49: Lottie

My mind is a whirl. I don’t know what to focus on. I don’t know where to start.

First of all, there’s the guest house. How can it be so different from the way I remember? Everything is smaller and shabbier and kind of less iconic. We’re sitting on the veranda, which is far less impressive than I remember and has been painted in a quite revolting beige color that’s peeling away in strips. The olive grove is just a scrubby patch of ground with a few sparse trees. The view is good, but no different from any other Greek island view.

And Arthur. How could I have been impressed by him? How could I have sat at his feet, lapping up his pearls of wisdom? He’s not wise. He’s not a sage. He’s a seventy-something alcoholic lech.

He’s tried to grope me twice already.

“Don’t come back,” he’s saying, waving his roll-up in the air. “I tell all you young people. Don’t revisit. Youth is still where you left it, and that’s where it should stay. What are you returning for? Anything that was worth taking o