A Recipe for Daphne

by Nektaria Anastasiadou

  He rubbed his stinging eyes, stuck a marker between the pages, returned the book to the safe, and walked home, hardly feeling the chill. It was three days before he was to leave for Miami: just enough time to transform the recipe into something functional so that he could continue his experiments in Daphne’s kitchen.

  He opened the apartment door and found his mother seated in her favorite armchair. An unopened package rested in her lap. She was unusually calm. That worried Kosmas.

  “I went to the bank today,” said Rea.

  The previous evening, during a commercial break in Magnificent Century, Kosmas had announced his intention to propose to Daphne. Rea had stared at the television screen without comment. Perhaps her hearing was going. Kosmas had raised his voice: “Would you mind going with Mr. Dimitris tomorrow to get Grandma and Grandpa’s rings from the safe-deposit box?” Instead of replying to his request, Rea had complained about Hürrem Sultan’s bad makeup job. “I guess I’ll have to do it myself,” Kosmas had said.

  Now, however, Kosmas was surprised to see that his mother had actually done what he had asked. “Thanks, Mama,” he said. “It means a lot to me.” He kissed her wrinkly, baby-powder-scented forehead.

  Usually she grinned like a little girl when he did that, but this time her expression remained blank. “The whole time I was in the bank,” she said, “I was thinking it’s far too early for you to propose. Has Daphne said she wants to get married?”

  Just the week before Daphne had said “I don’t want a city that was built for me. I want one that was born for me. You are my city.” Kosmas had therefore supposed that she would say yes to his proposal.

  And yet, now that his mother had asked . . . Daphne did always shy away from the topic of marriage. “No,” Kosmas said to Rea. He peeled off his damp Puffa jacket. “I want it to be a surprise.”

  “But it’s too soon. You could scare—”

  “Where are they?”

  “There.”

  Kosmas looked around the living room. In October, his mother had brought in a painter. Not Mr. Ahmet the mold specialist, but a cheap laborer recommended by Aliki. The man had repainted the wall behind the television, but the mold had returned, just as Kosmas had said it would, and now it was blossoming in gardens of pinkish-orange circles. Kosmas would have to call Mr. Ahmet.

  “Where?” said Kosmas.

  “On the sideboard. Near the Christmas tree.”

  The arrangement that Rea called a “tree” was a vase filled with holly branches and Christmas ornaments. Beside the vase was a small silver tray lined with one of Kosmas’s grandmother’s crocheted doilies and crowned by a thick silver wedding band and a thinner gold one. His grandparents had maintained the old Byzantine ring tradition: women wore gold because it represented purity, beauty, elegance, and rarity; men wore silver, the symbol of strength. He picked up his grandfather’s silver ring and slipped it onto his left ring finger, where it would be worn during the engagement. Then he tried it on the right, to which it would be transferred after marriage. The fit was slightly big.

  “It needs to be resized,” he said. “I know an Armenian goldsmith in the Grand Bazaar, a friend from the army. I’ll take it to him tomorrow.” He looked up at his mother. She was staring at him with both hands flat on the package. “What’s that?”

  “Something from Daphne. Addressed to me.”

  “Why don’t you open it?”

  “I’d like you to read the return address label first.”

  Kosmas looked at the sticker. In the left-hand corner was a picture of a dog with three legs. Probably from one of those animal-protection organizations to which Daphne belonged. “It says Humane Society, Mama. Maybe that’s a dog she helped save.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” said Rea. “I mean her name. Daphne Zeynep Badem. Would you explain that, please?”

  Kosmas sat down on the sofa and wiped his hand over his tired eyes. “Her father is Ottoman.”

  Rea leaned forward. The package slipped from her knees and landed with a crackly thud on the floor. “How could you have kept this from me?”

  “I didn’t keep it from you. I just don’t see why it matters.”

  “Why it matters? I’ve been called an infidel my whole life. Even the most modern and cultured among them always have the word infidel on their lips. The second they think we’re not listening, that’s what they call us.”

