Songbirds

by Christy Lefteri

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  ‘OK, what if you were a deer and I was a lion? Would you still love me?’

  She thought about this as I threw the pineapple in the wok and began to cut the aubergine.

  ‘I think we will meet again in all our future lives.’

  I added the spices to the vegetables and began to boil the rice.

  ‘Do you mind if I lie down?’ she said.

  ‘Of course not. I’ll call you when it’s ready.’

  She went over to the bedroom and I could hear that she had turned on the fan. I thought about what she had said: I’d recognise you if you were a lion, and suddenly a different meaning came to mind. Because, in fact, in this life, I was a predator. First with stocks and shares, and now with the songbirds. Had she been somehow referring to this? I could not be sure. But a deep feeling of guilt overtook me. I had promised Nisha that I would stop hunting and I was planning on keeping that promise. But was it enough? Would that change who I was, a hunter, a predator? Or was the poaching only part of that truth?

  I had the odd feeling that she was in love with the man I should have been.

  I poured myself a large glass of wine and gulped it down to wash away all the questions.

  When dinner was ready, I went into the bedroom to tell Nisha. She was lying on her back on the bed with her eyes closed.

  ‘Are you asleep?’ I whispered.

  She shook her head. I sat beside her on the bed.

  ‘In one story,’ she said, ‘a married couple ask the Buddha how they can remain together in this life and be together in future lives as well. The Buddha said, “If both husband and wife wish to see one another not only in this present life but also in future lives, they should have the same virtuous behaviour, the same generosity, the same wisdom.” I know you’re not my husband but if we want to stay together we have to try and be on the same . . .’ She hesitated, wincing.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I said

  ‘It hurts.’

  ‘Where?’

  She took my hand and placed it low on her stomach, close to her pelvis, in exactly the same location she had placed my hand two weeks before. I leaned down and kissed her just below her belly-button. When I sat up, I noticed that blood was leaking from beneath her body onto the white sheets.

  Either she saw the expression on my face, or she felt the dampness on her skin, for Nisha jumped from the bed and looked down at the covers. I noticed in that moment that the back of her dress was soaked and blood was trickling down her leg.

  Trying to keep my hands from shaking, I called my doctor’s emergency number to request a home visit. Nisha had made her way to the bathroom and was sitting on the toilet with the door open.

  Her face was red and bloated with pain, drenched knickers around her ankles, streaks of red on her thighs. She was mumbling, saying something to me that I couldn’t understand.

  I sat down beside her and took her hand; she held it tight, as if she were about to fall from a cliff. Her words became more audible: she was repeating something in Sinhalese, maybe a prayer.

  I couldn’t move or speak, I just held her hand to stop her from falling into the black abyss that had opened up before us.

  Dr Pantelis arrived silently: I saw only the headlights of his car distorted through the privacy glass of the bathroom window. I tried to release my hand from Nisha’s so that I could open the door for him, but she wouldn’t let go.

  ‘Can you get up?’ I asked.

  She nodded and stood, slowly and with great effort. She held on to me as we made our way to the front door. By this time Dr Pantelis had come up the stairs. He took charge immediately, swiftly and professionally. Only then did Nisha allow her hand to loosen from mine. He asked me to fetch a chair. I did so. My next task was to get a glass of water. I did that too. Meanwhile, he had opened his bag on the floor and checked her blood pressure and oxygen levels, her heart rate and pupils. He then gave her a small canister of oxygen to hold over her mouth.

  Once she started breathing into it, I could see her shoulders relaxing. She glanced at me over the mask and I knew what her eyes were saying.

  The doctor and I lifted her onto the bed and I tucked the covers around her. Then, at his request, I led him into the bathroom as he wanted to see what had come out of her body.

  He looked into the toilet bowl.

  ‘I’m afraid she has lost the baby,’ he said, bluntly, but with a softness to his voice that made me want to break down and cry.

  I swallowed hard. ‘What can I do?’

  ‘Make sure you keep giving her oxygen through the night. Stay with her. If you find she bleeds again and it doesn’t stop, you may need to take her to the hospital. But for the time being she is fine to stay here.’

