by Alan Drew
They passed the wooden stands of trinket sellers and pushed through a large group of tourists standing in the middle of the street. And then, suddenly, there it was, the gleaming white marble of the mosque, the place where the Prophet’s friend, Eyüp Ensari, was buried.
Since arriving in Gölcük from Yeilli years ago, when smail was just barely walking, Sinan had wanted to visit Eyüp Camii, but it was a long way to come, and being at the store from seven in the morning until ten in the evening every day had not allowed it. He had decided it would wait until a day worthy of a sort of pilgrimage and this was that day. He wasn’t sure if he would ever make it to Mecca; he would if he ever had the means to do so, and it would be a profound disappointment in his life if he didn’t, but now such a trip seemed impossible. This was probably as close to the Prophet as he would ever come.
“Look at how tall the dome is, smail.” He touched the back of smail’s neck, right where the hair met the soft skin. “Do you know why they make it so tall?”
smail looked at him, but his lips didn’t part and he didn’t shake his head. He just looked and that was enough for now.
“So God can fit inside.” He tickled the boy’s neck, but smail stepped aside and looked back at the mosque, his eyes squinting against the yellow sun.
The white bricks of the mosque glowed in the midday light, rising above the courtyard in a series of domes and windows that was like light itself being created. The courtyard was busy with people—women dressed in full hijab, their bodies like black apparitions against the white building; men in skullcaps rolling up their sleeves to wash at the ablutions fountain; still other men seated at a café beneath the shade of a huge plane tree, smoking cigarettes and drinking tea from tulip-shaped glasses cupped in the palms of their hands. But for all the people, the place was quiet, and the din of car-laden streets, the horns of ships, and the yelling of merchants was lost in a distant hum that was like the murmur of rushing water.
Of all his failures as a father, not teaching smail the suras was among the worst. He should have taken him before the sünnet. He should have made him read the Qur’an at night before going to bed. But he hadn’t, and now all he could do was make up for lost time and hope the beauty of this place touched smail in the same way it moved him.
In the center of the courtyard stood a marble ablutions fountain.
“Watch me,” Sinan said to smail. “And do what I do.”
The boy nodded. A small sign, a thread of hope in that nod.
Sinan found an empty spigot. “Allahu Akbar,” he said. “God is great.” He dipped his palms in the cold water, using his thumbs to clean the webbed skin between fingers. He drank from the spigot until his mouth was cold and fresh with the taste, and then spat the water into the drain at his feet. “God is great,” he chanted in his head as he filled his palms again, and sniffed the water into his nostrils. He washed his face, starting at the top of his forehead down to the bottom of his bearded chin, leaning forward to keep his pants from getting wet. He splashed the water across his forearms and it was so cool on his skin, that he thanked God for it. Then he pulled off his shoes and laid them perfectly side by side. He folded his socks neatly atop his shoes and scrubbed the calluses on his right foot and massaged the sore stump of his left. All of this he did three times each, and when he was done his head felt clear and focused on God.
He lifted smail onto the worn marble stool in front of the spigot. Helping his son and explaining as they went, he cleansed his body for prayer. He helped smail get the spaces between his toes, removed the crust of sleep from his eyelashes, scrubbed the dirt from the cartilage of the boy’s ears, and prayed to God that the water might wash away his fears, flush away everything dark inside him.
The tour group had gathered at the entrance of the mosque, a semicircle of exposed skin, gold jewelry, and sports shoes. Repeating “please” in English, Sinan was able to push through the crowd without touching anyone, and when they reached the front both he and smail pulled off their shoes and carried them inside. Through his socks the marble entrance felt hard and cold, but as soon as they entered the mosque the plush carpet cushioned his feet. Sinan raised his eyes to the ornamented dome with its painted arabesques and shields of Ottoman script. Above him rose an archway of honeycombed marble, and beneath that, on the wall of the mosque, hung rows of intricate floral tiles, so delicate they looked as if actual flowers had been pressed in amber.
