Apologies of a Teenager in Cyprus

Larry the starfish guy

There was a place that was just for us. That’s important. That place, that special place. It doesn’t matter who you are, when you’re a teenager you need one. Five days a week you go to school. You pretend to care about your future, or not. You listen in class, or not. You do your homework or you play video games. You conform or you rebel. For five days a week. But Friday night you are no longer a student. If only for the next 48 hours you are yourself. You are on your time. You make your own labels. You can be whatever you want to be until Monday morning when you are once again an upstanding student or a trouble maker. And you have your place where you can be yourself. The little slip road in Larnaca that brought together Savino, Stone Age, Lounge and Indigo was ours. Our place.

 It was a quiet weekend and there wasn’t much to do. Rachel stayed at mine, keeping me company for yet another night while my grandparents began adjusting to life in their new apartment. Hungry and uninspired by what could be delivered to us we headed out. After dinner we walked to Indigo for a few drinks. We weren’t sure who we’d bump into there but someone was always around. The beer began to flow and it wasn’t long before the word shots had come up. No one drinks shots unless they want to get completely and utterly wasted. You can’t enjoy a beverage that barely spends any time in your mouth. You don’t want to savour the flavour. You probably don’t like the flavour but its Friday night and you want the week to blur away. Your inhibitions start to fade and you can’t help but dance. People’s voices become muffled and all you can think about is your next drink. You have to keep mixing them or the buzz will wear off. You don’t want anything to wake you from your drunken haze, your little world. In your place.

The lights begin to swirl and your movements become more fluid. Everything feels weightless.

And then it hits you. You’ve drunk too much and you’re either going to be sick or fall asleep. Either way you’re going to fuck up everyone’s night. It’s never good when someone throws up. People suddenly don’t want to drink anymore. Their caring instinct takes over and they sober up immediately. Even if they’re still drunk they manage to act like they’re not. They feel the need to get this poor person some water. Maybe a hug. Everyone’s seen that sad image when girls hold each other’s hair off their face and rub their back to ease the wrenching. That’s always comforting and they know it. They want to be there for their friend in need. It’s a sure fire way to end someone’s night, to arouse their need to tend to you. And if you fall asleep you are also allocated a baby sitter to keep an eye on you.

So, I did the only thing I could. I excused myself and asked Rachel if she wanted to go for a walk. This is normally part of an unwritten code that depending on what is going on can mean several things. It can mean, “Someone here is irritating me and I want to bitch to you about it.” It can also mean, “I’m really into this guy and I need to get some mints.” Or it can mean, “I’m bored and need to get out of the smoke and noise.” Or in this case, “I’m drunk and desperately need some fresh air.” You know who your best friend is when they leave a good time to see to it that you’re not on your own.

We took a walk around to another one of our places. The far side of the fort, where the waves lapped against the side of the aged building. There were plenty of places to sit and it had become of somewhere of multiple uses. Young lovers used it as a nook to spend time losing their virginity and start rumours at school. Young drinkers such as myself took advantage of this concealed wall to drink cheap off licence booze and lark about. Tourists sat sunburnt and reflective of their time in Cyprus with ice cream or fishing rods. That night our worlds would collide in this one spot. Stumbling, still dizzy we walked around to the back of the fort. Barely able to lift my head up I stared bemused at the bright lights protruding from the floor. A new feature at the time, the lights would no longer work in a few months. Allegedly someone drunkenly cracked one of the lights in and then decided to pee into it. I thought that was unnecessary. I mean, the sea was right there. Maybe it was a physics experiment. I don’t know.

After I had gotten my all out of staring at the light I turned my attention over to Rachel who had been talking with some late night fishermen. They sounded American. I smiled and pretended I was listening. My mind wondered around as chit chat carried on in the back ground until I spotted something that could hold my attention. Lying on the edge of the path way before the foot or so drop into the sea was a little gray star. Without hesitation I picked it up. It was hard and cold. As I examined it with eager curiosity I could feel wet sand between my fingers. “That’s a starfish you know?” The American explained with a chuckle. The ‘be silent and they won’t notice you’re hammered’ approach had not worked. But they were nice enough to explain that it appeared lifeless until it was returned to the water where it would resurrect itself. “Can I keep it?” I asked not quite realising just how crazy I sounded. They laughed. I don’t even know if that was an answer but I walked away happy with my prize. I was going to carry him in my pocket until I got home and then I’d set up a tank for my new friend.