  I stayed by her side all night. I peeled her out of her wet clothes, helped her into one of my T-shirts and sat by her side. We did all this without speaking. She wanted me to hold her hand so she could sleep.

  ‘How are you doing?’ I would say, whenever I saw her eyes flicker open.

  ‘Yes, I’m doing OK.’

  Beyond the glass doors of my bedroom, I could hear murmurs from the people passing in the street, the barking of a dog, the wheels of a car, footsteps, clattering plates at Theo’s. It all seemed miles away. I was in between worlds: behind me was a road that reached a dead end and would never now open up; a child that would not come into existence. Yet, I could see him or her, a half-formed shadow with Nisha’s bright eyes. Maybe I’d been too hasty. I’d made too many plans. I had been too sure of myself. This unloving child was so real to me. It filled the cocoon in which I sat and Nisha slept, like the light from the sun and the song of the birds that came through the window that morning.

  Of course, I thought, birdsong glows like sunlight. A strange thought, which was snatched away from me as sleep tried to catch me. I stood, by the window, making sure to stay awake.

  When Nisha woke up around five o’clock, I was seated upright on the bed beside her.

  ‘Good morning,’ she said, with such sadness that it broke my heart.

  ‘Good morning. Did you sleep OK?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘The pain has gone. I’m tired.’

  I nodded, kissed her on the cheek and went to fetch a glass of water, which I held to her lips. She had a few sips and handed it to me.

  ‘I’m empty,’ she said. A clear and quiet truth.

  The air in my apartment was heavy and humid. I had sweated through my clothes. There were a few items of clothing that Nisha had left over at my place – some underwear, and a red beach dress with yellow flowers that she often wore in the garden. I helped her to get dressed. It was as if she was half-asleep, her arms and body malleable, like soft clay – she allowed me to move her without resistance. It was the first time I had seen such vulnerability in her. Nisha was always strong, fearless, practical. Now, she had handed her power over to me.

  She said only a few things. Namely that she would tell Petra that she was unwell with a stomach bug and that hopefully after a little more rest she would be able to return to her duties. With every word she spoke, every small decision she made, I could see her strength returning, her back straightening, the colour gradually returning to her face.

  We walked through the garden to her room. The red dress kept reminding me of her blood-soaked blue dress. I tucked her up in bed in order for her to get some rest before Petra and Aliki woke up.

  ‘Stay with me for a few minutes?’ she said, quietly, and I heard the deep sadness in her voice again.

  ‘Of course.’

  I sat beside her on the bed and stroked her hair.

  ‘You know,’ she said after a long silence, ‘every person comes into this life with a certain amount of breaths. You live until those breaths run out. It doesn’t matter where you are or what you’re doing, if you have no breaths left, your energy will pass. This baby just didn’t have enough breath to come into this world
.’

  I took in her words but said nothing. There was a stillness in the room; the fan was off and the heat was immense.

  ‘When you die,’ she said finally, ‘your energy passes into another form. Imagine having two candles. You pass the flame from one candle to the other.’

  I knew she was talking about our unborn child, the child that would never be born as our daughter or our son. But I didn’t respond. I found it hard to speak, to know what to say. I simply listened and stroked her hair. Soon she was asleep.

  I looked around the room. On the nightstand was a religious statue and her reading glasses. On the old wood dressing table, her makeup and jewellery. In the far corner of the room was an ironing board next to a laundry basket filled with clean and fresh towels and bed linen that had already been ironed. Behind this, a feather duster and a couple of multicoloured aprons hung on a hook on the wall.

  Of course, I’d seen her tending the garden, but I had never, ever imagined her life beyond her bedroom door, her life as a maid in this house.

  I gave Nisha a soft kiss on her forehead as she slept and left her room through the glass doors. Back in my flat, in the bathroom, the toilet was still full of Nisha’s blood and what looked like clots and grey tissue. I heaved. There was nothing else I could do but flush the toilet and leave the room.

