Dion: His Life and Mine (14 page)

More than twenty years after dreaming of being its queen, I found myself welcomed as a guest in Athens. The city had decided to honour Dion by naming their new theatre after him, in which it would host an annual five day festival, aptly named ‘The Dionysia’.  I had been asked to open the theatre and attend the first festival, which included a music competition with prizes for the best song and musician. As guest of honour, I was also required to judge; it seemed being married to a musician was qualification enough. Still, I appreciated that Dion was being honoured for his artistic achievements and not for the infamy attached to his death.

Athens was not how I had imagined and not how Theo had described it, but that is progress. Theo was welcoming and I was grateful. Curiously, we were able to meet as old friends without animosity; time apart had given us more in common. We were both parents of young men and both bereft of loved ones. Theo’s wife had died before Dion, leaving Theo to bring up their son, Hippolytus, alone. But not alone for long: five years before my visit he was reunited with my sister, Phaedra, who finally fulfilled her childhood desire and became his wife. So Theo was now, officially, my brother and I found I was able to love him as one, as I had always done.

Relations between my sister and I had improved over the years, mainly because we barely ever saw each other. She hadn’t set foot on Crete since our father had died. She sent her dutiful condolences when Dion died and I sent her the appropriate card for
the appropriate occasion when it arose. Sometimes, mother would visit her in whichever place Phaedra had settled, but never lamented her absence on Crete. It was a subject we never discussed.

Time, tragedy and responsibility had taken their toll on Theo. He was greying before his years, but he was still a handsome man and had kept his physique intact. We talked of old times on Crete, with Aster and Daedalus, his wife and my husband. After I had been there a couple of days, and he had begun to feel closer to me, Theo broached the subject of Naxos. “I’m so sorry about leaving you there. I just don’t know what came over me. I’d been having these strange headaches on Crete and moments of time just seemed to fall out of my head. It wasn’t until we were sailing away that I realised I hadn’t seen you for a while. I guessed you were asleep below deck, but you weren’t. By the time we searched the whole ship and realised what must have happened, we were almost at Athens and then...”

“And then it was too late to turn back because you wanted your father to know you were safe as soon as possible.”

“I planned to turn the ship round and come and get you as soon as I’d given the old man a hug, but...”

“I know, I know, you found you had more pressing matters at home,” I said touching his arm lightly.

“What you must have thought of me!”

“You don’t want to know and it would be very unladylike of me to tell you.” Theo laughed at me, relieved. “But in a strange way you did us both a favour. We were never meant to be lovers. If you hadn’t left me I wouldn’t have met or married Dion and you wouldn’t have married Antiope. It’s obvious that she made you happier than I ever could.”

“And what about you, was your marriage happy?”

“Not always,” I answered truthfully. “But I wouldn’t have swapped it for any other.” At that point, Phaedra entered the room. She welcomed me with a curt embrace. Her hospitality had been comfortable and efficient, but not what you might call warm. I had tried to bring up the night we left Crete, and apologise for not telling her about the plan, but she had brushed these attempts aside by saying ‘the past is the past’. I wasn’t sure I believed this forgive-and-forget façade.

“What are you two talking about?” She kept her coolness hidden behind a breezy tone and a painted smile.

“Our marriages and how fortunate we have been to have them,” I told her diplomatically.

“Oh?” said Phaedra.

“But I’m afraid I win, Ariadne. I’ve been lucky enough to find a second spouse to match my first.” He embraced Phaedra and winked at me. So did the familiar engagement ring, which sparkled on Phaedra’s finger, as it had on our mother’s hand. Phaedra’s wedding ring held it firmly in place. There was no chance of either of them being misplaced.

“And your bouts of memory loss? Do you still get them?”

“They come and go in phases. After we buried father and I married Antiope they stopped for a while, but then a couple of years ago they started again.”

“Maybe I can help find a herb?”

“Of course, I’d forgotten that you were interested in herbs too. But there’s no need, my clever wife takes care of me in that department,” he said, squeezing her hand. She beamed and I was silent. It seemed that I was also suffering from memory loss, or, maybe, I just hadn’t ever known about Phaedra’s passion for plants.

Theo, certainly, still had a memory problem. Maybe, not as severe as leaving his girlfriend alone on an island, but little things, like forgetting meal times, mislaying objects, repeating things he had already said, and forgetting servants’ names. I tried to broach the subject of herbs with Phaedra, hoping we could connect with something that wasn’t our past or our family.

“Have you tried giving Theo a herb to help with his memory?” I asked her, after we’d had to placate a diplomat from Sparta, whose visit Theo had forgotten.

“He has herbs.”

“With all due respect they don’t seem to be working very well.”

“They work perfectly well.” Phaedra rounded on me, “all he needs is a little reminding. I didn’t know about the Spartan visit, so I wasn’t able to remind him. It’s not a big problem. Once the diplomat had had some honey cake, he decided he must have mixed up the date. I know how to take care of my husband.” I understood the inference: I had evidently not known how to take care of
my
husband and look what had happened to him.

At first I put Phaedra’s attitude down to over-protection. It was possible she still felt envious of what little Theo and I had shared in the past. I backed down. She was his wife and I was their guest. But I was also his friend and something didn’t seem to add up.

On my fifth day, Hippolytus returned from visiting his father’s relatives in Troezen. Theo had already told me how guilty he felt over the years he had lost with his son, grieving for his wife. “After Antiope died, it was too painful to look at him, he reminded me so much of his mother.” He must have changed in his adolescence. When I entered the drawing room where he was animatedly telling his father the news from Troezen, I was transported back to Crete where his doppelganger had patted the family dog and made small talk with my mother. Hippolytus even stood up as I entered, just as his father had done and, just like his father, he was welcoming.

