Orhan's Inheritance

by Aline Ohanesian

  The boy is sick today. He refuses to fetch water or tend to the animals. He refuses to get up at all. Fatma asks Seda to tend to him, and to everything else. To do so, she will have to leave her modest room. Her hair is longer now and her body more shapely than it has ever been. She must take care to cover herself, especially on a day like today, when she is free to walk through the courtyard. In her hands, she carries a bowl of porridge, lumpy but warm, with which to comfort Ahmet. She aims to nurture the boy and cheer him up. God knows, he can do with some kindness. Seda suspects he is not sick at all, but weary. Of life and of death.

  The air is stiff. It bites her exposed ankles. Her bare feet grip the packed earth. Cool and moist, the sensation is foreign to her. It’s as if her feet still remember that other time, of lace-trimmed stockings and suede shoes.

  Ahmet is lying on the floor, huddled near the solitary bundle of hay that awaits any visiting horses. Seda would give up a day’s bread ration to see a horse in the stable. Ahmet’s head rests in the crook of his elbow, facing the back wall. His eyes bore into the stonework the way old fortune-tellers stare into coffee grounds. Seda stands above him in her familiar silence. If she had words, she would use them now to console him. Whatever it is, it’s in the past, she would say. Forget it.

  She lays the bowl of porridge at his feet, hoping the gods of memory will leave him alone. Ahmet doesn’t look away from the spot on his wall. He stretches a bent knee and gives the bowl a good stiff kick. The porridge spills out of the bowl, splaying across the hay and part of the wall. Annoyed, Seda places her hands on her hips and stomps her foot, only to be ignored by Ahmet. She may be a mute maidservant, but he is only a stable boy. How dare he? She turns quickly to fetch the broom and some water but collides face-first into a body. There is no mistake about it, her nose is pressed up against the ironed uniform on Nabi Bey’s chest. The smell of pistachios and cured meat coats her face like a shroud. Despite the eye-watering odor, Seda stands perfectly still, holding her breath.

  The bey grips her arms, pins them to her sides, and throws her down. Seda’s head lands in the warm porridge, somewhere between Ahmet’s curled body and the wall he faces. She looks up at the boy in alarm, but his eyes continue to decipher something in the stone wall. He doesn’t say a thing. Nor does the bey, whose hands move quickly. He lifts her apron, followed by her skirt. He pants a strange pant and through it Seda is transported to that other time. She waits for Bedros and his large rock, for the bey to slump down onto the ground the way the gendarme did, a gaping hole in his skull. But there is no Bedros and no rock, only the strange scent of pistachios and garlic, the sound of panting and the urgency of a pair of probing hands. Seda turns her head and bites her lip. The bey rams himself into her. A scalding steel spoon scraping what little is left inside. He scrapes once, then twice more. And it is over before she can remember to scream.

  The bey stands before her, buckling his belt.

  Seda presses her thighs together and places a protective hand in between her legs. She is like the porridge on the floor, only dirtier. There is a sensation that the bey has forgotten his spoon inside her. Like maybe it is still lodged there, where it might sit and fester, where Fatma might see it and feel betrayed.

  Nabi Bey bends down, offering his hand, and without thinking, Seda takes it. He helps her up. Then, as if in retrospect, he glares at the spilled porridge at his feet. He nudges Ahmet in the calves with the front of his boot. “Clean this up,” he says before leaving.

  So, it is simple as that. Spilled porridge, a push, a shove, a steel rod penetrating her middle, and the necessity to clean it all up, to move on. Seda is lowering the back of her bloodstained dress with her trembling hands, while Ahmet fetches the broom and rag in silence. As for the filth and shame left inside Seda, that Ahmet ignores.

  CHAPTER 28

  Ghosts

  KEMAL AND HÜSNÜ collapse onto the cushion along the back wall of the khan, their wearied bodies colliding at the shoulders. They have been dreaming of this khan since the border town of Gaziantep where a goat herder poured encouraging words into their desperate ears. He promised they would find warm food and, for the right price, the soothing embrace of a woman’s arms. This last vision alone was responsible for Hüsnü’s unyielding pace in the past two days.