“Look at this, smail,” Sinan whispered.
In the Southeast there weren’t any mosques as beautiful as this. In Gölcük, too, the mosque had been cheap, built of wood and plaster rather than marble. This is why he had brought smail. What did the boy know of being Muslim? Poverty. Poverty and ugliness. He had known the pain of the knife, the loss of his home, the loss of his sister. He knew that God was capable of punishing innocents. But here was beauty, a Heaven built to reflect God’s mercy.
smail spun around, his head thrown back to see the very top, and Sinan did the same, astounded by the light, like threads of white silk, cascading toward the floor. They passed beneath wrought-iron chandeliers, the hush of their socks pressing into the carpet, the glow of the bulbs illuminating smail’s face. The carpet glowed a brilliant green and Sinan was sure this green was the exact color of Heaven.
smail rubbed his eyes and swayed on his feet.
“Now is not the time to be tired,” Sinan said.
Sinan placed his feet in the center of his prayer rug and motioned to smail to do the same. They stood together, smail half as tall as his father, and faced Mecca.
He closed his eyes and so did smail, but then Sinan opened his and watched his son stand there blind to the world. His face was intent, lines gathering between his eyes as if he were concentrating on a difficult problem in his homework.
“No, smail, watch me and follow.”
Sinan then brought his palms to his ears as though listening out through the walls of the mosque, putting the world behind him, separating himself from all unimportant things. “Allahu Akbar,” Sinan said.
“Allahu Akbar,” smail said. And Sinan felt a flood of relief at the sound of his son’s unsteady voice.
He placed his left hand over his right just below his stomach, and stared at the flowers in the carpet.
Glory to You, O God, Yours is the praise.
And blessed is Your name, and exalted is Your Majesty.
And there is no deity to be worshipped but You.
I seek refuge in God from Satan, the accursed.
And for Sinan, the world, except for the sound of his son’s voice, began to disappear. There were no toppled cement apartments, no tents filled with dusty blankets, no devastated wives, but his daughter was still there, hovering in his mind like a ghost. He was getting used to her being there, accepting the fact that she would stay.
In the name of God, the infinitely Compassionate and Merciful.
Ruler on the Day of Reckoning.
You alone do we worship, and You alone do we ask for help.
Guide us on the straight path,
the path of those who have received your grace;
not the path of those who have brought down wrath, nor of those
who wander astray.
smail got lost and stumbled through the words, quietly whispering out a gibberish that was an approximation of the prayer. Sinan repeated the lines until smail said each one correctly, and he thanked God for giving smail back his voice.
Repeating God is great, Sinan dropped his arms to his side as he bent at the waist. He tried to keep his back perfectly parallel to the ground, and to help this he rested his hands on his knees. Holy is my Lord, the Magnificent.
Suspecting something, he glanced at smail. The boy’s arms dangled loosely and his back curved like a cat stretching after a long sleep. He pressed his palm against smail’s back, flattening it out. “There,” he said. “It’s not supposed to be easy.”
Holy is my Lord, the Magnificent, the boy repeated, breathing drama
tically hard.
Sinan raised his shoulders, letting his arms fall to his sides.
God listens to him who praises Him.
He heard a shuffling sound behind him, the movement of shopping bags against cotton shorts. He tried to put it out of his mind and concentrate, but his head filled with the exclamations of people spinning in place to take in the sight of the dome, the excited voices of women touching beautiful cold tiles.
Our Lord, to You is due all praise.
God is great.
He sat on his feet and smail did the same, both of them placing their palms on top of their knees. The voices grew louder and phrases in English bounced around the dome, echoed across the walls, hung in the cool air and settled in the carpet.
A deep breath and Sinan touched his forehead to the soft carpet, and held himself there for a moment with his palms next to his cheeks.
Glory to my Lord, the Most High.
