I Met a Man

I followed the sudden turn of his head, and we both saw Erol, coming in carrying a glass of milk, ready to respond to Cliff's every need and request. Cliff murmured something weakly to Erol that I couldn't discern but that Erol, having been with Cliff for every step of his last stage of decline, understood.

Setting the glass down by Cliff's hand, Erol gave a tilt of his head at Tabib and they both went out to the kitchen and I sat on the empty chair beside Cliff.

"In that book," he said quietly, " Mark Amalfi's, there," and I took down a book from the shelf above the desk. Several folded pages fell out, and I picked them up and opened them, as Cliff clasped my wrist. I only read the first few words—"I met a man in Cyprus . . ."—and knew I couldn't read any more.

"I want you to give it to him—after," he said. "And I think now you had better explain to him about what I have left him and try to get him to go to the States. He could learn how to run a restaurant; he is such a great cook. I have told him, but he won't listen. And Rick, you will look after him, won't you? Not forever, but keep an eye on him, you know, while he gets over me. I know he loves me, Rick, and . . ." he stopped, unable to find the words, and I hugged him gently.

"I will," I said. "And I am taking Tabib back with me this time. Erol can come with us—for at least a while—if he wants to, or come later permanently, after the paperwork is finished."

Chapter Twelve: Erol

We laid Cliff's ashes to rest in a crypt in the small, headstone-crowded cemetery next to the Anglican chapel in Girne. Rick had made all of the arrangements to take him back to Virginia, but we had found the note in the pages of his manuscript that said he would prefer not to have to leave the home where he had been the happiest.

"You already know about Cliff's behest to you," Rick told me when we set out on the short walk down the hill to the British Club, where Cliff had requested we raise a pint to him and watch the yacht activity in the Girne Harbor after whatever ceremony there would be. He had insisted that my friends be there, so it was Rick and Tabib and me, and, as well, Nazim and Basir. And, of course, Layla Ergun. She had been the glue that had held the creative spirit dwelling in the Durrell villa together for decades of "her men" tenants.

"But he also had me look at possible arrangements for a life for you in the States," Rick continued. "There's an empty restaurant that would be ideal for you there in the Washington, D.C., suburbs. We've done the demographics. A good Turkish restaurant will do well at that location. And I'm willing to bet it will do splendidly with your cooking skills and your natural hosting abilities. All it needs is for you to say yes. Tabib and I are looking forward to having you there with us. Cliff seemed excited by the prospect too. So, is it a yes, then?"

Two hours later, I changed out of my more formal wear in Cliff's bedroom at the Durrell villa—I would always think of this room as Cliff's bedroom—into a pair of low-slung, tight jeans and a close-fitting red T-shirt, and I walked down the cobblestoned street to the Tree of Idleness. The evening was already drawing nigh.

I thought back to what Rick had told me as we left the Anglican church yard, and before I had turned away from the entrance of the British Club and wished Rick and the others to raise a pint for me as well as Cliff, I walked back up the hill for a private moment at the crypt.

"Thanks, Rick," I had said. "But these were the happiest months of my life too. I believe I will stay here with Cliff and live the life that was meant for me. The villa can be mine now. Cliff left me enough money to buy it, and Layla is happy to be rid of it. I had never known, but you see, she hasn't been managing it for anyone all of these years. Lawrence Durrell left it to her; she is one of the characters in the Alexander Quartet that he wrote there. I will leave it to you, the lawyer, to discover which one."

I chuckled to myself at the riddle I'd left Rick to work out as I entered the Tree of Idleness café in the square in the twilight, with those fairy lights in the looming branches of the center tree and olive trees around the fringe of the café's stone terrace. And, in that soft light, I listened to the twittering laughter of the Mediterranean men and watched the wisps of strong Turkish tobacco smoke drifting up, as I was eyeing and being eyed. Until I gave that certain look to the one who was the most beautiful man alive—at least for that evening—and I led him back up the moonlit laneway to the villa—my villa.

And because he was really, really beautiful and yielding—and with no mention of money changing hands—taking him into my bed for a night of sleep broken up with brief periods of wanton lust, waking to the feel of a hand encasing my cock and the wheedling whisper of wanting me. Sighing "Yes," and releasing my throbbing need deep inside him.

And each and every time I met a man, his name was Cliff.

Authors' Notes

The settings of this work, northern Cyprus in 2009 and the villa on the mountainside in the upper reaches of the Cypriot ancient abbey village of Bellapais, are real, as are the Tree of Idleness café in the Bellapais square and the British author Lawrence Durrell and his celebrated The Alexandria Quartet and Bitter Lemons literary works. Both works were, in fact, penned, at least in part, while Durrell lived in this villa in Bellapais between 1953 and 1957. One of the authors ofI Met a Man, habu, also lived in this villa and penned novels there in the mid 1990s. The character of Layla is also based on a real person, who, in fact, was the model for Justine in The Alexandria Quartet.