A Recipe for Daphne

by Nektaria Anastasiadou

  They had spoken of movies and food, subjects that Fanis still heard dating couples discussing as they tried to determine whether their tastes were similar or opposed. Then, when Fanis praised her singing, she asked who his favorite was.

  “The great Sinatra,” he said. “And yours?”

  “Roza Eskenazi.”

  Fanis felt a frisson of synchronicity at hearing the name of the Great Diva, the Queen of Underworld Rembetiko. “I adore Roza. But my mother won’t allow any of those popular albums in the house. She says they’re basse classe.”

  “Neither will mine,” said Kalypso. “So I bring them home secretly and play them when Mother’s out.”

  “Sing something,” he said.

  Kalypso chose “My Sweet Canary,” one of Roza’s songs. But she skipped the innocent overture and dove straight into the most provocative verse, begging him to come into her embrace so that she could fill him up with kisses. Although he was two years older than Kalypso, Fanis blushed. It was true that he had wanted a demure bride, and she was far from demure. Moreover, he had never fancied girls who put their elbows on the table, as she did. He had said that a woman should not laugh too much, and Kalypso was always laughing. But he realized on that day that perfection belonged only to angels and he wanted a woman, this enchanting young woman, and not an angel.

  When Kalypso decided it was time to leave, she grasped her red saucer hat so that it wouldn’t fall, sprang forward, and—so quickly that Fanis didn’t have a chance to react—kissed his ear lobe. She was out the door in a second. Fanis was left sitting there, paralyzed by the sensation of her kiss: he hadn’t known that the ear was an erogenous zone. Over the months to come, her ear-lobe kisses progressed to nibbles, licks, and bites. Fanis had never before experienced such intense pleasure. After Kalypso’s death, he never let another woman touch his ears. That part of his body belonged to Kalypso.

  “At your service.”

  Fanis looked up at the waiter. Then he looked at the other customers. Everyone was dressed badly, which meant, of course, that it was still 2011. “Four cherry-jam-filled surprises and a tea,” he said.

  “Right away.”

  Fanis turned his attention to the street and saw a young woman walking so quickly that she was almost skipping. Her long hair bounced against the small of her back. Without thinking, he jumped up and knocked on the glass. She turned and waved. “Come in,” he said.

  Daphne came over to his table. “I’m meeting Selin,” she said, between cheek kisses.

  Daphne’s outfit lacked the joy of Kalypso’s polka dots, but it had an ethnic sort of elegance: an ankle-length black dress and a long necklace with a silver pendant that looked like . . . the hand of Fatima, daughter of the Prophet Muhammad. Did Daphne have tendencies toward the other side?

  “What’s that?” Fanis asked.

  Daphne picked up the pendant. “This? My favorite necklace.”

  “I’m not talking about it as jewelry,” said Fanis, “but as a symbol.”

  “It’s Fatimah’s Hand for Muslims, Solomon’s Hand for Jews, and the Mother of God’s Hand for Christians.”

  “How lovely,” said Fanis, relieved. “My favorite Turkish word is hoşgörü, which means looking pleasantly upon other people and their ideas. So much better than tolerans, isn’t it, which really just means that you’ve decided begrudgingly to put up with others? That hand, as you’ve explained it, Daphne dear, is a symbol of hoşgörü.”

  “I love that,” said Daphne.

  “Do you know what I love?” said a woman.

  Fanis turned and beheld cherry-red fingernails clutching a drawstring duffel. God, he thought, I must start coming to Neighbor’s House earlier in the day.

  Selin sank into a chair beside Fanis and answered her own question: “I love that Istanbul is the biggest city I’ve ever lived in. Bigger than Paris, and yet I still manage to run into someone I know almost everywhere I go. Isn’t that wonderful?”

  “Certainly,” said Fanis. “It must be because we’re always out.”

  “Unfortunately we can’t stay long,” said Selin. “There’s something we have to do.”

  “Something important?” said Fanis.

  “Yes.” Selin took a Chinese fan from her purse and aired her perspiring face. “A secret.”

  “You’ll have a tea at least.”

  Daphne hugged her unbleached-canvas schoolbag to her chest. “We have an appointment.”

