by Jan Coffey
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know she was married.”
I offer pieces of the truth about Jax and how he died, and our conversation takes on a more casual tone. She has a lot of questions about Elizabeth and what she’s been doing. I’m truthful in answering them, for the most part. And then I tell her about my own tragedy regarding Autumn.
Oddly enough, that news is the absolute icebreaker. She’d love to meet with us today.
“Can you come to my place?”
“I’m sure we can manage it.”
She gives me the address, and I compare it to what I already have in my contacts. It’s the same. I say goodbye, telling her Elizabeth will be thrilled to see her.
Patricia lives in Beyoğlu, a different neighborhood from where we are. To get there, I’ll need to take a cab or hire a driver.
As far as showing up alone at her house, that’s all neatly arranged in my mind too. I’ll tell her the truth when I arrive, that Elizabeth had to go to the police station and the consulate to replace her lost passport.
This meeting is only an introduction, a first chance for the two of us to get to know each other.
I dress, throw on my makeup, and grab my bag. At the front desk I ask about a car service that can take me to the address, wait for me, and then bring me back. The receptionist suggests the same company I used to go to the airport to pick Kyle up. I decline and ask for another.
“Limousine Services is another one that we use.” She rattles off the information. It’s a bit more expensive than the standard driver services. Am I willing to pay the higher price to engage them?
Of course I’ll pay the higher price to engage them.
Twenty minutes later, a white Mercedes town car pulls up to the door. The doorman checks the credentials of the driver. I do too. She’s a woman in her forties. Quiet, polite, none of the talkativeness of our driver two nights ago. I give her the address and sit in the back seat.
The leather seats give off the smell of luxury. The smoked glass windows cut me off from the real life that pulses through the streets outside.
I think about Patricia Nicholls and our conversation. A switch was flipped when I mentioned Autumn. The loss of a baby is tragic, and that obviously connected with her. She didn’t say something heartless like You’re young, There’ll be another, or God works in mysterious ways.
I fight down the sudden ache rising in my chest. Since the first day at the hotel, when I imagined Autumn crying in the crib, I’ve kept myself busy so I’d have little time to think about my daughter. But she’s always there on the edges of my thoughts, reminding me and helping me to do what I must. Even today, when I was speaking to Patricia Nicholls, Autumn was there.
She’s gone from this life, but still she gave me permission to use her name to help Tiam…another lost child.
After Tiam had given me Patricia’s name, it took only a quick online search to learn Elizabeth’s former colleague is eighty-two. But our brief conversation assured me that she’s extremely sharp. I consider calling Zari and asking her what she can tell me about Patricia, but I decide against it. Zari still doesn’t know I’m in Istanbul.
The car crosses a broad bridge over the Golden Horn. Tracks for the trams run down the center of the roadway. On the outside of wide sidewalks, the railings are lined with fishermen.
I’ve been here before with Tiam. I’ve seen these hardworking people. Day and night, in every season, they stand here trying to catch enough for their next meal. These fish are needed to feed their families. I wonder how many of them are immigrants. I focus on the women fishing alongside the men. I think of my mother.
Zari was an immigrant, and there is so much that I am curious about. I can’t wait to spend more time with her and learn more about her history, my history.
The Galata Tower rises in the distance. Tiam told me it was once the tallest building in Istanbul. When it was built, it anchored one end of a massive sea chain that the Turkish rulers used to close off the entrance to the Golden Horn. Even then, governments were all about control, raising the walls, keeping out the very people whose lands they’d destroyed.
As we come off the bridge, my driver immediately cuts off the main road, and we make our way through busy neighborhoods. These twisting roads and alleys are jammed with refugees from Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, and Iran. They’re on the streets—Kurds and Arabs and Iranians, as well as Uyghur Turks—selling whatever goods they can carry on their backs or push on their handcarts. The alleyways, crowded and dirty, remind me of sepia-tone photographs of immigrants in New York City. Those people, desperate people searching for a better life, had arrived at Ellis Island with a lifetime of belongings jammed into one suitcase.
As we drive through the streets with tenements rising on both sides, I see the dogs and the cats and the ragged children with hungry looks on their faces. They stare at this white symbol of luxury passing by them.
I feel ill. I’m embarrassed about what I represent. I’m ashamed of the life I was raised in, thanks to Elizabeth. I recall what she said to me when I confronted her with the crimes she’d committed.
Have you gone hungry for a single day in your life?
Many of these people are the victims of endless wars and upheaval. In wave after wave, they’ve been driven from their homes by governments motivated by greed and the insatiable thirst for power and influence. They are the lost and the dispossessed, trying to scratch out a place to live.
When the city thins out a little, I check my phone for any messages from Tiam. Still nothing has come back. I send her another text.
Call me Sherlock. Going to see Patricia.
I worry that there’s something wrong. She’s usually very quick with her replies, especially when we’re in the same time zone. I consider calling her, but the map on my phone says we are getting close to Patricia’s address.
