18

Recognitions and a Tower

Just before dawn on wednesday morning, Kosmas delivered his beloved and her package of apple strudel to Gavriela’s door. After looking up and down the street to make sure that no one was watching, Kosmas backed Daphne against the building wall, grabbed her bottom, and lifted her to his height. He caressed her lips with his, nibbled her, and pulled her tongue into his mouth. It was almost as if they were making love again. But he knew he couldn’t keep her there for long. Indiscreet eyes were numerous, and even if they couldn’t cause a scandal in a secular neighborhood like Cihangir, gossip was never pleasant.

“I’ve got to go,” said Daphne. “If my aunt’s neighbors see . . .”

“Tomorrow night?”

She nodded yes and pulled away.

Kosmas returned to the Lily, where he found Uncle Mustafa sweeping white buttons and other debris from the kitchen floor. Not once in his life had Kosmas left the kitchen in disorder. He started to apologize, but Uncle Mustafa patted his shoulder and said, “All my life I dreamed of getting Madame Bahar onto this countertop. You know, the one who comes for strawberry tart on Saturdays. Now I’d break my back if I tried. I’m glad somebody finally put this kitchen to good use.”

“I might be falling in love,” said Kosmas.

“Are congratulations in order?”

Kosmas hesitated. “Not yet.”

“Let me guess.” Uncle Mustafa leaned the broom against the counter and poured their morning tea into tulip glasses. “Rea can’t stand Daphne.”

“It’s more complicated than that. I’m ashamed to admit it . . .”

“Take the fava bean out of your mouth, son.”

“Her father’s Muslim. You know my mother’s not prejudiced, but if things got serious with Daphne, it would be a problem.”

“Of course,” said Uncle Mustafa. “And if it weren’t that, it would be that Daphne’s feet were too big or too small, or her hair too blond or too black.”

Kosmas stared at Uncle Mustafa: his expression was blank, as if he were discussing a supply order. But he had to be joking. Rea wasn’t that bad.

“The problem isn’t Mom,” said Kosmas. “Daphne’s got a fiancé in America, and she’s leaving on Sunday. So this is probably a temporary summer thing.”

Uncle Mustafa took a sip of tea. “Either that,” he said, “or you’d better get to work.”

“Meaning?”

“I mean that maybe you shouldn’t let this chance slip by.”

“The thing is . . . I always thought I’d marry a Rum, to keep our community and traditions alive.”

“That’s understandable, son. Anyway, it’s not always easy for a Muslim girl to marry a Christian boy. Just because it’s legally possible doesn’t mean that getting her family to accept you will be easy.”

“She’s Christian. Or at least so she says.”

“I see.” Uncle Mustafa switched into Greek, which he spoke reasonably well when he wanted to: “To vrikes, to thes kai ksyrismeno.” You’ve finally found a pussy and now you want it shaved.

“Excuse me?”

Uncle Mustafa reverted to Turkish: “Your father’s favorite saying. You got what you wanted, but now it’s not perfect enough.”

Kosmas was speechless. Such hard talk wasn’t like subtle Uncle Mustafa. And Kosmas had certainly never heard his father say that.

“Anyway”—Uncle Mustafa glanced at the apron still lying on the floor—“you’d better tie ribbons to the back door. In case I come to work early.”

“Good idea,” said Kosmas.

On Saturday morning, after yet another night of lovemaking at the Lily, Daphne snatched a few hours of sleep and awoke to the characteristic message alert of her Turkish cell phone. It had to be from Kosmas. Not yet ready to open her eyes, she pressed her face into the starched pillow and thought about the past three nights. On Wednesday, Kosmas had taken her on a Vespa ride to Rumelifeneri, a village on the shores of the Bosporus and the Black Sea; they had picnicked on fresh tomatoes, goat cheese, boiled eggs, and olives in the arch of a Byzantine castle while waves rushed against the rocks beneath them. On Thursday evening, they had gone for coffee at a chic café in Teşvikiye and lounged on couches while drinking latte macchiato, talking about their childhoods, and admiring the rose bushes surrounding the illuminated mosque. On Friday, they had gone to a rembetiko club, which led to Daphne’s second tsifteteli performance. The scene that had followed at the Lily was the reason she was having such a hard time getting out of bed now.

She reached over to the nightstand, grabbed her phone, and rubbed the sleepies out of her eyes. The message, however, was not from Kosmas. It was from Lidia, an Argentine friend in Miami. “Mira tu email, nena.” Check your email, girl.

Daphne pushed herself to a sitting position, slid her feet into her flip-flops, and stumbled into the kitchen, where her aunt was already busy peeling potatoes. “Coffee,” she said.

“Not yet,” said Gavriela. “You’ve been out with him until four a.m. every night since Tuesday. I want to know: is he that good?”

Daphne scrunched both eyes shut for a second and smiled.

Gavriela paused mid-peel and grinned mischievously. “Who’d have guessed?”