  Fanis sighed. Selin shifted an ear toward one of the wall-mounted speakers, exposing the left side of her neck. There it was: the persistent hickey. She definitely had a boyfriend.

  “Do you hear that?” said Selin. “It’s Ella Fitzgerald’s ‘It Don’t Mean A Thing.’ I just love the Stuff Smith violin solo.”

  Fanis closed his eyes and sang along.

  “Your voice is extraordinary,” said Daphne.

  “That’s kind of you to say, dear,” said Fanis, “but it’s Ella’s rhythm that’s extraordinary, not my voice.”

  “I must hear you chant sometime,” said Selin.

  “I must hear you play sometime,” said Fanis.

  “Perhaps you will.” Selin crossed one meaty leg over the other. “Mr. Fanis, do you mind if I ask an indiscreet question?”

  “That’s the only kind I like.”

  “How old are you?”

  “How old do you think I am?”

  Daphne twisted her beautiful long hair over one shoulder. “Sixty-five.”

  “Sixty-two,” said Selin. “Come on, tell us. And don’t lie.”

  “I don’t know how to lie,” said Fanis. He removed his identity card from his wallet and displayed the birth date. “March 27, 1935. Seventy-six. Would you have guessed it? And I have no one in the world, neither children nor relatives.” He looked Daphne in the eye. “My future wife will inherit everything: my apartment, my antiques, even my illustrious Byzantine surname.”

  Fanis hoped that this might tempt Daphne, but it was Selin who responded, “Surely, Mr. Fanis, a man like you doesn’t need to entice women with an inheritance.”

  Who was this siren, this enchantress, set on preventing him from marrying one of his own kind? Then again, Fanis reasoned, was not his goal, in a larger sense, to perpetuate old Istanbul, and was not Selin, a Sephardi whose family had lived in the City since 1492, a part of old Istanbul? He couldn’t deny it. As lovely as Daphne was, those comfy sandals and untrimmed cuticles might grow tiring. Yet Selin—with her kitten heels, her flawless maquillage, and her artsy spunk—was already overworking his old heart.

  “We need to get going,” said Daphne.

  “But you haven’t had tea,” Fanis protested.

  He didn’t even have a chance to stand. Selin leaned over and kissed his cheeks, paralyzing him with the scent of her perfume—Yves Saint Laurent, Cinéma?—and a peek at her dark décolletage. “Goodbye, Mr. Fanis,” she said.

  “Have fun, girls,” he heard himself say, but he was unable to move. As soon as they were out of sight, he glanced downward and noticed, right in front of him on the table, a business card. In white letters on a blue background were the words “Selin Kerido, Violinist” and . . . her phone number. Fanis looked left and right, grabbed the card, and stuffed it into his wallet. The waiter delivered the plate of cookies that Fanis had ordered before the girls’ arrival. Just the thing to soothe his excited nerves. He wouldn’t want to risk an ischemic stroke.

  Ten minutes later Fanis left Neighbor’s House. With Selin’s card in his wallet, he felt as if he was floating rather than walking. Selin Kerido, querida mia, he repeated to himself. Not that he planned on giving up Daphne, but it couldn’t hurt to have Selin “in reserve,” as young Greeks were fond of saying. Fanis descended the hill into Çukurcuma, but he was too excited to return home. So he kept walking, taking the polluted air in deep breaths, and he reached Yeni Çarşı before he realized it. He was so euphoric that he didn’t think of the police captain until he had almost stumbled upon one of his chickens. Fanis insti
nctively took a step backward. Then, buoyed by Selin’s attentions, he rounded the corner and entered the alley.

  “Good evening,” said Fanis, resisting the urge to grab the captain by his shirt and throw him against the lamppost.

  “Good evening,” returned the man in the Panama hat. “Isn’t it a bit hot for that scarf?”

  “I don’t feel the heat,” said Fanis. But I did feel it on the night of September 6, 1955, when you refused to help my fiancée’s father.

  The captain retrieved another stool from his entryway. “Have a seat. I’d enjoy some company.”

  Was this old-style Turkish hospitality, or had the captain recognized him? Either way, Fanis had no intention of sitting with the man as if they were old friends. “Thank you, but—”

  The captain shouted to his wife, “Semiha! Two teas. We have a guest.”