A flash and the click of a camera shutter. Something was said in English followed by another flash.
Then Sinan briefly forgot what came next. When he opened his eyes he found smail staring back, waiting to follow. Being caught in this momentary lapse only extended it and he felt a pang of embarrassment; a good Muslim should be unaffected by such small things, his concentration focused only on God.
“Bend down,” Sinan said too forcefully.
smail’s eyes widened and he did it immediately.
Sinan again pressed his forehead to the carpet, the cool scent of the pile filling his nostrils.
More flashes burst from the tourists’ cameras.
Allahu Akbar.
Sitting up, he leaned his weight on his twisted ankle and raised his right foot so that the top faced the mihrab. He paused, closed his eyes, and tried to get the quiet back, tried to open himself up like a door through which God could visit, but the anger had already risen in him and it was growing like sharp thorns in his stomach.
All greetings, blessings and
good acts are from You, my Lord.
The tour group shuffled around the mosque, gazing at columns, leaning down to rub their fingers through the carpet, even walking up to the minbar to gape at the carved staircase. Sinan, ready to explode, focused hard not on the voices of these strangers, not on his own voice, and not even on his thoughts of God or the Prophet, but on the voice of his son. smail’s voice was like a young bird learning a song, missing certain notes, but trying and straining and trying again.
Peace be unto us, and unto
The righteous servants of
God.
Silence floated back to him.
O God, bless our Muhammad
and the people of Muhammad;
As you have blessed Abraham
and the people of Abraham.
He opened his eyes and the silence he had achieved retreated into the dome like pigeons startled into flight.
He glanced over his right shoulder, above the top of smail’s black hair, toward an unseen angel recording his good deeds, and said, Peace and blessings of God be unto you. He looked over his left shoulder toward the unseen angel recording his wrongful deeds, but when he did he was presented with a man in a tank top, his exposed skin like blank paper, his hands lifting a camera with the lens pointed directly at him. Sinan forced himself to look straight into the lens, right through the focusing mechanics of that eye, and into the eye behind the lens, the one of a man as soft and vulnerable and full of sin as any man, as he himself even.
The click of the shutter echoed across the floor, a crack in the solace of still air.
Peace and blessings of God be upon you.
AFTER PRAYERS, SINAN SHOWED smail the hair of Muhammad pressed in sealed glass and gold leaf. He lifted smail up to see the embroidery on the green shroud draped across Eyüp Ensari’s tomb, and he couldn’t help but think of rem’s casket being lowered into the ground. They ran their hands across the cool tiles outside of the mosque, the floral designs rising on the walls like an untamed garden.
But none of it seemed to impress smail and they made the trip back to the ferry in silence. The boat arrived and Sinan held his son’s hand as they pushed through the crowd to board. They descended the stairs into the ship and sat down in the very back where there were no windows and the rumble of the engine cut out the sounds of the world. Sinan slid smail against the wall and wrapped his arm around his shoulders and didn’t let go of him until the ferry left the dock.
“I’m proud of you, smail,” Sinan said. “You prayed very well.
You’re a good Muslim.”
The boy said nothing.
“You’re a man now,” Sinan said, “and men have to control their feelings.” He didn’t really believe this—or he was unable to do it himself—but it seemed like the right thing to say. “You have to think of your mother. You have to be strong.”
“Why’d you send rem away?” smail said, watching his fingers pinch the end of his shirt. “I thought it was the right thing to do.”
smail was silent and rolled the end of his shirt into a little cigarette and unrolled it again.
“Did you love her?”
“Yes, I did.”
They were quiet for a while, the clanking of the engine gears growing louder in his ears, and in their silence Sinan could feel his son’s accusation. He wanted to tell the boy that he did it for him, but the truth was he simply wanted to share the burden of his guilt.
“She hurt me,” Sinan said.
smail looked at him and he felt stupid for saying it.
“I was wrong.”
“Where’s she now?” smail said.