  The meal we had not eaten was still in the kitchen, the glasses empty on the counter. The ring was in my pocket. I took it out and stared at the light bouncing off the diamond. Then I put it away in the cabinet. I knew I couldn’t propose now: I would have to wait until Nisha was better, wait for the right time.

  *

  The sun was setting as I made my final delivery. I was ready to return to my apartment, the spare room now empty and, well, spare. But not for long. Seraphim and I would be hunting again in just under a week. And I had a lot to ask him.

  15

  Petra

  O

  N MONDAY MORNING AT THE shop, I showed Keti the bracelet. She examined it closely, turning it over in her hands, her brow furrowing at the broken clasp. ‘It doesn’t look like she took it off herself, on purpose,’ she said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Will you take it to the police?’ she asked.

  ‘What’s the point?’

  Keti nodded in understanding.

  ‘Why don’t we make posters,’ she suggested. ‘Maybe someone saw her . . . I could draft a flyer on the computer,’

  ‘Could you?’ I nodded. ‘I think it’s a good idea.’

  ‘Do you have any photographs of Nisha on your phone?’ she asked.

  I scrolled through and found one. It was a close-up I had taken of Nisha and Aliki on Aliki’s birthday almost a year ago. They were in the garden beneath the tree, Nisha’s arm around Aliki’s shoulder. They were both smiling.

  Keti sat down at the computer in the back office and drafted a flyer:

  MISSING PERSON

  IF ANYONE HAS SEEN THIS WOMAN

  PLEASE CALL 9-------

  THERE WILL BE A GENEROUS REWARD

  She cropped the photograph I had given her to remove Aliki from the photo, and zoomed in on Nisha’s face. Her eyes were arresting: anyone who saw this would recognise her immediately if they’d ever seen her. Nisha’s eyes aren’t something you forget.

  Keti printed many copies of the flyer and we split them between us. Even though Keti lived near the university, we thought it wouldn’t be a bad idea to show them beyond my neighbourhood.

  Before we locked up that night, I thanked Keti heartily.

  ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Nisha was a friend. You don’t have to thank me.’

  Soon Nisha’s face stared out of flyers on every street in the area.

  *

  I was managing to keep my business running smoothly– no small thanks to Keti, who had even begun coming in early to dust and sweep the shop, trying to make up for the cleaning that Nisha would have done. I couldn’t bring myself to hire a new cleaner, not yet. It would feel like an admission that Nisha was really gone.

  Life at home, however, was falling apart. My mornings were put back by having to make Aliki breakfast and take her to school, and I had to let Keti open the shop on her own. I would run out after lunch to pick up Aliki, and Mrs Hadjikyriacou would watch her in the afternoons, while I returned to work. I would come back again in the evenings often later than I had planned, due to trying to finish enough work at the shop, squeeze in as many appointments as I could. I was exhausted. I felt like I was failing on all fronts.

  At home, Aliki was restless. She would wander around the house, putting on and taking off her Converse trainers. She would match different colours then regret the choice. She’d walk around with one pink shoe, one chequered. Then one green shoe, the other striped. The cat called Monkey followed her around, sniffing her feet, rubbing its face against her hands as she tied the laces. She avoided the garden and I could hardly blame her: the garden was covered in snails. On the boat, particularly, there must have been about thirty, of various sizes, with their glossy shells and nimble eyes at the tips of their tentacles, slithering over the bow and stern, climbing languidly up its hull. After rain, Nisha would have peeled the snails off the boat, one by one, gently so as not to hurt them. But in her absence, nature had taken over.

  On Tuesday night I had to stay at work very late. When I got home, it was past nine o’clock and Mrs Hadjikyriacou was asleep in the armchair by the fire. On her lap, with her hands resting on it, was the framed photograph of Stephanos in his military gear. When she heard me, she opened her eyes. The fire was dwindling.

  ‘Ah, Petra,’ she said. ‘You’re back.’ And then she seemed to remember that she was holding the photograph, and she looked down at it and ran her white fingers over the glass.