He was, of course, a Libertia fan. The festival, his father told me proudly, had been his idea as he wanted to make Athens a centre for culture. Hippolytus had come back from his trip to meet me and accompany me to the festival. He particularly seemed to like “Persephone” which he played over and over again, until Theo told him, tactfully, to stop in case it upset their guest. Not that anything this young man did could offend anyone. He was particularly interested in hearing about my experiences of travelling with the band. I had just got the three of us into a fit of giggles, retelling an incident at Utopia in Olympia, when Phaedra entered the room and our amusement left it.

“Hippolytus, you’re back!” Hippolytus stood up to greet his stepmother.

“Oh silly, where’s my kiss?”

Hippolytus blushed.

“My sons are just the same, too embarrassed to kiss their mother, especially in public!”

“Yes well, I’m not Hippolytus’s mother, am I darling?” Phaedra said pleasantly. Hippolytus shook his head and asked his father if he could be excused to unpack. Phaedra insisted on helping him, although Hippolytus said there was no need, and Theo and I were left on our own.

“Phaedra has a very healthy approach to being a stepmother. She married me when Hippolytus was twelve and much too mature to be mothered. She told him that she wasn’t replacing his mother and never could. Instead, they would be friends and he should call her Phaedra. It was a very sensible approach and it’s worked well.”

“It certainly seems that way. They seem close. I’m not sure if my sons would let me help them unpack.”

“Yes, in some ways they’re closer than a normal mother and son would be. It’s such a relief to me. I couldn’t have imagined many other women with Antiope’s son.” I thought of Oinopion and Staphylos. They had male role models. Cal and Likertes were always good to them and Daedalus doted on them, but there wasn’t anyone who could live up to Dion in my eyes. Well maybe one, but he was married. Theo must have been thinking the same thing because he said,

“But then Phaedra turned up and well, she was your sister and ...”

“You were reunited after all these years and have a happy marriage.” I diplomatically finished for him.

“Yes,” he said gratefully, “that’s it exactly.”

I took an afternoon walk around the palace gardens. It amazed me that, in a busy city like Athens, there was this secluded area of green peace and tranquillity. Hippolytus joined me. He was especially keen to hear about Oinopion and Staphylos and expressed his disappointment that they hadn’t come with me.

“They’re busy working on projects on Crete.” I told him, hoping I didn’t sound curt.

“I would have thought they would have come to an event that honoured their father.”

“Like I said, they’re very busy and they like to keep out of the limelight as much as possible.” Hippolytus nodded his understanding.

“Still, they must be so proud that their father was the lead singer of Libertia!”

“Yes,” I said carefully, “they are very proud of their father and his … musical abilities.” It was the truth. His sons were proud of their father and recognised his genius. However, the man they loved bore no resemblance to the man Hipplolytus, and others like him, loved. This had been one of the reasons why they had, politely, declined the invitation that had been extended to all of us. They saw no reason to celebrate the life of a man they never knew, a life that had been created by strangers and so was remote from them. Dion, of Libertia-fame, was for the likes of Hippolytus. Their father was their own. It was a distinction I respected, initiated and instilled. Although, it was also true that they were busy with projects on Crete. They shared a united love of the place. Luckily, their relationship was harmonious. Whilst their love and ultimate goal was the same - the greater good of Crete, they had different interests, so there was no stepping on toes. Oinopion had followed in both his parents’ footsteps and had a particular interest in viticulture, whilst Staphylos had plans to build up Crete’s tourist industry.

“It must be so cool to have a father as a rock god!”

“Well, unfortunately, they don’t.” I, gently, pointed out.

Hippolytus blushed.

“It must be cool to have a hero, such as Theo, for a father,” I added.

“But he isn’t, is he? Everyone thinks he’s a hero for killing the Minotaur, but he didn’t.”

“He would have, if there had been one, or died trying. That’s what he had intended to do. Besides, he did kill the Minotaur. He met and saw my brother, for the person he truly was.”

“It must have been awful to lose your brother like that.”

“That wasn’t Theo’s doing. He would have stayed and fought with Aster. No, I meant that apart from his siblings and Daedalus, Aster knew nobody and was seen by nobody else. To the rest of the world he was a monster and I’m sure, despite the love we all lavished upon him, especially Andro, there must have been times, when he was alone, that he felt like one. Then your father came along - everything Andro had been and everything Aster wished he could have been. Yet, Theo never made him feel like a monster, ever. The friendship they shared made Aster feel human and for that reason your father will always be a hero to me.” It was only when I heard the words come out of my mouth, that I realised how much I meant them. “You must come and visit us all on Crete. I promise that you will get a warmer welcome than your father did.”

“My father says he was treated very warmly on Crete, particularly by you and your brother.” Hippolytus sighed, “it must be nice to have brothers. Dad was always envious of your relationship with Aster and he says that Andro was an amazing athlete.”

“Yes, he was and an even more amazing brother, which was more important to me, anyway!”

“Of course, you were lucky to have him, and Oinopion and Staphylos are lucky to have each other. I often wish I had a brother I could confide in.” Hippolytus said this, as if the weight of the world had been placed on his back, while Atlas had a coffee break. 

“Well, Oinopion and Staphylos are sort of cousins and they can be the next best things.” This seemed to lift Hippolytus and at dinner we broached the subject with Theo and Phaedra. I suggested that Hippolytus travel back with me in two weeks’ time. Although Theo was pleased that I had extended a welcome to his son, he was also sad that Hippolytus wanted to leave Athens, so soon. He had only just returned from Troezen and would be visiting his mother’s relatives the following month.

“Young people never seem to want to be at home! Do you have the same problem with your sons?”