Rachel and I walked back to Indigo to find the others but it was getting late and they had gone home. We decided, having not had enough, to sit outside and have one last drink. I took our new company out of my pocket. I already knew I’d never forget that night. I had the widest grin on my face. Already in my head I was imagining my pet starfish and the fantastic tale of how he came into my life on that routine Friday night.

“I’m going to call him Larry.”

“Why Larry?”

“It suits him, don’t you think?” I said, beaming with pride.

 Still fascinated by him, I began twirling him around in my hands. I smoothed away most of the damp sand and ran my fingers along the little grooves on his body. I couldn’t wait until I woke up the next morning to see him with sober eyes. The first time I had ever seen a real starfish and I was going to bring him back to life.

Just as my thoughts had gotten ahead of me, I started to feel something cold creeping across my hands. Instinct took over and in a fit of panic I heard a crunch. You do often react when you’re drunk. But more often than not that reaction tends to be the wrong one. Refocusing my unsure eyes I became certain. My new friend had died in my hands. I had broken off one of his legs. I was overcome with shock at what I had done. I was holding him one minute, sure to make him a home where he could be comfortable and live under the sea once more. The next he had been maimed by my own hand. As dreams of our happy future together faded I was overcome with grief. I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes. Stinging, alcohol induced tears began to fall down my cheeks and onto Larry, still in my hands, now more lifeless than ever. To this day I don’t know whether it was my tears or something that oozed out of Larry but I could feel it dripping down my hand. Disgusted and wondering why the hell I was holding a dead starfish, I snapped out of my drunken stupor. My eyes dried up and all thoughts of Larry vacated my mind. I dropped him into the nearest ash tray and Rachel followed my lead in walking away as quickly as possible. On the way home a strange thought came to mind, one that I would look back on for years to come. “Rachel, I wonder what the waitress who found Larry must be thinking?”

Graduation

My apologies that this is not a real entry. Tomorrow morning I finally get my Bachelors degree after all this time. I have to wake up early and something doesn't feel right. I'm not as excited as I should be just nervous and wondering why I agreed to put myself through it.
Any ways - sneak peak at tomorrows story:
Bored with nothing to do, two young girls venture out for a night on the town only to have it end in murder...

Apologies of a Teenager in Cyprus

These short stories are an apology to my liver and any one else who may have been damaged by the events that took place on the Island of Cyprus during the early years of this millennium, including my parents, grandparents, future offspring, starfish, friends and another vital organs or body parts.
Please note that whilst partially auto-biographical these stories are subject to artistic licence and any characters that bare description to real-life people are simply an accident - Not really, its all true... or is it?

Turning 17

When you’re growing up away from your parents there are many things you hope never happen to you. When you are growing up away from your parents in an odd country like Cyprus there are many things that must never happen to you, and it’s funny how plans borne of the greatest ideas can lead to, in hindsight, ones that are flawed at best. Andrei Brechkovsky, a close friend of mine, was celebrating his 17^th birthday. Its a cliché to say the Russians like a drink but Mr Brechkovsky liked a drink. Two drinks. Thirty. And proposed for this most historic of birthdays, seventeen being the year you are allowed to drive a motorbike and claim your freedom, a 24 hour party in the park Drink-a-thon.

Rachel and I got there fairly early given the time frame, cracked open a beer at one in the afternoon and watched on as the birthday boy dowsed himself in alcohol. We watched him tear the wrapping paper off of booze and cigarettes, stationary and an elephant dung paper weight. Standard gifts you give each other when you’re a teenager. We sang and danced and learned all about Russian folk music.

Drinking so heavily in the middle of the day is something that most adults tend to avoid. And that’s because they know something teenagers don’t. It’s almost a right of passage on the fateful day that you learn your lesson. Not only can your liver not process alcohol as quickly so you get drunker, but beer, famous for not taking its time to travel through the human body, hurries itself along faster in the daytime. Frantically we looked for a toilet but the only ones in the park were closed. So in one moment of complete desperation we picked our trees. It was only Rachel’s luck that she picked the perfect cover from the main path. A large towering tree, hollow in the middle. She emerged relived and proud only to discover that behind the ideal tree of her choice was a house and as luck would have it the occupants were home. Something that to this day I have never let her forget.