  ‘He was so handsome, wasn’t he?’ she said.

  I nodded.

  ‘And such a kind heart. He would always bring me BBQ when he made it. And do you remember that time he came to pick me up from the airport? It was a Sunday and his only day off, but he came.’

  ‘I do remember.’

  ‘I’m sorry, my love,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you don’t want these things darkening your heart right now. I always feel lonelier at night, don’t you?’

  I nodded again.

  ‘You’re lucky you have Aliki. She’s a little genius, that girl. She tells some good stories too. She told me a story from The Mahadenamutta and his Pupils. Fascinating and hilarious!’ She handed me the photograph and slowly got up.

  I thanked her for helping me out, for watching Aliki and for staying so late.

  ‘It’s my pleasure, my love,’ she said, and went home, where I suspect Ruba was waiting up for her.

  I found Aliki sleeping on Nisha’s bed with Monkey. In her arms she held the little Buddha that Nisha kept on her bedside cabinet. I didn’t wake her; I put a throw over her and kissed her on the cheek. She didn’t stir. The cat gave me a dirty look for disturbing it and went straight back to sleep.

  I considered Nisha’s room. It was so austere, with only the barest of essentials. She had hung a few pictures on the wall, but after living here for nearly ten years, it still felt temporary. My eyes fell on Nisha’s dressing table, and it occurred to me that I hadn’t searched the drawers there; I had just searched the desk, the most obvious place.

  Aliki was sleeping comfortably and, quietly, so as not to wake her, I pulled out the dresser drawers one by one. In one, I found Nisha’s underwear – cotton, white and cream-coloured knickers – all neatly folded. How strange it was to find her undergarments, to be rummaging through another woman’s most intimate things.

  In the third drawer, underneath a pile of neatly folded T-shirts, I found a photo album. Its cover was soft blue leather, the colour of the sea. The first photographs were from Nisha’s wedding day. She was so much younger, her face fresh; she looked like a different Nisha to the one I knew. She was a young woman with dreams for the future. Her husband had been young too, clean-shaven, quite
small in build, and he seemed to sparkle. I imagined that he would have been the kind of man to tell jokes at parties. She was wearing a white dress, embroidered with red flowers. She held a small bunch of red roses. There were dates beneath each photo that I could barely make out in the half-darkness.

  The album was a window into Nisha’s life back in Sri Lanka. A visual story. Her husband standing on his own on the side of a street carpeted with red flowers, on the road a red bus with a lit-up sign on its front reading 22 Kandy, above it the canopy of trees adorned with red blossoms. Another of a waterfall, rushing down a cliff, falling somewhere behind a bustling market; amongst this crowd Nisha and another woman both waved at the camera. I could almost hear the sounds that these people could hear.

  Towards the end of the album, her husband was suddenly missing, and I knew these photos must have been taken after his death.

  The final pages of the album were pictures of Kumari, from when she was a baby until she was about two years old, the age she was when Nisha left and came to us. My eyes rested on the last photograph in the album, where Nisha was holding Kumari in her arms. It reminded me of Nisha holding Aliki in her arms at that same age, but my daughter had been a plump toddler, though both girls had thick, shiny, dark hair. Nisha held them the same way.

  I thought of the wooden statue that Muyia had made. The mother and child. It was Nisha. Yes, I was sure. The woman holding the child was Nisha and the child was Kumari. I lay down beside Aliki and the now-purring cat and fell asleep.

  *

  The next morning, while Aliki was eating her breakfast, I went to see Nilmini.

  ‘I know you said you’d read Nisha’s journal,’ I said to her as she swept the floor, ‘but I also found this photo album last night and I wanted to give it you as well, in case it helps you to identify anyone from the journals.’

  Leaning the broom against the wall, Nilmini took the album from my hands and held it to her chest, just as she had done with the journal.

  ‘I suppose I just thought you might like to see it.’

  ‘Thank you, madam,’ she said. ‘I have begun reading the journal. What I can tell you is that in this journal are twelve letters written for her daughter Kumari, during her first year here in Nicosia.’