I don’t know – weird.”
She laughed as he ran his towel rapidly between his legs, buffing his loins dry. He saw a beautiful pale pink camellia dotted with moisture from the spring rains. Almost a sacred plant to the Greeks, he had learnt that basil was never used in cooking but carefully and reverentially cultivated as the king of herbs and a thing of beauty in its own right. “Stop….stop…,” he said breathlessly, reaching down and gently lifting her to her feet. Suddenly a shadowy face appeared framed by long straight hair and a small twangy voice said,
“Hi, I hope I didn’t startle you.”
“Becky.”
As she approached he noticed that she had wrapped a sarong loosely around her hips and that she wore her floral bikini top – a very flattering combination of stylized blooms in black, white and orange. He noticed a large black wasp hovering around a bunch of dark grapes near Becky’s door and made a mental note to warn her. Granted, it was a commonplace for Greek matrons to call anyone young, my child, but he felt that the old lady said it with
