Stories
Dancing with the devil
I didn't realise the danger of my holiday romance...
There was no denying how grown up I felt, wearing my shades and lazing on a sun lounger. Sipping my Coke, I thought I looked every inch the sophisticated holidaymaker.
Just then my brother Andrew, 21, leant over to me. ‘Stop posing will you, Cath?' he teased, rolling his eyes until I was giggling so hard my sunglasses fell off.
Okay, not quite the glamorous tourist. In fact, I was a 14-year-old schoolgirl from Blackburn on a family holiday in the Turkish resort of Kusadasi.
Me, Andrew, my mum Diane and dad Alan, both 45, were staying in a hotel in the bustling Ladies Beach area. We'd arrived two days earlier and, with the blazing sun and friendly locals, couldn't have asked for more.
‘Come on you lot, lunchtime,' Mum grinned, scooping up her beach bag. That was another highlight - tucking into the delicious Turkish food.
As we wandered along the strip, we decided on a restaurant called Halikarnas. ‘Oh, those chicken skewers look scrumptious,' Dad grinned, eyeing up the menu.
‘We'll definitely have some of them,' Andrew smiled at the waiter who'd been hovering over us from the moment we'd sat down.
The waiter gave a megawatt smile back, showing his pristine white teeth. Then he quickly took everyone's orders - and was it my imagination or could I feel his eyes boring into me the whole time?
As he moved around to take my order, he stared at me so intensely it made me nervous. ‘What your name?' he asked in broken English. ‘You very beautiful girl.'
My cheeks burned and Dad and Andrew chuckled away as I mumbled a reply.
‘My name Alex,' the waiter grinned as he took my order and sauntered off to the kitchen.
‘You've gone as red as a tomato,' Dad teased as I shifted in my seat. Then Alex was back, asking if I'd help him clear the plates away from a nearby table!
Was this some kind of practical joke? Why was he paying me so much attention?
Still unsure, I stood up and started helping. As we bent over a table, he turned to look at me.
‘I'm 16,' he said. ‘How old you?'
‘Oh, umm, 14,' I mumbled shyly, staring at the tablecloth.
He kept grinning at me like the Cheshire Cat. I knew there were loads of girls back at school who'd have fancied the pants off him but, although he was all right looking, I didn't really feel that way.
But I lapped up the attention. How many boys back in Blackburn had ever called me beautiful?!
I was a bit taken aback, though, when he tapped his number into my mobile phone. Talk about a fast mover!
My family teased me that I had an admirer but, walking along the strip back to my hotel, another
guy smiled at me and shouted out: ‘Hello, pretty.'
It seemed all female tourists got attention, but when we went back to the restaurant Alex immediately pulled a chair up to our table and offered me a free drink.
Soon he was chatting away to us like an old family friend, and I noticed he'd started calling my parents Mum and Dad like he was one of the family.
As we tucked into our meal, Alex suggested we go for a spin on his moped to Pirate Castle, a popular tourist attraction. I'd never been on a moped before and quite fancied whizzing around taking in the sights.
My parents looked unsure but Alex's uncle, who owned the restaurant, reassured them.
‘Don't worry, he's a good boy,' he said. ‘He'll look after her.'
‘And you've got your phone?' Dad said, looking at me pointedly.
Mum and Dad gave their permission, and soon I was on the back of Alex's moped clinging on tight as we scooted around corners. Well, I really felt grown up now. This was definitely something to tell the girls back home about!
Arriving at the castle, I was stunned by the breathtaking views, but Alex seemed more interested in firing questions at me.
‘You at school?' he asked. ‘You... have boyfriend?'
‘No,' I replied, hating being under the spotlight.
He kept rambling on though and, only able to understand about half of what he was saying, I just nodded to most of it.
I felt relieved the questions finally stopped as we rode back to the strip. But on the way home, Alex said he had to stop off at his auntie's house.
‘Just a few minutes,' he insisted, flashing that huge grin of his.
‘Okay,' I shrugged. What was the harm?
‘This is my auntie,' he said, introducing me to an older woman who nodded at me while a baby played on the living room floor.
But then Alex quickly ushered her into the kitchen. I sat trying to listen in as the two of them talked in frantic, whispered Turkish. What was going on?
When they came out, Alex's auntie had a huge grin on her face and started hugging and kissing me like I was her long-lost daughter!
It was so weird, and I started to feel uncomfortable. What had Alex said to her?
Just then, my mobile rang. Dad. Seeing his name flash up, relief washed over me.
‘We've got to go,' I insisted to Alex. He didn't look happy, but didn't argue.
After that, I avoided his uncle's restaurant, spending my time at the beach instead.
Last thing I wanted was a bloke I barely knew getting all clingy. I was 14, for goodness' sake, too young for all that nonsense.
But just a few days later, I bumped into him... and he presented me with a silver ring and necklace with a love heart.
‘It's, err, very nice,' I stuttered, thinking: ‘This is getting creepy, avoid him at all costs.'