  Hüsnü does not hesitate to pull his tattered boots from his feet, dropping them to the floor like stones. This act alone is a luxury. As soldiers, they almost always kept their boots on, in defense against cold and theft. But Kemal stays as still as possible, his eyes fixed upon the officer seated at the back of the room. For a moment, he is Eagle Eye again, scoping out danger. Even in the dim light, he can make out the officer’s starched uniform and pomaded mustache. The man sits erect with only his head bent slightly before a steaming bowl of broth. He lifts the bowl to his lips and buries his mustache in the warm liquid. It has been weeks since Kemal has had something warm dance upon his tongue and years since he’s seen a creased uniform. Suddenly he is acutely aware of the stench of his body, his torn trousers and the abhorrent condition of his boots. The coarse hair of his beard itches with lice.

  A portly woman, her thick hair loose beneath the head scarf, comes toward them.

  “Merhaba. What’s your pleasure?”

  Hüsnü’s face lights up, but Kemal keeps his eyes upon the officer and his soup. The man’s gray temples flinch at the sound of the woman’s voice.

  “Çorba, if you have it,” says Hüsnü, flashing his best smile.

  The woman nods and disappears behind a small wooden door in the far corner of the room.

  “God, I hope the rumors are true,” says Hüsnü. “Did you see how round her back side was? Like two watermelons cooling in a brook.”

  Kemal can sense the old officer listening. “Not now,” he whispers.

  “Not now?” exclaims Hüsnü, loud enough that the stable boy might hear. “Then when? When I’m dead?”

  The portly one comes back, balancing a pair of bowls on a large rusty tray.

  “I like women. Is that a crime?” Hüsnü’s voice is jovial. He is asking Kemal but looking at the woman. “But my friend here, he’s like a cleric.” He clamps a hand down on Kemal’s shoulder.

  “Maybe he likes boys,” says the woman, raising an eyebrow. “Or goats.”

  The officer with the starched uniform clears his throat.

  Kemal feels his face reddening. “We need a room for a night or two,” he says, ignoring her.

  The woman nods. “You can stay as long as your pockets allow. My name is Fatma and the boy outside is named Ahmet.”

  “We have no use for the boy,” Kemal blurts out. “Just the room.”

  “I wouldn’t give him to you anyway. The boy is for fetching water and taking care of animals.”

  “No one said anything about wanting a boy,” Kemal says, exasperated.

  “Easy, friend,” says Hüsnü. “The hanim here is simply clarifying things. Aren’t you, Fatma dear?”

  At this, the starched officer heaves himself off of his cushion, leaving his empty bowl on the floor where his feet once were. He takes careful measured steps toward the two friends.

  “You boys have papers?” he asks, looking down at them.

  Hüsnü stands up. Reaching in his breast pocket, he produces the corrugated piece of parchment with their signed release.

  The officer’s eyes scan the page and rest upon the seal at the very bottom. “I’ll take this for now,” he says. “If everything checks out, I’ll return it to you by sundown tomorrow.”

  “But, sir, the war is over,” Hüsnü begins to protest. “We’ve served the better part of three years in the army and have been lawfully dismissed.”

  “You have an objection?” the officer asks, the question more of a dare.

  “No, not at all,” says Hüsnü, suddenly cowed. They’ve been through this before. Every village has an ağa, or chieftain, intent upon demonstrating his power. This bey is no different.

  “All my frie
nd wants to know is, whom do we have the honor of waiting upon tomorrow?” Kemal asks.

  “It is not your place to ask questions, soldier. That privilege is all mine.” The officer leaves them sitting before their now-lukewarm porridge.

  “Oh, don’t look so forlorn,” says Fatma Hanim. “That is Nabi Bey, the governor, and he is more or less harmless. He’s leaving for Sivas soon anyway. Eat your soup,” she says, turning her backside to them.

  “What about the room?” asks Kemal.

  “And the . . . company?” asks Hüsnü.

  Fatma clucks her tongue with amusement. “Like chickens before the grain,” she mutters.

