Claire - Erica - Cleo

2. Tuesday - Decisions

The sun had already risen and it was relatively high in the sky. Claire freed herself from his embrace. For a moment she thought she had fallen asleep.

"Do you realize we spent the whole night making love?"

"Yes, honey. It was a wonderful night."

"One of a kind. Enchanting. A life experience. How many times did we do it?"

"Five, I think. Six if you count the blowjob at the start."

"What's your personal record?"

"Seven times in a day."

"With whom?"

"With a chick that was older than me and kind of a nymphomaniac."

"My own personal record was three times. With Marcelo, of course. Come to think of it, it may actually have been two and a half. Whatever. Let's say three."

"If we keep it up, we could get past my record of seven."

"Good for us. But now I'm hungry. Shall we go to the kitchen to make breakfast?"

"To be honest, I got a little hungry myself."

"I always have a good breakfast when I wake up. Well, most of the times it is considered lunch and not breakfast" she said, giggling.

"Good for you."

"Maria will come over in about an hour but I can't wait, so let's make some together."

"Who's Maria?"

"She is my housekeeper, totally erratic . We'll have a laugh when she gets here. She is an odd case. Do you remember the housekeeper in "Two and a half men"? Same thing. I'll tell you how I met her.

"When I came out of jail, the house was a mess. Closed for a year. It needed maintenance and some repairs. Thus, I needed a maid, more of a housekeeper, a gardener of general duties -the garden looked awful- and a decent renovation crew. A friend of mine, who knew I was in jail, introduced me to Maria. Very few people knew I was in jail. For most of my relatives and friends, I was re-educating in France. So, that friend of mine told me he knew a decent housekeeper who had been through a tough situation and wanted to get to her feet. She couldn't get a job because she was in jail. This aroused my curiosity and I wanted to listen to her story.

"Maria had a one and only son. She was divorced and had a hard time raising him. He was kind of troublesome. He involved with drugs at the age of seventeen. They found him dead due to impure heroin, six months later. As you can imagine, Maria flipped out. She was determined to discover the drug dealer who supplied him the heroin. The police didn't give a damn, so she decided to take the matter into her own hands. She had toughened a lot and nothing could scare her. She had nothing to lose after all and didn't even care about her own life. Finally, she found the guy. She went to the police and turned him in. They told her that they knew him but they can't arrest him without any proof. Later on, she finds out that he was bribing people in the police and they were protecting him. So, Maria decides to take the law into her hands. She went to Omonia square and procured a .45 caliber gun. The very same night she located s the dealer, in a café in Alexandra's Avenue, close to the Police Headquarters. When she was sure he is the right guy, she unloaded the gun on him. To think that she had never even touched a gun before. Then she remained calm until they arrested her.

"Her trial got plenty of exposure and everyone defended her. Considering the extenuating circumstances, she was sentenced to three years in prison but since she was in custody for two years already, she came out in a year. She may be justified but when people hear she was in jail for murder, they get scared. I decided to meet her. I did, we talked and we bonded. A strong connection was developed between us. She is fifteen years older than me. I don't get along well with disorder so I entrusted her the house completely. I went to Mykonos until the repairs were finished. The crew troubled us a bit, but we managed to work out a solution. Maria coordinated them. She was watching them all day, quarreled with them, taking care of everything. Other problems occurred along the way. She took care of these as well. On my behalf, since I had no financial issues, I've been extremely generous with her and she duly appreciated it. Maria works for me for two years now and she is loyal and dedicated like a dog. She takes care of everything. She does the shopping, cooks, cleans and deals with every possible issue without getting me involved. She only interferes in my love affairs. Do you know what she told me once? "Claire, you are the daughter I never had. If anyone hurts you, I won't hesitate to unload a gun into his head and go back to prison." This is how dedicated she is. So, you'd better not break my heart" she added, laughing. "Bear in mind that she hasn't seen me with someone those two years. Which makes sense , since I didn't have anyone. Guess how she will react when she sees you."