  Fanis felt his lower legs begin to tremble. “How long have you lived here?” he asked, suspicious about why the captain had returned to the old neighborhood.

  “Just a few weeks. We were further down before. We took this place because we had trouble climbing the stairs of the other. You know how it is. And you?”

  “I’ve lived here my whole life. On—” Fanis hesitated. Perhaps it wasn’t a good idea to tell the truth. “On Sıraselviler,” he said.

  “It’s not the same place we were born into,” said the captain.

  Semiha’s rubber clogs thumped on the entryway tile. She brought teas “dark as rabbit’s blood,” as Fanis’s mother used to say, as well as a plate of butter cookies. “Welcome,” she said.

  “Well I find you,” said Fanis. “I’ve put you to trouble, and I really can’t stay . . .”

  “None at all.” Semiha set the tray on the stand beside her husband. “I made these cookies an hour ago. My mother used to say that if you want company, you should bake.”

  “Wise woman,” said Fanis, sitting. “Health to your hands.”

  Semiha bowed and withdrew inside the house.

  “Married?” said the captain.

  “No,” said Fanis. Thanks to you.

  The tinkle of spoons hitting the sides of tea tulips echoed through the alley.

  “It’s not good to be alone,” said the captain. “A man needs someone to make his food, someone to say good morning to, someone to drink a tea with, someone to give him medicine when he’s sick. Isn’t that right?”

  Fanis bit his tongue so hard that he could taste blood. He didn’t want to lash out right away. He wanted answers first.

  “You mentioned that you lived further down,” he said. “A friend of mine had a meyhane further down. The Petridis Winehouse. Do you remember it?”

  “Do I remember it? I was its best customer. Their raki was something else.”

  “Do you remember the owner as well?” Fanis rasped. His dry mouth stuck to each word.

  The captain tossed a handful of seed to his clucking chickens. “How could I not? It’s too bad he left, too bad they all left. That was the beginning of the end of our Istanbul.”

  “I was engaged to that man’s daughter,” said Fanis. He expected some sort of reaction. The captain had to have heard something about Kalypso. As much as her family had tried to hide it, rumors had eventually spread.

  “Were you? I can’t say I remember the family. You didn’t marry?”

  “No,” said Fanis. He could feel sweat accumulating on his palms. “The meyhane was destroyed and the family dishonored. They picked up and left for Canada.”

  “Things were better when the Rums were here.”

  The hypocrisy! Fanis rose to his feet. His tea tulip smashed onto the curb. “How dare you?”

  “Friend, what—”

  “The worst part of it,” said Fanis, trying to control his urge to pummel the man, “do you know the worst part? The worst part was that her father, Tasos Petridis, went to the police station to ask for your help, and you—a regular customer who was never allowed to pay!—you kept him waiting for an hour. You said you couldn’t spare the men, and then, and then . . .”

  The captain also stood. He set his empty glass on the tray. “Friend—”

  “No!” Fanis kicked the curb. “I am not your friend!” His whole body was shaking. He wondered if the stroke was coming. He had to hurry. “Tasos Petridis was beaten unconscious as soon as he left the station. That’s why he wasn’t with his daughter when . . . when it happened. That’s why they were all alone.” Hot tears pooled in Fanis’s eyes. Afraid that his voice was about to break, he added, almost in a whisper, “And I have never forgiven you.”

  “Please, brother, have a seat.”

  Fanis fell back onto the stool. Otherwise he would probably have collapsed and shattered on the cobblestones just like the tea glass.

  The captain called to his wife, “Sugar, collect the birds and bring us more tea.” As Semiha herded the chickens and the rooster through the entryway and into the back garden, the captain asked, “What’s your name?”

  “Fanourios Paleologos.”

  The captain took off his sunglasses. “You sought me out on purpose?”

  “No,” said Fanis, feeling the resurgent helplessness of that night. “I followed you for years, and then, after I married, I gave up. But the other day I was walking down Yeni Çarşı and saw you feeding the chickens. I recognized you instantly.”

  “Why did you come back?”

