“How old do you think he is?”
“Not a day under a hundred and seven,” Theo said. “It’s the oleic acid derived from all of the olive oil we eat here. It reduces blood pressure and keeps us young. Did you know that the average Greek uses twenty-three liters of olive oil per year?”
“You are relentless,” I said, keeping my eyes on Vasilios’s disappearing form. “Does everyone move that fast in Greece? I thought you were supposed to be a relaxed culture.”
Theo tipped back on his chair. “Relaxed? Who told you that? Have you ever spoken to a Greek?”
“I am Greek, remember?”
“Barely,” Theo said. “You won’t even drink the coffee. Don’t get me started on the half cup of sugar you dumped into your cup at the bus stop this morning. You practically had to chew it.”
“I was tired. And you leave my sugar coffee alone.” I relaxed back into my chair, feeling a small nudge of relief. The waves were soothing sounding, and my mind desperately needed a break from everything with my dad.
Thirty minutes later, Theo was attempting to steal a piece of charred octopus off my plate, when the staccato footsteps appeared again, announcing Vasilios’s return. His face was bright red and he was drenched through his T-shirt.
“Camera time,” Theo said, dropping his fork and pulling his camera out of his backpack.
I jumped to my feet. “Vasilios?” He was breathing heavily, and from his red face he looked about a minute away from a heart attack, and my heart rate went up too. “Are you okay? Have you been running this whole time?”
Vasilios took a moment to catch his breath, doubled over with his hands on his knees. Then he popped up like a Toaster Strudel. “I am fisherman. I fish. For taverna. For family. One day in net, I see. I find…” He said a word in Greek, looking to Theo for help.
Theo’s eyes widened, and he repeated the word back, and then they spoke for what felt like forever, Theo rattling off questions and Vasilios responding nearly as quickly. Theo’s face was brightening with every word, and despite my best intentions, anticipation was forming a tidal wave in my chest. When I couldn’t stand it anymore, I grabbed Theo’s arm. “Theo, what? What did he find?”
Theo’s face was a cautious mixture of disbelief and awe. “Kalamata, what did Atlantis look like?”
He wanted me to spell it out? “Uh… well, it was an island, made up of concentric rings. Alternating land and ocean. And in the middle was a golden statue to Poseidon. Everything was covered in gold, and there were hundreds of statues.”
“Covered in gold?” he prompted. “Or something else?”
“No.” I thought back, mentally thumbing through my Atlantis knowledge. They’d had their own type of precious metal. What was it called? Oro something? The word flew to mind. “Orichalcum!”
“In English, orichalcum, yes!” Vasilios began spouting off words again, and Theo translated, keeping his eyes fixed on Vasilios.
“Orichalcum is a mixture of copper, zinc, nickel, lead, and iron. Plato wrote about it in the ancient texts; it was the currency of Atlantis. And the three outer walls of the Temple of Poseidon were coated in it.”
All of those facts lined up with what I already knew. I shifted antsily, my hands gripping the table. “Is that what you found? Theo, is that what he found?”
Another burst of Greek. Theo translated again. “Yes, that’s what he found in his net. A piece of orichalcum.”
My heart began thumping so loudly in my chest that it couldn’t hear my brain’s instructions to calm down. Consider the facts. The odds of whatever Vasilios had found being orichalcum ranged from virtually impossible to completely impossible. It could be a rusted tin can, or a piece of an old ship. It could be anything.
As if in answer to my question, Vasilios reached into his pocket and pulled out a small lump wrapped in a red cloth. He held it out to me eagerly, and I froze.
“Kalamata,” Theo prompted, but all I could do was stare.
My hands were shaking. Or was the table shaking? Something was shaking. “Um… Is he… ? Is that… ?”
“Koitázo,” Vasilios urged.
“Open it. Wait!” Theo lifted his camera to his eye, steadying it on his shoulder. “Now open it.”
I took the object from Vasilios. Felt its weight. Felt the significance of it tunnel my vision and steady my breath. This isn’t it. This can’t be it, I instructed, but maybe…
I couldn’t stop myself. I unwrapped the cloth quickly, nearly dropping the object in my haste, and then it was out in the open, the cloth bunched in my shaking hands and—
There.
Nestled in Vasilios’s red-and-white checked napkin was a cell-phone-shaped piece of metal, scratched and irregular, with a definite metallic gold hue and rounded edges. On one end were several fine lines, the remains of etching, worn down by the sea, and on the other was a jagged edge, like something that had been broken off from something larger. Something regal.
Everything zoomed down to a tiny frame, the rest of the world disappearing, the way it did behind Theo’s camera. “What… ? How… ?” I had no idea where I was going with that sentence. “What—are you sure? Are you sure this is orichalcum?”
It is, my heart insisted. But hearts didn’t know things like this, did they?
“Yes, yes, yes,” Vasilios said eagerly. It was heavier than it looked, and warm, almost as if it were alive.
A piece of Atlantis.
Liv, don’t get ahead of yourself. I needed to ask the questions. The right questions. The ones that a real archaeologist or scientist or mythologist or whoever would ask. The ones Indiana Olive would ask. “Vasilios, how do you know this is the real thing?”
My voice sounded calm, but I was holding the orichalcum so tightly that it was hurting my fingers.
Vasilios launched eagerly into his explanation, and I waited for Theo’s translation as patiently as I could, my eyes glued to the metal.
“He had it tested, by a friend of his who is a scientist in Thessaloniki. He didn’t want to take it to the authorities, because he thought they would take it from him. But his friend confirmed that it is the correct percentages of metal to make it orichalcum.”
I sank into my chair, my heart on fire. How? Why? Could this possibly be for real? “Where did you find this?” I asked.
Another eruption from Vasilios. Only this time I recognized a word. Aspronisi. The volcanic island my dad had named that first day at Maria’s. The one he claimed was the closest landmark to Poseidon’s temple. The spot that my dad and Dr. Bilder had pinpointed as the most likely location of the center of Atlantis. That Aspronisi.
Theo and I quickly locked eyes. I don’t know who looked more shocked. “Did he say Aspronisi?” My voice came out in a whisper. Now even Theo looked shaken. He set his camera down, eyes wide.
“Yes!” Vasilios said excitedly. “Aspronisi.”
Vasilios spoke and Theo translated. “He found it thirty meters east of the island. He says he remembers it like it was yesterday.”
My chest erupted in confetti. Fireworks. Lava. All of my little-girl dreams were bursting in my chest, clamoring for a turn, jumping with their hands in the air.