Nazgul Bayram

After two weeks of absence, the woman was there again, across the street from the school entrance. She was wearing navy blue slacks and a white silky blouse, her highlighted brown hair in a perfect messy burn framed by the sunglasses she had rested on top of her head. Nazgul couldn’t help but stare for an extra second, and when they briefly made eye contact, the woman took it as her cue, an invitation to cross the street. Nazgul started walking a bit faster, but not enough to where the woman couldn’t catch up to her and start walking by her side. That might have been on purpose, but she would never admit to it.

“I thought my dad had been clear with you,” Nazgul said, without looking at the woman. “They don’t want you near me.”

“Would you just listen?” The woman replied, with something in her voice close to regret. “All I want is for you to listen to me, that’s all. To listen to my side of the story.”

“How different is it going to be from what I already know?”

“Depends on what exactly they have told you.”

“I don’t want to talk about this in the middle of the street and so close to my school, you know what would happen if my friends learned that my real mother is a hooker?”

Both words sounded odd as she heard herself say them. After all, she had grown up knowing that Fadime wasn’t her biological mother, but Nazgul had always thought of her as her real mom. The word hooker, was just because it was a word she’d never been allowed to say out loud.

“Naz, please, listen to me,” the woman said, slowing down her pace, but still right next to her. “Let’s go eat, wherever you want, grab lunch, or coffee, or a dessert, please. My treat. But, please, at least listen to me this once.”

Nazgul stopped, considering the idea. Come to think of it, she wasn’t due at home for another couple of hours, and, true, she could use some food, especially from a place her parents would never let her step anywhere near.

“I’m surprised Seyfo doesn’t let you come here,” the woman said, and Nazgul felt weird hearing her call Baba that. Seyfo. No one had ever called him by that name. To everyone around them, he was Seyfullah Hoca, the imam.

“Why?”

“When we met, these were the only places he’d visit,” she smiled with a sort of nostalgia, and for a split second Nazgul indulged in the thought that she might miss him. “You could always find him with one of those guitars in his hand, I forgot the name—”

“Bağlama,” Nazgul said.

“Yeah, that’s the one.”

“He still plays it.”

“I bet. He was really good! Wow, kiddo, I wish you could’ve seen him back then.” In her eyes, Nazgul could see the light of those who revisit a memory that still brings them happiness. “He was just captivating, there was something about him. And he would get with his Kurdish friends and they would just sing and sing for hours. And, Naz, gosh, he had this liveliness to him, his voice, and when he looked at you and flashed you with his smile, wow, you might as well be the only person in the room.”

Baba playing bağlama, she knew, but smiling? That one was hard to picture. She had always known him as this serious man, very into his business, straight to the point. But yet again, the Baba that she knew wouldn’t visit Kurdish cafes or restaurants, much less within walking distance from the Kurdish Center. The Baba the woman was describing might as well be a completely different man. And he was; that man was Seyfo.

“Was that before or after you started sleeping with people for money?” Nagul heard herself say, and the smile that the woman was sporting fell flat in a matter of seconds, as she looked down at the spread the waiter had brought a bit earlier.

“We don’t have to talk about that right now,” she said. “Why don’t you let me tell you some more stories? Like the first time your dad prepared a spread like this, he even baked the bread himself, or so he said.”

She let out a little giggle as if, trying to get her on her side, but Naz did her best to remain unfazed. She did want to, though, to listen to some more stories of the Baba of before, of Seyfo. But that wasn’t why they were there, at least not Naz.

“You can tell me stories later. For now, all I want to know is why you decided it was better to sleep with people for money than to stay with us and be my mom.”

There was s pain in her words that she didn’t know existed.

“Naz, it’s not like that. There are two sides to every story, I just don’t know how much of this is appropriate to talk about with a seventeen-year-old. So, first, why don’t you tell me what you know, or better yet what they told you about me.”

“Why won’t you tell me your version, plain and simple?”

“Hmm, okay,” the woman said, with a look that said she was ready to give up. “Then, why don’t we do it this way, just ask me questions. Things you want to know.”

“Why do you sleep with people for money?” Naz insisted.

“Listen, Naz,” the woman said, her tone slightly more serious. “We can start with that one, but I feel that we aren’t close enough yet for me to be truly honest, so I’ll probably just waste your time with half-truths. Why don’t you try a different question first?”

“Okay,” Naz said, surprised at how easily she’d been convinced, yet knowing it was only because she had a more pressing question to ask, “did you meet Baba because he was your client?”