As it got darker the evening carried on and more people came to wish our dear friend the happiest of birthdays.  A group of us sat down in a circle to prepare for the drinking games I had brought along. Jake spent the most ridiculously lengthy time slaughtering a half a dozen lemons and wasting most of them in the process, deeming them not up to his bar tending standards. We opened a bottle of tequila I had been saving for such an occasion. Brought from Chile by a friend of my father’s, it was a rare tequila, laced with chillies. Several shots in I wandered aimlessly over to the wall of the locked amphitheatre in the park and stared over through some fencing, like you do. It took me sometime to focus but I could see blue lights. Like a messenger in distress I circulated through the crowd warning them that I had seen moving lights. No one listened. In all fairness my credibility was lacking. Convinced that I was drunk and hallucinating everyone went on enjoying the party. So I assumed everything must have been fine and continued doing my thing.

I don’t know quite how much time had passed, or how the others had finally been alerted to the news but, ever so subtlety, a party goer approached our group. We were lying on our backs watching the stars blur into each other across the sky. “Run.” No particular tone. No emotion. No panic. Just “Run.”

Christina, Rachel and myself followed Mark thinking he would clue us in to what was going on, certain that a man so calm must know what he’s doing. Jake, who in a fit of panic completely forgot about his girlfriend Christina, took off in the opposite direction with one of Andrei’s other friends, Ivan. In my drunken panic, my underage mind thought of nothing but reliving myself of any evidence that we had been drinking. It hadn’t occurred to me that I smelt like an American sorority girl on spring break. I threw the tequila into the bushes but pushed the drinking games to the bottom of my bag, unable to part with them. We ran as quickly as we could through the park towards the main road. Half way along we stopped to regroup. Some of the others had caught up and Christina had gotten a broken phone call from Jake. Out of the dark green grass we saw a figure in the distance. We turned off our torches and stood frozen.

When you’re 16 years old and you think your going to be arrested the first thing that comes to mind is how your parents will react. When you’re 16 years old, about to be arrested and your parents are in another country, you wonder how your guardian grandparents will react. It’s hard to say how two Cypriots in their early 80’s with specific ideas about how a young lady should present herself, would react to their 16 year old granddaughter being arrested at 10:30 in the evening for drinking in a public park. They were going to kill me. And then they were going to call my father. And then I’d be on the first plane back to England. And then he would kill me. Shaking in my flip flops, my mind searched for answers. I needed a game plan. There were so many choices. Should I tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Should I lie? Would I get caught lying? If I got caught lying would it make the situation worse? If I told the truth would I be ridiculed by my peers for not at least trying to lie? Great! Panic and peer pressure. What a wonderful combination. I could feel my brain dancing the same way my bladder had been dancing that afternoon.

The figure in the distance got closer. It turned out to be Jake. Huffing and puffing with a huge grin on his face he emerged from the darkness and I had never been happier to see his face. The story he told was shocking. He had seen things you couldn’t imagine. In the wilderness he learnt of the harsh world we were living in and he had emerged a free man and more enlightened than he could have ever wished to be. Well, sort of, I exaggerate. He managed to get away. Ivan and him had been stopped and searched. Once they had realised that Jake was in fact Cypriot they became more interested in the other young lad. They barely looked into his bag but decided to take Ivan in for questioning. Jake saw an opportunity and snuck off.

As angry as we were about the whole situation it seemed like the police were moving in a different direction and nothing was going to happen to us that night. We weren’t going to stick around and find out. We sat in the bakery outside the park and watched the squad cars that had been looking for us drive home to their bitter, ignored wives.

Andrei’s night turned out to be quite different. He returned to the scene of the party to cover up his bike. Still with no actual licence or insurance he couldn’t afford to have it identified. On his way back the police stopped him and he was taken in as well. In his bag the police discovered some pills. Andrei suffers from hay fever as well as several other allergies. But the police kept them just in case. He had birthday presents on him too. A carton of cigarettes. The police kept them too. He was underage and they’d fetch a pretty buck at the next police auction, if the officers didn’t smoke them themselves. And a suspicious brown clump of soil and hay preserved in a bulb of thick glass. The arresting officer turned his harsh eyes towards the boy and asked brutally, “What is this?” And Andrei, truthfully and honestly turned to the man who had ruined his birthday and replied, “Shit. It’s shit.” For reasons that cannot be explained they kept the shit and all.