Then, on our third night, in a bar with my family, I started talking to a tall, muscular Turkish guy.
‘Forget Alex, this is more like it!' I thought, taking in his chocolate brown eyes, olive skin and sexy quiff.
‘My name's Jack,' he smiled. Better looking and better English than Alex! I smiled to myself as he entertained me with cheesy party tricks.
We really hit it off, and I managed to persuade Mum and Dad to visit the bar again the following couple of nights. It was great!
One day, I bumped into him in the street. ‘Hi!' I grinned. He almost jumped a mile!
‘Why didn't you tell me about you and Alex?' he hissed.
Alex? What did he have to do with anything? ‘What do you mean?' I pushed.
‘He came round my house shouting and screaming, warning me off you,' he revealed.
‘How dare he?' I spluttered. ‘He's not my boyfriend!'
But it put the wind up Jack and, after that, he kept his distance.
I didn't make a big deal out of it with Mum and Dad, didn't want to look silly and immature.
So, with three days before we were due to fly home, I kept smiling when Alex called out to us as we passed the restaurant.
‘You on Bebo?' he asked.
‘Yes,' I said before I could stop myself. Argh, why hadn't I lied?!
As much as I'd enjoyed my holiday, part of me was relieved to get back home. And when Alex contacted me via a webcam, I didn't see the harm in chatting to him - not now there were hundreds of miles between us.
He pointed to an older woman and a boy sitting beside him.
‘This is my mum and brother,' he announced. ‘You'll meet them when we get married.'
Married? Was he crazy?!
Now was definitely the time to tell Mum everything. ‘I hope when he was rabbiting on in Turkish, you didn't accidentally agree to marry him!' she smiled.
‘Well, at least I'm here and he's over there,' I sighed. ‘There's no way he can come and get me.'
I decided to ignore his messages. They came less and less frequently, dwindling finally to nothing.
Three years later, I'd left school and become a dental nurse. When Mum and Dad said they were going back to Kusadasi on holiday, I made my own plans.
Just two days into their trip, though, Dad phoned home. ‘Guess who we bumped into last night?' he began. ‘Alex!'
Alex was with his girlfriend, a young Irish girl. ‘That's me off the hook, then,' I giggled.
Back home, Dad showed me some snaps he'd taken with Alex. ‘He says hello,' he added.
‘I can't believe he still remembers me,' I chuckled. ‘It's been three years.'
He was just a distant holiday memory to me and would have stayed that way until one day, a year later, I got a call from Dad. His voice sounded shaky.
‘Have you seen the newspapers?' he asked. ‘It-it's Alex... he's been accused of killing two people in Turkey!'
‘What?' I blurted. He'd been creepy and lovesick, but surely he wasn't capable of killing anyone?
‘It's him, I'm sure of it,' Dad insisted.
When I got on the internet to check the news, my blood ran cold. There, staring out at me, was Alex.
It was him all right, the same short, stocky build, thick spiked hair, and that smile - I'd recognise it anywhere.
A shiver ran down my spine as I read how he'd been arrested for the brutal double murder of his girlfriend Shannon's mum Marion Graham and Marion's friend Kathy Dinsmore, both 53.
Shannon had also known my holiday romeo as Alex, but his
real name was Recep Cetin.
As I read on, I couldn't believe how similar our stories were. Like me, 15-year-old Shannon, from County Down, Northern Ireland, had met Cetin at a restaurant in Kusadasi where he worked.
And, like me, she'd been on holiday and had started dating him when she was only 14 - the same age I'd been when I met him.
‘Shannon must have been the Irish girlfriend you met last year,' I told my parents. ‘Look, it says here he even started calling her mother "Mum", like he'd called you "Mum" and "Dad".'
But that's where the similarities ended, because it was reported that Cetin had murdered Marion and Kathy after Marion refused to allow him to marry Shannon.
That fateful day, he'd apparently arranged for Shannon to go off on a boating trip while luring the women out of the house with the promise of a sightseeing trip.
But instead he'd taken them to remote woods in Izmir, 60 miles away, and brutally stabbed them.
News reports said he'd claimed the women had been killed by mysterious kidnappers, and that he'd fought to save them, but eventually he'd confessed.
‘Those poor women,' said Mum, shaking her head sadly.
‘But there's more,' I told her. ‘The papers say he's 17 now...but he'd claimed he was 16 when I met him four years ago! Police are planning on taking a bone marrow sample to find out his real age.'
As my heart went out to that poor girl's family, I knew I'd had a lucky escape. Shuddering, I remembered all those times I'd been alone with him, how possessive he was, and his weird talk of marriage.
‘Th-that could have been us,' Mum gulped.
Shannon had spent many holidays in Turkey, grown close to Cetin over two years. What if I'd gone back there, would I have got caught in his web?
When you're on holiday, it's so easy to lower your guard, get caught up in the beautiful backdrop and flattering attention. But sometimes the price you pay can be deadly - and I almost paid.
Catherine Barry, 19, Blackburn, Lancashire
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