Greek-American Beauty (Full House Fanfic)

Chapter 86 - My Beautiful Panagiota

My cousin Panagiota eloped in 1990, and not one person in our family approved of the man she was marrying. He wasn't famous, had no connections to show business, had a "normal" job, but that wasn't the issue.

The issue we had with him was that he was superficial and controlling, and we all knew our wonderful Panagiota deserved so much better. We knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he didn't really love her, and that he married her simply because she was famous and beautiful, being the keyboardist for the Go Go Girls, and he took advantage of her kind heart. We all tried to warn her, but in her mind, she was in love.

It soon became obvious to us that her husband was beating her. This hit home for me because when I was 10, I had my first slumber party with a fellow Greek family who were family friends of ours (it was one on one as I was the only friend who actually stayed the night). And instead of it being fun, like it should have, it was traumatic.

The daughter in the family, Fereniki celebrated her 6th birthday in 1973, and I was thrilled at being able to stay at someone else's house for the first time, but after we'd gone to bed, her parents started to fight, and I mean physically as well as verbally. They were hitting one another, swearing, yelling, and I can still hear glass breaking from the dad pushing the mom into the glass cabinet! I was so terrified, but in a way I was glad I was there with Fereniki so I could hold her. We slept in the same bed together, and she was sleeping, but I still held her with one arm and tried to cover her ear with my other hand.

Sure enough, she admitted she was scared the next morning when we talked about what happened, so it goes to show that she indeed hear everything. We were both scared, and we asked Fereniki's mother what happened, and at first she asked if we were dreaming (but I don't think she really meant that I think she was just saying that because she felt bad that we'd heard the commotion, or to make us think we were dreaming when we hadn't) but then, she showed us the damage he'd done when he'd broken the cardboard boxes.

I was ok in the end, but I was still traumatized by what happened, and so was Fereniki. And now this situation with my cousin Panagiota reminded me of what happened, especially since she just gave birth to a baby girl.

We were thrilled for her, but at the time we didn't know the extent of her husband's abuse. It wasn't until one Sunday after church I met her and her baby at the Acropolis Greek Cafe, and I saw the poor woman had a black eye!

"I've left him." She said. "I'm just glad he didn't harm baby Sonia."

She explained that she was staying with an old friend from school, because she didn't want to put family members in danger, and he didn't know of this school friend, so she figured she'd be safe.

We were all so happy that she'd left that sick, stupid, poor excuse of a man, but that happiness was short-lived when I'd gotten a call from Thea Arhontoula (Panagiota was the daughter of my Thea Arhontoula, one of my father's sisters), telling me that after Panagiota refused to put her divorce on hold, her estranged husband shot and killed her, then killed himself in a murder-suicide.

I was so devastated, I was close to her growing up, I loved her like a sister. And she was there for me when I had troubles, and we did girl stuff together all the time. Not only was she the keyboardist for the Go Go Girls, but my favorite memory of us musically was when we were doing backup vocals for singer Yannis Katevas' (Γιάννης Κατέβας) over some years from the late 70s, to the mid 80s. His 1985 album "Nai Gia Sena Nai" (Ναι, Για Σένα Ναι) was one we were prominently featured on. It kind of reminded me of how the ladies from ABBA sang backup vocals on this Norwegian singer's album in 1981, despite already having great fame in their own right (Katevas was even willing to fly all the way to America from Greece to record with us!).

I loved her to bits, she always made sure I had everything I needed when visiting her, she'd give Vasilios and I the biggest cuddles when we'd visit, and if I were somewhere out at night and she happened to be nearby, she'd often drive me home.

Needless to say, Thea Arhontoula was traumatized by her daughter's death. We all were. She was only 30. Panagiota had clearly inherited her mother's good character, and I was forever impressed by her keyboard skills.

To this day, I don't know what she saw in that man. He didn't deserve her! He clearly just wanted in on the fame, and brag to his buddies that he'd gotten the Go Go Girls' keyboardist. But while we were devastated at Panagiota's death, we were relieved by his, because he couldn't hurt anyone anymore.