Excerpt
When they got to the house and walked in, all heads turned their
way. Costa couldn’t help but wonder if some were thinking, “Now
who’s this Costa who has dared to come here with a new woman?”
The household was split into two. Literally. Two levels, two
garages, and four bedrooms. Costa wondered what his parents would
think if they came from the old country and saw so many rooms when,
back at home, a family of four, five, six, or more often lived in perhaps
two rooms. Here, people not only had rooms galore but plenty of other
things too, yet their lives were usually stressful and miserable because
they always wanted more. “More” was their mantra, and whenever old
sweet death came to take one of them, the others gathered and sang for
the departed without any sliver of thought about all the misery that
person had gone through to accumulate all the stuff nobody would
give a hoot about anymore.
If this house were divided into two sections, so were the guests.
On the left, in the living room, were the men, some sitting on the
comfortable sofa, others standing with their drinks in hand at arm’s
length from a table loaded with appetizers displayed on decorated
platters. On the right, in the dining room, under a huge, gleaming
light fixture, were the women, separate but close enough to the men,
making sure their eyes were not lingering on another woman’s figure,
yet far enough so men couldn’t hear their conversation. This was a
custom they had followed, these Greeks from the old country to the
new: men with their peers talking amongst themselves and women
with the other women, talking about their men.
Emily came and graced each of them with a kiss, one on each
cheek, and Costa reciprocated without hesitation. Wherever Costa
went, his legacy was always in the forefront; his history as a womanizer
always preceded him. All these women knew it well and knew
those indiscretions had cost him his marriage. And perhaps some of
these women wished they had had their chance with him, but Costa
didn’t care. For him, the other person, the other man’s woman, that
sweet image of being with someone else’s mate, was a natural wonder
and curiosity, and this was usually the reason he had cheated…
Libros Libertad 