  “What about Uncle Mustafa?” said Kosmas. “He took care of us after Father died. You never lacked anything while I was in Vienna. Did he ever call you an infidel? And what about your friend the cobbler, or Madame Vildan, who brings you the newspaper every morning?”

  “I’m not saying they aren’t good people. Just that they never forget we’re different. And neither should we.” Rea slipped her hand inside her blouse, over her heart, and looked furtively around the room, as if she were worried that they weren’t alone.

  “Mama, are you okay?”

  She kneaded her chest beneath the collar bone. “My aunt used to pretend we were all the same. Her door was always open to Ottoman women. But in fifty-five, when the rioters broke into her house, destroyed everything in sight, and smashed her pearls with a hammer, one by one, neither those women nor their husbands made any attempt to intervene. My aunt never invited anyone into her home ever again. She had learned her lesson.”

  Kosmas knelt at his mother’s side and put his hand on her knee. “But Daphne’s mother is Rum, and so is Daphne.”

  “That’s not what her identity card will say. They’ll register her as Muslim. You’ll see.”

  “And even if they do, so what?”

  “If you have children—”

  “They’ll be Christian, Mama.”

  “And if she divorces you and marries a Muslim? Have you thought of that? Have you thought of how your children will be raised?”

  “I’m not even engaged and you want me to think about divorce?”

  “You have to think about everything before you marry!”

  “Mama, she’s an Orthodox Christian, period.” Kosmas scratched his head with the aggression of a flea-bitten dog. “Even if her identity card says otherwise, that’s what she is. Who cares about the government’s stupid categories?”

  Rea fumbled for her cane and inadvertently knocked it onto the parquet floor. Kosmas snatched it up and handed it to her. “Please, Mama.”

  Their eyes locked. It seemed to Kosmas that the fine lines running down and outward from beneath Rea’s lower lids had both increased and deepened. Her upper lids drooped like elephant skin. Behind her clear brown pupils, however, Kosmas saw a scared little girl. “Mama?”

  Rea lifted her chin in silent reply: No.

  Kosmas slid the ring off his finger, returned it to the tray on the sideboard, and locked himself into the bathroom. He turned on the shower to its hottest setting and vented his frustration—with Rea’s doubts and his own—by scrubbing himself raw with an exfoliation mitt and a bar of carrot-smelling soap. It was three days before he was to leave for Miami. As soon as he got back, he would find an apartment and move out.

  When he had worked out the details of his plan, he got out of the shower and threw on a robe. Steam poured out of the bathroom as he opened the door. “Mother!” he shouted. She didn’t reply. “Where are you?”

  He went into the living room. The package, still unopened, rested at the foot of the armchair. He went to the kitchen. First he saw the soil spilled all over the floor, then the African violet, and then his mother crumpled beside it. Her eyes were open.

  “Mama! Mama, are you okay?”

  She tried to pull her housedress down over her swollen legs, as if she were embarrassed to be showing so much skin. “I don’t know,” she whispered.

  The hospital doctors said she’d fainted from hypotension caused by mild bradycardia, which was common in older patients. Fortunately, she hadn’t suffered any fractures or head injuries: just a few nasty bruises. The emergency-room intern hung a Holter monitor around h
er neck, stuck its five sky-blue electrodes to her chest, and explained to Kosmas that his mother had to be monitored to determine if she needed a pacemaker.

  “A pacemaker?” whispered Kosmas. He and the intern were standing in the stark hallway. Rea was still hooked up to a saline IV in the examination room, but the door was open. “Is this serious?”

  “It doesn’t look so at the moment,” the intern said. “The ECG was fine. She doesn’t have a temperature. But at her age, it’s best to be careful. Put a bit more salt in her food, keep her well hydrated, increase her intake of red meat. Her blood tests showed low iron levels. Anemia, that is. She could lose a little weight. She’s not diabetic yet, but she’s headed in that direction. You have to keep a good eye on her.”

  “For how long?”

  “Until we can determine what’s going on. We may need to keep her on the Holter for a couple of weeks.”

  “I’m supposed to go to America in three days.” Kosmas glanced at the wall clock. It was past midnight. He corrected himself: “Two days.”