  SEDA LIES DOWN on her cot, drinking in the darkness, too tired to turn her stiffened body. Though the images of her life are happily lost in the darkness, sleep continues to evade her. Tonight it is sounds that come to torment her. She hears their voices, every one. Nazareth’s hearty laugh silenced by the clicking of Muammer Bey’s worry beads. Kemal’s soulful voice accusing her of stealing his vision. The sound of Nabi Bey’s grunts plays over and over again in her head.

  The bark of the sheepherder’s dog interrupts the symphony and pulls her back into the present. She is here, unharmed, mind more or less intact, breathing in a dark khan where no one remembers her name. What happened in the stable is already forgotten, relegated to the past, like everything else. Still, she has been extra careful to avoid the bey not only for her own sake but also for Fatma’s.

  From her paneless window, Seda can see the sun rising up again, its orange light chasing away all the sounds in her head. She stands up, reaching for her apron and tucks her hair beneath her head scarf. The apron is key, because she sleeps and works in the same dress, her only one. She thinks of her nightgown, lying next to Anush’s in a drawer somewhere in Sivas.

  Three knocks come from above her head, where the ladder meets the ceiling, Fatma’s signal for Seda to ascend the ladder and erase the sins of the night. She climbs the ladder and enters the empty room. A drained bottle of raki, Fatma’s antidote for ambitious clients, lies on the floor, spent. It loosens more than their tongues, she likes to say. The divan has been stripped of its yorgan. A trick Fatma uses to lessen the washing of the week. Seda can smell the bedpan full of urine, sitting at the foot of the bed. On the tiny desk in the corner is a basin with soapy water, an empty pitcher as its only company. The desk is also where Fatma keeps her hand mirror. Seda goes to the mirror first, fingering its wooden handle.

  One year after her arrival, Seda spent a night doubled over with stomach pains. The next morning she bled all over her only dress, convinced that death had finally caught up to her. Fatma invited her into this room. She pressed a washcloth in between Seda’s thighs and slowly, gently, parted her legs. Holding the small mirror in between her thighs, Fatma forced her to look. Seda had looked away in shame, but Fatma turned her chin back to the bloody flesh wound in the mirror.

  “This is where all life begins and ends,” Fatma said. “You are not dying. Only beginning.”

  I don’t want another beginning, she remembers thinking.

  “This is life happening, despite you,” continues Fatma. “Independent of you. This here is what fascinates and scares them. You must know it better than they do.”

  Seda blushes at the memory of this speech. What would Mairig say to such a thing? Fatma warned her that now more than ever she must stay out of sight, confining herself to the small room, back doors, and hallways. If she doesn’t, men will claim her for themselves.

  Seda places one hand on her belly, wondering if the mirror could help her see if the bey’s spoon has planted a seed. She puts the mirror back, reflective side down, closing the portal to the place that threatens to trap her, that has already trapped Fatma. She walks toward the divan and picks up the bedpan full of urine. When she turns around, she is confronted by a bearded soldier in the doorway. Fear rushes through her entire body. He is holding a pair of boots in his hand and staring at her like a dumb ox. How long has he been standing there?

  Seda turns her back to him immediately, her face close to the wall, chin tucked in so that her forehead brushes against the limestone. She stays perfectly still, willing her body to evaporate into the stone, the smell of urine from the bedpan filling her nostrils.

  “I’m sorry . . .” he stammers, his voice barely audible. “I was looking for my friend.” Then silence. His voice lingers, its familiarity hanging in the air. The voice calls forth a yearning in her belly, fear mixed with longing.

  Seda turns around slowly, forcing herself to look, but he is gone. Has she seen another ghost? If she were sane, she would not hear these voices and see these visions. She would not wake cradling her yorgan and pressing a phantom baby brother to her chest. She would not liken bearded soldiers to her Kemal.

  She opens the latch and quickly climbs the ladder back down to her room. The room appears smaller than usual, its walls closing in on her. She has been found out. Whatever, whoever, he is, he has seen her. But instead of pursuing her, he fled. Thank God, he fled.

  If he gains his courage and comes looking for me, I will kill him.

