“Call me Irena. Let’s talk at the table while my housekeeper Melia serves us, shall we? My son has been impatient for this night to come.”
Irena had to be close to Alexa’s age with a charm her son had inherited. “My daughter has been no different.”
Like coconspirators, the two women smiled at each other in understanding before Kristos assisted his mother to the candlelit round table. She walked carefully while Alexa and Dimitra found places and the four of them sat. A fifth place had been set, no doubt for her younger son.
Soon their dinner arrived and they began to eat. “Kristos told me he met you at the university. What do you teach, Kyría Remis?”
“English to business students, and please call me Alexa.”
Irena nodded with a smile. “How long did you live in Canada?”
“The whole of Dimitra’s life. Once she went to first grade, I started a program to become a teacher while I attended the University of Ottawa. After my postgraduate studies, I started teaching Greek there.”
“I’m very impressed.”
“Don’t be, but thank you, Irena.” She drank some of her coffee. “When my grandmother passed away last year, my retired grandfather wanted to move back here. We came last August. Because of my experience living in an English-speaking country for so long, I joined the faculty here to teach English in a bilingual program.”
“We’re glad you did,” Kristos interjected. “Otherwise we wouldn’t have met.” He couldn’t take his eyes off Dimitra. Alexa had to acknowledge that like these two, she and Nico had been just as love struck and oblivious to everything except one another.
“What are you studying at the university, Dimitra?”
“She’s terrific at math, Mama.”
“My least favorite subject,” Irena murmured.
Alexa nodded. “And mine.”
Dimitra flashed Kristos’s mother a smile. “Mama says I get it from my father.”
“Lucky you.”
Tell the truth when you can, Alexa.
“When I met Dimitra’s father, he had plans to take engineering classes in college. We were both students and met on vacation,” she said without naming a location, “but were unavoidably separated. In time we lost touch.”
She eyed Irena, needing to change the subject. “I’m so sorry about your husband. How wonderful that you have two devoted sons.”
Irena nodded. “I’d say both you and I are lucky in the children department.”
“You’re right about that.”
Kristos looked at his mother. “I wish Papa were here to meet Dimitra. Why do you think Nico is so late?”
Nico? Alexa thought his brother’s name was Yanni.
“Business, of course. Since becoming CEO, his life isn’t his own anymore.”
“But he said he’d come.”
“He knows it’s your birthday. I’m sure he’ll phone if he can’t make it. Forgive us, Alexa. We’re talking about my husband’s best friend, Nico Angelis.”
“I call him Uncle Nico,” Kristos volunteered.
“He’s done everything for us since Tio passed away and said he’d drop by.”
Irena kept on talking, but Alexa had gone into shock.
Nico Angelis had been the best friend of Irena’s husband?