  “Is there anyone else who can take care of her? Your father? A sibling?”

  Kosmas thought of Mr. Dimitris. He wouldn’t refuse, but the situation would be awkward for Rea. And Kosmas would also be guilty of encouraging Mr. Dimitris in a hopeless suit. Better not to involve him.

  “No one,” said Kosmas.

  The intern stuck his ballpoint pen into his shirt pocket. “Perhaps you could postpone.”

  Kosmas felt like a child whose ice cream had fallen off its cone onto the dirty pavement.

  After taking his mother home and putting her to bed with a cup of chamomile tea, he took his airplane ticket from his dresser drawer, sat down at the narrow kitchen table, and stared at the mess left in the wake of his mother’s fainting episode: the black soil spilled on the floor, the hot red pepper flakes scattered across the table. Then he read every word and abbreviation on his red and white Turkish Airlines ticket. His chest tightened. He had to talk to Daphne right away.

  She answered his call immediately, but instead of greeting him, she said, “Only three days left until we’re together again!”

  Kosmas heard traffic noise and happy Latin music that seemed entirely out of place as he stared at his mother’s jumbled bottles of olive oil and vinegar. “About that,” he said, trying to remember what day and time it was for Daphne. “Where are you?”

  “At dinner with a friend. Is something wrong?”

  “It’s Mother. She fainted and had to be taken to the hospital. They have to monitor her heart for a couple of weeks. She might need a pacemaker.”

  “Is she still there? In the hospital?”

  With his ticket, he swept the table of hot pepper flakes—called acı in Turkish, the same word for pain. “No,” he said. “She’s here, napping.”

  “Is she going to be okay?”

  “Hopefully, it’s just . . .”

  Again Kosmas heard electric steel strings. The Spanish lyrics that accompanied the music, although unintelligible, seemed to express his longing and disappointment.

  “You’re not coming,” said Daphne.

  Kosmas felt a rush of relief. The tightness in his chest eased: she’d made the decision for him. “I’m just not sure if it’s the right thing to do,” he said.

  Daphne was silent.

  For a moment Kosmas heard nothing but the ripping of wind. Daphne had moved away from the music.

  “Did she receive my birthday gift?”

  “Today—no, yesterday. But she hasn’t opened it yet.”

  “I guess she didn’t have a chance. Why don’t you give it to her now, to cheer her up? It’s a Pantone coffee maker from the Pérez Art Museum. Pink, her favorite color. ”

  Kosmas was too tired for concealment. “Before she fainted, we had our talk. I told her your father is Muslim.”

  “I thought you already did that.”

  Kosmas lowered his foot over the potless violet and squashed it into the floor tile. Now he had a second crisis on his hands: Daphne had learned that he’d lied to her a month ago about the talk with his mother.

  “And?” said Daphne, her voice frighteningly quiet. “Does this change things for us?”

  Kosmas thought of calling Mr. Dimitris whether Rea liked it or not. He could get on that airplane after all. He could talk this out with Daphne, face to face. But that wouldn’t be right. It was his filial duty to stay. He ripped his ticket in half and threw it onto the soil and acı pepper at his feet. “Nothing’s changed,” he said. “I love you just as much as ever. But I have to look after her now. I’m all she has.”

  21

  The Moon and the Star

  On january 8, the day Kosmas should have arrived, Daphne invited her parents to dinner at Versailles, a Cuban restaurant with chandeliers and mirrors reminiscent of those in old Istanbul pastry shops. Ilyas Badem ordered his favorite fried green plantain chips, three portions of shredded chicken and rice, a Cuban beer for his wife, and guava juice for himself and his daughter. The family spoke, as always, in a strange mix of English and Istanbul Greek with a spicy sprinkling of Turkish and Spanish.

  Out of respect for her father, Daphne waited until the waiter had left their table to say: “No soup, Baba? What kind of Turk are you?”

  “The soup!” said Ilyas, slapping his cheek. “How could I have forgotten?” He called the waiter back and ordered three bowls of cream of malanga. Then he looked into the wall mirror. His sweep hairstyle had been upset by the strong winds. He rearranged his strands so that they properly covered his bald spot and then, pointing at the parking lot palms whipping about in a sudden gust, said, “This hurricane’s going to be a bad one.”

