’s drinking in the sight.
“Join us!” She yells over the music as the circle widens towards him.
“No,” he says with a smile as the circle tightens again, moving away from him.
Then, as the song transitions to a familiar tune she recognizes by the beat of the drums, the clapping, and the exuberant shouts, Dany breaks from the circle and heads back to their table.
“Come on!” She pleads, grabbing his hand.
He shakes his head, “Daenerys, no!”
She tightens her grip, “Though luck, 'coz you’re dancing with me!” With a firm tug, she pulls him to his feet.
‘Fuck!’ Jorah groans, then swings around, grabs his almost full glass of brandy and throws it back. He barely has time to put it back on the table before she pulls him again, this time towards the circle.
They join in just as the singer says: ‘Dance my heart, feel my joy.’ Two men break the circle, letting them in, Dany grabs hands with one and Jorah with the other. She bites down on a smile, wondering if this is the first time he’s held hands with a strange man.
“I don’t know what I’m doing.” He says as his right foot stumbles over his left, trying to keep up with the moves.
“Look at my feet and follow my lead.”
With a small grunt he does just that. At first he’s stiff as a board and two steps behind, completely off tempo, his brows furrowed, eyes intently on her feet. Then he loosens up and he’s just a step behind. Dany beams once he falls into her rhythm. She knew he would, he always does.
His eyes lift to hers. “You got it! You’re doing great!” She says over the music.
“I still have no idea what I’m doing.”
“Neither do I!” She admits. It’s just a game of ‘pick a Greek and copy their moves until you catch on,’ but God, is it fun. “Χόρεψε Καρδία Μου,” she sings as she squeezes his hand. Dance, my heart.
They continue dancing together for two more songs, and halfway through, she senses that Jorah might actually be enjoying himself. He has also improved, picking up the changing dances faster than before, even joining in the whistling and the occasional 'Opa!' thrown by the Greeks. Her heart feels so full it might just burst.
Once a song she doesn't care for starts playing through the speakers, Dany bids her breathy goodbyes to her dance partners and exits the circle, pulling Jorah by the hand.
“Was that so bad?” she asks right before gulping down an entire glass of water.
“No.”
“Will you do it again?”
“Depends on how drunk you can get me beforehand.”
A snort bursts out her lips.
“Ready to head back?” She asks, noticing the bill inside a glass, and wondering where her lovely waiter had went to for she's like to say her goodbyes.
“Yes.”
“I’m taking the bottle,” she says and Jorah drops another large banknote on the table.
She should leave it, she’s dangerously close to drunk, but goddamn, what a night to be drunk on life, on alcohol on that one syllable four letter word.
Together, they stroll along the length of the dock, her arm wrapped around his waist, her head resting on his shoulder, feeling utterly alive and content.
Jorah steps onto the boat first, then extends a much-needed hand to her, for the world hasn't stopped spinning yet. But it's not the disorienting kind; it's the gentle sway of a dance, just enough to whirl her thoughts and make her a bit unsteady.
Once aboard, she doesn't release his hand, instead she guides him to the white couch-like seat at the bow and plops herself down on it. He follows suit, taking the bottle from her hand and sipping a drink.
Only a few stars twinkle up in the night sky, for the moon is out, full and golden, dripping over the rippling waves, and the air is salty from the sea and fragrant with the scent of lilac waffling from the shore. Dany closes her eyes and inhales deeply, wanting this very moment to stay with her forever.
“Beautiful,” Jorah murmurs.
“Yeah,” she agrees, opening her eyes and meeting his.
His hand is goose down over her cheek “I think I see it now," he breathes, searching her eyes as if he could find the answers to all of his questions in them, "The magic that lingers here. I see it now.” His lips quiver as they pull themselves into a small smile.
Dany's heart is no longer a thing of flesh and blood, but a star collapsing in on itself. "I love you," the words burst from the depths of her soul and out her mouth like a supernova.
The smile vanishes from Jorah's lips and his throat bob.
Suddenly she wishes she were anywhere but here, for she feels as if her skin has been flayed, and she's left a red, shaking, throbbing thing longing for a balm.
His mouth opens, nothing comes.
Say something. Oh, God, say something!