The final cries of lives that had fit themselves into forty-five seconds
In the pitch dark she dragged her feet across the ground, feeling her way forward, trying to understand where it was she had come from.
SÜMEYRA AĞAOĞLU
The old woman jolted awake from her bed in fear.
She could not escape the nightmare that haunted her dreams. For a long time now, a grey wave of fog had been settling over her sleep.
In the dead of night, she had become trapped between desperate tangles of thought, reaching hopelessly toward times she could no longer make right.
The aches of the past lived inside her chest cavity with every breath she drew.
In every fold of her mind, each fraction of that extraordinary tremor she had lived through was hammered in like a nail.
With great effort, she pulled herself upright from where she lay.
With trembling hands, she gently pushed the door ajar…
and stepped outside.
The road was level…
but far longer than it should have been.
She saw the walls begin to crumble as the ground shook beneath them. Drifting in and out of dust and smoke, she moved forward along an unknown path.
In the pitch darkness she dragged her feet across the ground, groping her way, trying to understand where it was she had come from.
The smoke was burning deeper into her throat with each passing moment, drawing a veil over the few bright images still left in her memory.
Her eyes searched for a light.
Buildings that had not collapsed leaned against one another to remain standing;
heads bowed in sorrow, they simply stood there.
Now the full weight of all her memories had descended upon her.
Some had gone to sleep still holding a grudge that night…
thinking they would make up in the morning.
Some had slipped a single stone into their pocket…
meaning to propose to the one they loved.
Some were going to the hospital for a birth…
they had packed their bag and set it by the bedside.
With the last strength her body could give, she came to stand before the rubble heaped across the pavement.
And all at once…
she stopped, as though turned to stone.
A harmony of voices echoed in her ears, rising from above the clouds.
In those desperate hours when her heart burned to hold onto something, a small fragment of hope fell into her.
She saw a child running toward her.
The pyjamas on its back were torn and covered in dust.
She saw the smile in those sleepy eyes.
She heard everyone shouting.
Was this not once the home where her son, her daughter-in-law, and her grandchildren lived?
If she knocked on the door now… would anyone answer?
Was there anyone inside?
If they came out… wouldn’t that be something?
She had made sweet rolls for the children…
wouldn’t the smell find its way to their noses?
When morning came, wouldn’t they drop the older one at school and leave the little one with her again?
If they couldn’t find her at home, wouldn’t they wonder?
Where else would they leave that tiny child but with her?
Who else would look after…
a little one no bigger than a hand…
My daughter-in-law will be up by now…
waking the children.
My son loves his sleep so…
he’ll bury his head right back under the covers.
Winters are bitter here where we’re from…
February has arrived…
snow was a little late this year…
the children will get cold now…
Amid thoughts and memories, her body, grown numb beneath a great roar, could no longer hold itself upright.
An unbroken chain of unfinished stories seeped into her very marrow; memories rising to the surface were constructing the recollections of a future never lived.
Beneath the shame of still drawing breath, in the dark, the final cries of lives that had fitted themselves into forty-five seconds…
were dying in her dead heart.