  For a second Fanis didn’t know. Then he collected himself: “To ask why you didn’t help people who treated you so well. To ask how you could stand by and do nothing when your neighbor’s shops were being destroyed and their homes invaded. To ask what gives you more of a right to this place than we have. To tell you how I suffered when my fiancée—”

  “Murat Aydın,” said the man, holding out his hand. “Retired librarian.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Fanis. “You’re not Tayyip Aydın? You’re not the police captain?”

  “Tayyip was my brother.”

  Fanis examined the man’s bulging nose, the deep lines in his forehead, the trim mustache, the way he squinted in the afternoon light. It was all Tayyip Aydın. Was he lying?

  “Listen, friend,” said the man. “I can’t answer your questions.”

  An escapee chicken toddled outside and nudged her owner’s pants leg. Murat tossed her a few cookie crumbs. “There was a Rum family in our building,” he said. “We played hide-and-seek with their children when we were young. My mother and I hid them in our apartment during the pogrom. We thought that Tayyip would also help our neighbors.”

  “But why,” whispered Fanis, “why didn’t he?”

  For a few moments, Murat stared at the chic twenty-somethings sipping cappuccinos in the tourist café across the street. Then he straightened his back and said, “When Tayyip was a teenager, he worked as an errand boy for a haberdasher, a Rum with a huge belly. Mr. Takis. Not a bad guy, but he would order meat from a neighboring restaurant every day for lunch, whereas Tayyip ate bread and olives in the back room, like a hungry mouse. That bothered Tayyip. Later he became a policeman and started believing all that propaganda about the Rums being a threat to Turkey. I’m sorry for him, friend. Sorry for all of it.”

  Fanis had readied himself for a confrontation. He had even thought they might come to blows. The apology, however, refreshed the pain, the betrayal, the disillusion. A sob escaped him. The chicken startled, flapped her wings, and sped back into the building.

  “Don’t worry about the glass, brother,” said Murat. “It’s an evil eye broken. Someone must have been jealous of you. Better the glass than your health. Semiha! Bring some cologne!”

  Semiha hurried outside and squirted lemon cologne into Fanis’s extended hands. He looked at her like a helpless child, unable even to rub his palms together. She poured some cologne onto her own hands and applied it to his forehead and cheeks. Then she grabbed a broom and began sweeping the shattered glass while Murat held a shot of raki to Fanis’s lips. Fanis recovered from his stupor after one sw
allow, which seemed to go in through his mouth and exit through his eyes. Murat set the glass on the doorstep.

  “Let it go,” he said. “Let it go.”

  “The captain?” said Fanis.

  “He died in a car accident eighteen years ago.”

  Fanis surprised himself by saying something that he had always thought impossible: “May God have mercy on his soul.”

  “I don’t know if he’ll get it, but thank you for saying so.” Murat took a sip of raki from Fanis’s glass. “You know, I was imprisoned afterwards, when they tried to blame it on the Leftists and rounded us up. I was accused of being one of the rioters. My brother had me released. He wanted me to worship him as a hero for that favor.”

  “What was he like?” asked Fanis. “I don’t mean at his job, or when he went to football games. What was he like at home? Forgive me, I know it’s impolite to ask, but I’ve always wondered.”

  Murat took another sip of raki. “Up until the pogrom, I thought he was a good guy. You know, the kind who’d stick up for you, who wouldn’t push you around or blame you for things he shouldn’t. He was good for a game of backgammon or for a night out at the meyhanes. A quiet type. The change was sudden.”

  “The change?”

  “It happened when he was promoted to captain. Whether he was wearing his uniform or not, he knew that everybody was paying attention to him. He became so arrogant. Even tried to kick me out of the house because I kept company with Communists. He calmed down a bit when he married and had kids, but our Tayyip—the good kid—was gone forever.”

  Semiha returned with more tea. “Come, Uncle,” she coaxed. “Tea heals.”

  Fanis downed half the steaming glass. It soothed the pain in his throat.

  Murat went inside and came out with a scrap of paper. “That’s my number,” he said, “but you can drop by anytime. We’re always here.”

  Fanis put the paper into his wallet, next to Selin’s card, and shook Murat’s hand.