The house on the cliff

if the sequence had been choreographed by the very best, and she executed it to perfection. Not that she seemed serious and concentrated. There was no trace of solemnity about her. She was usually chatting about something or murmuring a song, telling one of her stories, laughing and joking, stopping every now and then for a drag on the cigarette that burned perpetually in the bronze ashtray on the window sill. She would always pick it up near the base, pinching it between her thumb and forefinger, bringing it to her lips with an elegant gesture, then put it back down. Sometimes, she addressed whatever object she needed, with stern familiarity. “Cloves? Where are you hiding, cloves? Oh, there you are! Why didn’t you speak up earlier? Because you have no voice, that’s right, my poor little spices.” She never seemed to get sweaty, flustered, untidy, hurried. Her thick grey hair, gathered into a heavy knot at the nape of her neck, was darkly glossy from the scented bay laurel oil with which she anointed it after washing. That evening though, she seemed distracted, and the songs she murmured kept stopping in mid-verse and continuing without words. “There goes the summer,” she said, out of nowhere. It was August still, but Loxándra believed that after the August 15th feast day, you start preparing for the cold. At her words, I realised the north west wind was blowing, hard. Even where we sat in the basement you could hear the pine trees, a noise like crumpling paper that built to a crescendo and and then began again, like the waves that struck the shore. We went upstairs and closed the windows that were banging with the wind. She fried the eggs, too, and when she brought me the plate, it held just the yolks, perfectly cooked, neither solid nor slimy, ready for me to dip potatoes in, one by one. It was a special treat, from when I was little. “Gold sovereigns” we called it. She would eat the cut-off whites as she cleaned up. Loxándra always ate standing up, her food cut into small bites she could pick up when she walked past. She only sat down to drink coffee. Coffee, for her, was serious business. She made her coffee, brought it to the table, and sat in her usual place opposite me, with the usual sigh, “O, my aching bones” (or sometimes “O, my kidneys”), which didn’t really mean her bones or her kidneys were hurting, just that it felt good to sit down. She lit a cigarette and said, as if casually, “The driver brought the newspapers.” I was ashamed, and dropped my gaze. I hadn’t read to her in days, maybe more than a week She looked at me, and I saw that the black shine of her eyes was more veiled than ever with cloudy cataracts. When was the last time I had paid attention to Loxándra? When was the last time I had offered to read her the newspaper with being asked? Even with the thickest of eyeglasses, she could only make out the headlines now. It’s not that I was unwilling to read to her, but the newspapers weren’t only boring, but also very irritating, with their stilted formal language and their constant