I glance out the window, not surprised at all by the change. No garbage on the streets. No laundry hanging out to dry in the alleyways. The very picture of gentrification. Of course this would be where an expat would live. Here, between well-kept apartment buildings, I see old houses surrounded by gardens and high walls with gates. We slowly work our way past a large park with manicured green grass and flowers between brick walkways. The only dogs allowed in this neighborhood are on leashes. The traffic is still heavy, but there are fewer people on the streets.
We turn up a narrow side street that will take us to Patricia’s home.
I glance at my phone to see if there’s anything from Tiam. Still nothing. Worry has planted a knot in the pit of my stomach. I recall how washed-out she looked after finishing the treatment yesterday.
A car comes out of nowhere, cutting us off. My driver slams on the brakes and hits her horn.
It all happens so fast. Two smashes explode around me in rapid succession—my window, and then the driver’s. Pebbles of glass shower me. She’s screaming in the front seat as doors are yanked open.
I try to fight off the hands reaching in to grab me. But before I know it, I’m being dragged bodily from the car.
Part IX
O how long shall we, like children, in the earthly sphere
Fill our lap with dust and stones and sherds?
Let us give up the earth and fly heavenwards,
Let us flee from childhood to the banquet of men.
Behold how the earthly frame has entrapped you!
Rend the sack and raise your head clear.
—Rumi
30
Tiam
An hour after my mother leaves for work, I go down the stairs to the street. Normally, I take a bus and the tram. Today, however, I call for a cab. When I get in, I ask the driver to take me to the hospital.
My breathing has been getting worse day by day, but I’ve been trying to pretend nothing is out of the ordinary. Ordinary for me, at any rate. It’s not unusual for the slightest thing to set me off at any time. The change of seasons. Allergies. A temporary worsening of the city’s air
quality. Sometimes there’s no reason at all. Still, I’ve been ignoring my situation all week. I can’t do that any longer. The sticky mucus is building up, and yesterday’s treatment wasn’t effective in clearing my lungs. The doctors at the clinic confirmed it. I was asked to come back today, although I made sure Christina didn’t know anything about it.
After all these years, I’ve come to understand my body and my disease. I know why I struggle to breathe and how to handle the pain in my stomach. I know the signs. And I know the consequences if I don’t react right away. The clinic can’t help me. My condition is much more serious.
I’m so tired. So worn out.
The emergency room people surround me as soon as I walk in, for I’m a familiar face. This is the same hospital that Zari brought me to thirty years ago. It’s one of the best pulmonary care facilities in the entire city. They already have my medical records. They know that the bronchodilators and the medications are part of my daily routine, and I don’t come to them unless it’s critical.
An IV gets inserted into my arm, and they start the intravenous antibiotics and the steroid shots. Next come the breathing tests, before they put me in the vest. Then I wait for the lung specialist to come.
Even though I know the procedures and understand their value, I’m exhausted and frustrated. There’s nothing I can plan for. My life isn’t my own. My body is tired. Sometimes I just want to give up. How easy it would be to curl into a ball and die. I wish the choice was mine, and that I were brave enough to do it right now and be done with it.
A text from Christina lights up my phone.
Hey soul sister. Love you. Dinner tonight?
Her message immediately dispels the doomsday cloud surrounding me. I look at the sun shining outside the windows of the hospital and blink back my tears. I can’t bring myself to answer her message and tell her where I am. Maybe things aren’t as bad as they seem. I make a pact with myself that if the doctors can somehow work their magic and I walk out of here today, I’m showing up for that dinner.
The hope of flaunting my health and my accomplishments at Elizabeth is fading. The truth has to come out—for my sake and for Christina. Even for Zari. But our meeting doesn’t have to be a showdown. It only needs to be the final stitching of a wound that has been bleeding far too long.
The doctor comes in, with another on his heels. They take turns listening to my lungs. They speak to me calmly and ask the standard questions. But I see how they both avoid looking into my eyes. It doesn’t matter. I don’t require a committee report to tell me how badly I’m doing. Right now, I’m like one of those fish on the Galata Bridge sidewalk, flopping around, unable to breathe. I don’t need someone to confirm it.
When I ask them about the next step, they become evasive, looking at their clipboards and the monitors and anywhere but at me. Then, with a vague comment about needing to go and consult and look at test results, they slip out the door. The vest continues to thump and pummel my chest. It takes great effort not to tear it right off my body.
Another text comes from Christina. Call me Sherlock. Going to see Patricia.
I wish I were strong enough to pick up the phone and thank her for everything she’s doing for me. I consider texting her, just a few words. But as I’m trying to decide, my mother sails through the doorway, and I immediately put the phone down.
“Why didn’t you call me?”
Her eyes are on the equipment and the IV attached to my arm. She is pale and already tearing up.
“I looked in your room before I left this morning. I thought you were sleeping.”
I don’t dare tell her that I stayed still intentionally when she checked on me. I didn’t want her to be worried.
I switch off the power to the vest for a moment. “How did you find out I’m here?”
“Emine called me.”