  Once downstairs, Seda throws the contents of the bedpan out of the window and sticks her head into the cold morning air of the courtyard. There are different forms of death. Not everyone dies of disease or hunger. Perhaps the fates have reserved something different for her. A kind of madness designed to blur her reality. Dreams and nightmares blending into one long sorrowful path. Was the bearded soldier really there? Had he spoken in Kemal’s voice or was she finally going mad? Either way, he must be forgotten or destroyed.

  Ahmet approaches the window. He avoids her eyes, as he’s done every day since the incident in the stables.

  “Need an extra pail,” he says to her.

  Seda waits for more.

  “Guests,” the boy offers. “Two of them. Soldiers.”

  So she is sane after all. The soldier was real, the familiarity of his voice an aberration. Not the first time the real and unreal danced in her head. Seda ducks back indoors to give Ahmet what he wants. She wants to ask who they are, where they are from, and how long they will be staying, but this would require speaking. She unlocks the door to the courtyard, the pail too big to fit through the window.

  “Leave it unlocked, will you?” Ahmet asks, grabbing the pail. “I’ll be right back.”

  Seda says nothing. She turns to the dough resting beneath a square of muslin, intended for ekmek bread. Like her visions and ghosts, it has risen up and grown in the night. She is pounding at air bubbles trapped in dough when the door swings open.

  There, with the sunlight at his back, is the bearded soldier from the morning. Seda moves quickly. She picks up a cast-iron pot and swings it at his head. The soldier ducks, barely avoiding the pot. He takes two large steps toward her. Seda backs up into the table, knocking over a sack of flour. Puffs of flour rise up at the man’s feet, making him look like a demon rising from a cloud. He clamps his hands around her wrists and pins her to the wall. The soldier’s face is only inches from Seda’s, but she keeps her head turned to the left and her eyes squeezed shut. Her panting is the only thing between them. She opens her mouth to scream, but the voice she has neglected for so long has now turned its back on her. She twists her wrists, but his grip only grows stronger.

  “Stop,” he whispers. “Stop. Please.”

  She keeps her face turned, her eyes glued shut.

  “It’s me.” He is whispering again, his breath warming her right ear.

  “Lucine.” He whispers her name like a desperate prayer. It is an incantation that pulls her all the way back to that other life.

  CHAPTER 29

  Resurrection

  KEMAL’S HEART FINALLY begins beating again. He lets the air into his lungs in one loud gulp and holds it there, afraid to let it go. He had thought nothing of walking into the room, and even less of interrupting the girl. Until she turned her head. Beneath the head scarf were the gray eyes and proud chin. The
re was surprise and terror in her face but no recognition. He knew her immediately. And in that moment, he forgot to breathe. His mind and body disconnected, pulling apart like threads of yarn. Now his hands are wrapped around her wrists and his body is pressing her against the wall.

  She stops struggling, but the fear is like a third body wedged between them. She keeps her head turned away from him, pressing her right cheek into the wall. Her head scarf has come undone, and he can see that her dark hair is much shorter than before. She is gaunt, like so many these days. Her eye sockets recede into the cave of her face.

  “Am I hurting you?” he asks.

  She shuts her eyes tighter and thrashes her head back and forth, right to left. Again and again.

  “Stop. Please. It’s me. It’s Kemal.”

  But the thrashing does not stop.

  “Lucine,” he repeats again. This time she stops, but still will not look at him.

  “I’m going to let you go now. Please don’t hit me or run away.”

  She makes no reply to this.

  “Will you promise?” he asks.

  Her eyes remain shut, but there is a faint nod. He loosens his hold on her wrists. He lets them slide down from the wall until they hang at her sides. He pulls away from her slowly, in small increments. It is like pulling away from the sun.

  “Have I hurt you?” he asks.

  She shakes her head no.

  “Will you open your eyes now? Please.”

  She does this. Her eyelashes part and her eyes settle on a spot to the right of his feet. Then, bit by bit, they come closer to the middle where he stands. They settle on his boots, then climb their way slowly up to his calves, knees, and waist. Kemal blushes, feeling exposed. She looks higher up, at his chest, then at the hollow where his chest meets his neck, where she stops.

  Kemal waits an eternity for her eyes to reach his face. Her eyelashes quiver with hesitation and fear. Silently, he wills her to look at him. Just once. So that the spell of fear can be broken.