5
On Christmas Eve I strolled through the park, along the Main riverbank and its backdrop of skyscrapers, museums, and darkly painted benches. It was the perfect night for outdoor exercise. The only people out on the streets were Muslims, Jews, and a few lonely Christians. My legs were heavy and tired, and in front of me a couple strolled slowly. Their kid cried, looking distinctly like a moth in its yellow snowsuit. Trying to pass, I tripped over a tree root and fell onto my hands and knees. The acute pain brought tears to my eyes. The kid clapped excitedly and stopped crying. My pants had torn and my palms were scratched. I cursed, climbing slowly to my feet. A pair of eyes and a hijab were focused on me. The man asked if I was OK. I nodded and he nodded, too. The woman quickly produced a pack of moist wipes from her bag, came toward me, and handed them to me. When I reached out to grab the wipe, she took my hand and proceeded to clean my wound. Her movements were fast and precise. I thanked her. Then I went home where I wanted to tell Elisha everything while he washed out my wound. He would put his arms around me, caring and lovingly.
“What happened?” My mother sat on the stairs facing my front door, legs tucked up. Gigantic shopping bags stood at her feet. She came every night around six, an aluminum foil–covered bowl in hand.
“Nothing. I slipped.”
“Can’t you pay more attention?”
“Mom.”
“Seriously, you’ll have to take better care of yourself. You hardly eat, never clean, and don’t even bother to put on makeup anymore.”
“Mom.”
“I know that I’m your mother. As if that was any help to you.”
I unlocked the door with my stiff, cold fingers and let my mother go in first. She put down her bags, took off her coat and shoes, and put on the slippers she had brought for herself a while ago. Then she went on to fill my kitchen shelves and the fridge with milk, yogurt, cereal, bread, oranges, vegetables, and chocolate pudding.
“Did you know it’s Christmas?”
“What do we care?”
Mother rummaged through my drawers. She thought she knew what was best for me and took advantage of the fact that I had no energy. She found the drawer with the dish towels, took one out, held it under cold water, and cleaned my cuts. Then she poured a generous helping of iodine over my hands.
“By the way, what I meant to tell you,” said my mother, “I looked at your sheets. You don’t wash them properly. I don’t know what you’re doing wrong, but as it is, they’re going to tear in five years.”
I looked at her, thankfully, and laughed out loud. Her face was full of tenderness.
Mother watched me eat. She herself did everything to remain underweight. We sat in the kitchen and Mother smoked one of her long white cigarettes, which in her case looked slightly frivolous. I opened a bottle of Georgian wine and mother spoke in a serious, calm tone that she must have prepared beforehand: “I’ll help you sort out his things.”
“No.”
“Then I’ll do it myself.”
Again, I refused, this time perhaps louder and with more force than strictly necessary. In the apartment above us, children sang “Stille Nacht.” An offkey recorder accompanied them. A moment of silence followed the song. Then a man yelled something that I couldn’t make out. Then the woman. The kids cried. My mother and I sat and listened as doors banged upstairs.
“I had planned on giving your neighbors almonds. For Christmas. But I didn’t get around to it.”
The recorder started over with “Stille Nacht.”
“I tried my best. You had everything you needed to become a happy child,” my mother said.
“I know.”
“Your father was one of the first who had to go. They pulled all Russians from the ministry and sent them as nonpartisan observers to Karabakh. I didn’t even know if he was still alive. Well. Supposedly the Russians were neutral, but the Azerbaijanis thought your father was an ally of the Armenians and the Armenians thought he was an ally of the Azeris.”
The neighbors got louder and louder.
“Afterward—” She didn’t say after what, but I knew what she meant. “It was just you and me. You didn’t say a word, didn’t even look at me. I wasn’t allowed to touch you either—a little like now. You were like a stranger, and you lost all warmth. You never got it back. From that day onward you became withdrawn and I never regained access to you. It’s absurd. I didn’t want to let you go. I knew it was wrong, but what should I have done? We had a dead body in our house.”
“It’s not your fault.”
Mother raised her eyebrows.
“It’s me. Everyone around me dies.”
“That’s nonsense.”
“It’s not.”
“Yes, it is.”
“I had an abortion.”
“When?”
“When I was together with Sami. Shortly before I left him. I didn’t get my period and my first thought was that I’ll have to make an appointment and somehow find the time for an abortion between my exams. Then I did a test and it was positive.”
“I had no idea.”
“It didn’t even occur to me to keep the child. I was embarrassed about that. In the clinic the hallways were decorated with pictures of kids. Pink babies everywhere. Can you imagine that?”
“Did anyone go with you?”
“Cem. Everyone thought he was the father and was afraid of the responsibility. He didn’t deny it.”
“Where was Sami?”
“In the States. I never told him.”