I should have known. We might not be related by blood, but Emine is the best auntie anyone could wish for. And when it comes to my health, she has everyone in this hospital on high alert.
There’s not much clearing in my chest. Every breath is a painful struggle. The mucus is too thick. Zari switches on the vest again. She stands close to me, and I think of all the times when she’d be clapping me on my back, encouraging me to cough. Or picking me up and running outside to get me to the hospital.
One time, she closed the door of the taxi on her fingers in her rush, but she didn’t say anything about it. That night, standing at my bedside after I was admitted, Emine noticed her friend’s swollen hand, though she had tried to hide it. Three broken fingers. Not a word or a whimper.
“I spoke to the nurse outside. She says they’re going to admit you.”
I shut off the machine again. “The doctors are coming back. They’re still consulting.”
“They’re too afraid to give you the news themselves.”
I knew this was going to happen, but still I blink back my tears.
Zari kisses my forehead. She caresses my face. She knows me so well. “You can do this, my love. They’ll help you breathe. They always do. You’ll be out before you know it.”
But it could be too late. Today is Thursday. Christina has done everything I asked her to do. She’s hidden the truth from Elizabeth and given me plenty of chances to make myself known. But I was looking for a momentous scene filled with flaring emotions. A movie-ending kind of meeting. Maybe I’ve read too many books, watched too many films. But I didn’t take my chance when I had it. I didn’t walk up to Elizabeth and say, Here I am. Your daughter. Alive.
There’s more than mucus clogging my chest. The words I need to say to her are suffocating me.
It took Elizabeth thirty years to return to Istanbul. What are the chances of her returning in my lifetime? My future is not measured in years.
A nurse comes in and tells me they’ll be moving me. But I’m not going into a regular hospital room; they’re taking me to ICU. The little hope I have left drains out of me. Tears fall in droplets onto the vest. My breathing becomes ragged, I’m starved for air. My mother turns the machine back on.
“Don’t give up, little one. Please don’t. Not now.” Zari is right there, kissing me. She is the mother of all mothers, the lioness beside me protecting her cub.
I cling to her arm. She doesn’t know what Christina and I had planned for this week. She doesn’t even know that her real daughter is in Istanbul.
I’ll never forget their first meeting this past April, and when the time came for Christina to go back to America. Maman was afraid that she’d lost her child forever. Afraid she’d never see her again.
For what felt like a lifetime, she’d lived with only the slimmest hope that someday her lost daughter would come back to her. Back into her life. Into our life. And now that she’d seen Christina, held her, cried with her, Zari feared that she’d be lost to us again. And then in June, when she visited us again, it was the same when the time came for parting. Zari grieved both times Christina left.
A mother’s love. I’ve felt it my whole life. I could never be jealous of the affection between those two. I’ve never thought for an instant that Zari loved her more than she loved me. Her heart has more than enough room for the two of us.
I turn off the machine and take out the mouthpiece again. “Christina is in Istanbul.”
Zari brightens immediately. “Where is she staying? Will she come and see us? Have you seen her?”
“I saw her yesterday.”
The glow in my mother’s face immediately dims. “How did she seem to you? The baby.”
“She’s still very sad.” I shouldn’t have said the words.
Zari taps her chest, signifying her grief. She is still mourning the loss of her grandchild.
My breaths are getting heavier, and nothing is clearing. I’m not coughing and expelling the mucus as I should. I scratch at my throat, wishing I could tear it open. Each word I speak steals air. I have to be precise.
“Call Christina. I need her here.”
I dia
l the number and hand her my cell phone. The mouthpiece is back on. The phone rings and rings and goes to voicemail. She must be with Patricia Nicholls right now.
“Where is she staying?” Zari asks. “I can leave a message for her at her hotel.”
With each tick of the clock, my body is collapsing around me. My heart is beating too fast, my thoughts are becoming a jumble. I feel like I’m racing toward a cliff edge. But before I go over, there’s so much I need to do.
I free my mouth from the device. “Elizabeth is with her.”
I don’t know what kind of reaction I was expecting, but my mother’s hand immediately wraps around my wrist. I realize that she’s holding on to me…and not just in a physical sense. I see it in her eyes. She’s keeping me close. This connection is meant to be a lifeline. It’s the hope and love that she feels I need right now.
She’s right.
“Get her for me?” I show her a text from Christina that has the hotel where they’re staying and Elizabeth’s new room number. “Please. Bring the woman here who gave birth to me…the woman who abandoned me.”
31
Christina
The window shatters, spraying me with shards of glass, and the car door is yanked open. My driver is screaming, and strangers are invading the confined space.
As a man grabs for me, I try to fight him off. His hands clamp onto my wrists like steel bands, and I throw myself backward, trying to wrench free of his grip. I kick at him as fiercely as I can, catching him in the hip. It’s not enough, and he drags me out into the lane.
Two cars sandwich ours between them, one in front and another in back. The narrow side street that connects the larger roads is lined with high walls and back gates and garage doors. No pedestrians. There is no one to call for. No one who can help. That doesn’t stop me, and I scream at the top of my lungs.