  “This storm,” said Sultana, rolling her eyes. “Hurricane season is over, for God’s sake.”

  “In January of 1952,” said Ilyas while the waiter served the beer and guava juices “A tropical storm passed over southern Florida quite near Miami. And in late December of 1984, Hurricane Lili hit Hispaniola. So you never know.”

  “You’re obsessed,” said Sultana. “Why don’t you learn to play golf?”

  Ilyas shook his head at his wife and leaned toward Daphne. “So why didn’t he come? Out with it.”

  “His mother’s ill,” said Daphne. She hadn’t allowed herself to complain to anyone, but she couldn’t keep from wondering whether Rea had faked the fainting episode to prevent Kosmas from traveling. “She might have to get a pacemaker.”

  “What else?” said Ilyas.

  “Nothing,” said Daphne, twisting her napkin beneath the table.

  Sultana adjusted her rhinestone barrette. Although she hadn’t been to Istanbul in thirty-four years, her excessive jewelry, bright nail polish, and girlish hair accessories made her look as if she had been beamed into Miami from 1960s Turkey. “I hope you’ve given up that silly idea of moving there,” she said.

  The waiter served the steaming malanga soup, Daphne’s favorite. She took in the nutty, garlicky vapors that reminded her of their neighbor Josefina’s kitchen, but she still had no desire to eat. Her appetite had vanished the day of Rea’s accident.

  As soon as the waiter had gone, Daphne asked, “Why did you two really leave?”

  Over the years, she had heard various answers to that question, the most common being that her father had received an excellent job offer that he couldn’t pass up. But she knew this wasn’t the truth: after all, Ilyas Badem had been assistant manager of the Istanbul Hilton, and he had started at the newly built Hilton Miami Downtown as a night manager.

  “I don’t want to dig up the past,” said Ilyas. He pushed back his chair.

  “Baba,” said Daphne. “I need to know. Will you sit down and talk to me for once?”

  “Buen provecho,” said Sultana. She puckered her lips and drank a steaming spoonful of malanga soup. “Daphne, why aren’t you eating? You’ve lost weight, you know.”

  “Baba?”

  Ilyas took a sip of sweet guava juice. “I don’t see why we have to disc
uss this.”

  “Baba, I’m thinking about moving there. I want to know why you left.”

  “Talk to her, my love,” said Sultana. “Maybe she’ll get some sense in her.”

  Ilyas looked out the window at the overcast sky. “We shouldn’t even be here. The hurricane could hit anytime.”

  “Are you going to tell her?”

  Ilyas remained silent.

  “Fine,” said Sultana. “I will. My people—not my family, but my friends and the community—rejected me. They said I’d gone over to the other side. First I lost my job in a hat maker’s shop. Then one of my best girlfriends didn’t invite me to her wedding. Of course she said it was an oversight and apologized, but I knew the truth.”

  For emphasis, Sultana gave her spoon a single shake in the air as if it were a maraca. “The other side didn’t want me either. Once I went to a mevlit prayer service with your father’s relatives. I told his cousin Ayşe how beautiful I thought the reading was. She fawned over me and said, ‘We love you so much that you should become Muslim.’ I said, ‘Let Muslims remain Muslims and Christians Christians.’ Ayşe and the other women didn’t speak to me for the rest of the evening. So you see why we came to America. It’s a place that was—and is—full of people like us. People who are neither here nor there.”

  “And you were unhappy here,” said Daphne.

  “Of course we were at first. Still, I don’t regret coming. We got used to it and had a life here that we couldn’t have had there. Here nobody cares that my husband is Turkish. But America doesn’t have that . . . that . . . Byzantine salt.”

  Daphne turned to her father. “Baba, why didn’t Grandma Zeynep ever come to visit us? And why didn’t we go to visit her?”

  Ilyas flipped his spoon from one side to the other, looking around the restaurant. Then, addressing the palms swaying in the parking lot instead of Daphne, he said in English, “We had issues.”