Sinan looked at his son—the ridge of his brow concealing his eyes, the bridge of his nose, his eyelashes blinking like insect wings.
“She’s in the cemetery, smail,” Sinan said. “You know that.”
“No,” smail said. “That’s not what I mean. Where is she?”
Sinan felt his throat tighten.
“Is she in Heaven?”
“I hope so, my son. I hope so.”
Chapter 59
THE NEXT DAY AND THE ONE AFTER THAT, SMAIL WAS SILENT again. He nodded or shook his head in response to questions. He drew pictures in his book, sitting in the darkest corner of the tent, the pad propped up on his knees. They let him play soccer again with the boys, but even after returning he sat in the tent, his jaw clamped tight, and refused to eat. Marcus sent a doctor to the tent, but Sinan wouldn’t let him inside. The man stood outside for a few minutes, his shadow falling across the tent, appealing to Sinan in broken Turkish to let him see the boy, but Sinan wouldn’t allow it. Nilüfer, if it bothered her, said nothing, even after the man had gone.
smail coughed in his sleep and tossed and turned until his mother pinned him in one place with an exhausted arm. But he never seemed to sleep, his breath never became steady and low, he never snored the small, child snores that calmed Sinan into his own sleep. So, by the third day Sinan was exhausted. All day he moved products and stacked them on shelves. All day he unloaded trucks and smiled at customers when they asked him for garden hoses or beach towels or California wine that cost as much as one ticket to Diyarbakr. And all day he wanted to sleep, but he knew he wouldn’t. He would lay awake worrying again tonight, listening to the erratic rhythms of his son, hoping smail would go to sleep and wake up in the morning the child he had been just a few months before.
When he left Carrefour, an early evening fog had gathered over the sea, engulfed the evening sun, and spread to swallow the coast. By the time Sinan had crossed the bridge above the highway and reached the field where three plane trees poked into the sky, the clouds blew in shards across the treetops, pressing the sky downward upon his head.
In the gray, he noticed a group of men standing in a circle near the trees, and as he got closer he saw a skinned goat hanging from the limb of the largest tree. The head alone had its skin, and blood dripped from its extended tongue and made a thick puddle in the dirt. Its body was pink and sinewy with exp
osed muscle and marbled fat. In the middle of the circle of men stood a half-dozen more goats, their bleating and wailing being carried away on the wind; Sinan could see their mouths moving, a silent pantomime of terror. Standing away from the goats as though he were scared of the beasts was the mayor. Three other men dressed in suits stood near him and they directed two butchers to kill another animal.
One man took the hind legs and the other pulled the goat’s head close to his belly. Before Sinan even noticed the knife, the man slit the goat’s neck and blood streamed onto the ground and quickly faded to a trickle that ran down the animal’s limp neck. They hoisted the goat from the next tree with a rope, cut the hide around the neck, and with gloved hands yanked the skin over the shoulders and down the back and soon the animal was stripped of its coat and no longer bore a resemblance to a living thing.
“These are for your families,” the mayor said. “Share the meat with your neighbors, too. Remember zakat, my brothers. Remember charity.”
The mayor came to him and handed him a piece of paper.
“The meat’s a gift from the party, Sinan Bey,” the mayor said. Sinan was surprised he knew his name. “You don’t have to take their food anymore.”
He looked at the paper in his hands. He couldn’t read the Turkish, but “Allah” was written in Arabic and it was superimposed over the image of the Turkish flag.
“I’m very sorry about your daughter.” The mayor patted Sinan on the shoulder. “It’s a shame, a waste. But you must go on. You have a son to raise, a wife to take care of. A man’s work is never done on earth, but his struggle is rewarded.” He kissed Sinan on both cheeks. “I’ll have some boys bring you the hindquarters, if we can get them past the gendarmes.”
“Soldiers?”
“Yes, they showed up this morning. They wouldn’t let me through earlier.”