“I’m thinking about breaking up with Paul. I can’t keep cheating on him like this. I feel guilty.”

“Paul’s been cheating on you for months, little mama, if not years.”

“I don’t know if that’s true. He dances with other women, and he’s told a few lies, but I doubt he’s actually slept with any of them.”

Gavriela raised her eyebrows and resumed her potato peeling. “You know best.”

Daphne cut a piece from the tsoureki bread Kosmas had baked on Wednesday. “I’m going to break up with him as soon as I get back.”

“Better late than never,” said Gavriela.

Daphne kissed her aunt’s cheek. “I’d do it now, but telephone breakups are insensitive.”

Back in her room, Daphne sat down at her little desk. While waiting for her laptop to start up, she took a bite of tsoureki: in its perfumy mastic and mahleb flavors hid memories of a midnight picnic—and endless kisses—at Rumelifeneri. Daphne had never expected that a mama’s-boy pâtissier would kiss so well.

She found Lidia’s email with the title Lo siento mucho: “Nena, forgive me for being the bearer of bad news, but you always said you’d want to know. Paul was with Luciana at La Rosa Negra last night, snuggling in a corner. Cristina says they’re sleeping together. I’m so sorry. That tramp isn’t worth the heels of your shoes.”

Daphne pulled up Luciana’s public Facebook page, which identified her as an actress-model-dancer-singer-songwriter. At the very top of the timeline were two photos of Luciana and Paul in a close embrace, as well as a video of them dancing together. She clicked through to Luciana’s website and skimmed the online CV. The first professional qualification was Luciana’s bust size: 42. The second was her waist: 25. The third her hips: 38. It seemed that she was the Dolly Parton of tango. Daphne then scrolled through the photos of Luciana’s modeling days, over ten years before: there were topless shots, bare rear shots, open-mouthed come-hither poses. What kind of woman put photos like that on the internet, published her cell-phone number to the world, and listed her measurements as if they were diplomas?

The initial adrenaline rush and shock had blocked Daphne’s emotions, but now tears of wounded pride slithered down her cheeks. Her relationship with Paul was a lie. She was just a cover, the good girl he presented at work and to parents while escorts and prostitutes fulfilled his real desires. Aunt Gavriela had been right.

“Here’s your coffee, little mama,” said Gavriela, startling Daphne. Her aunt had entered silently and now stood behind her, staring at the photos of Luciana. “Now there’s an artiste if I ever saw one.”

“Paul’s new girlfriend.”

Gavriela hissed like a snake. “I hope you told him to eat shit?”

Daphne picked up her cell phone. “Right now.”

“That’s my girl. Send him to the devil and then come out for more tsoureki. It’s absolutely divine.”

As soon as Gavriela had left the room, Daphne called Paul. Despite his being a tango night owl, he hadn’t been answering late calls for the past week. So Daphne was surprised when he picked up after only three rings. Juan d’Arienzo’s “El rey del compás” was playing in the background.

“Where are you?” said Daphne.

“The Biltmore.”

That was where they had met. At a tango lesson Lidia had dragged her to. Daphne remembered how courteous Paul had been in comparison with the other tango leches. She recalled the wainscoted walls, the portable dance floor that kept coming apart; Paul had carefully led her away from the gaps so that she wouldn’t trip.

“Do you have something to tell me?” she asked, after the long pause.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Paul.

“Luciana.”

“That again? She’s just somebody to dance with.”

“Is that what you were doing at La Rosa Negra?”

“Nothing happened.”

“Do you know she posted photos of you on Facebook?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know that she has her bust size on her site?”

“Yeeees.”

“And that she’s done soft porn?”

“She’s a dance partner, for Christ’s sake!”

“I’m not that stupid, Paul.”

Silence.

Daphne said, “If you want someone else, fine. But why the lies? Couldn’t you at least have had the respect to—”

“We’ve become so different. And you’re not so into tango anymore.”

“So you got yourself a whore?”

“A dance partner.”

“I’m not even going to ask if she was the first.”

A woman shouted in the background: “Paulito! Is that you over there?”

Daphne wanted to throw the phone out the window. “Go make your date for the evening before somebody else reserves her. I’ll send my dad for my stuff.” She hung up, closed her laptop, and went to find her aunt.

Gavriela was sitting in a living-room armchair with her pudgy legs crossed. She took a sip of coffee from a gold-rimmed demitasse cup, turned her face into the bright light streaming through the sheer curtains, and said, “Did you shit on him well, little mama?”

Daphne collapsed onto the footstool beside Gavriela. “Yes.”

“Enjoyed it?”

“Not at all, Auntie.” Daphne whimpered. “I knew it was over, but now it’s like it was all a lie from the very—”

Gavriela set her coffee on the side table. “Stop it right now. You’ve been with Kosmas all week.”

“I know, but that woman . . .”

“Would you have preferred a man?”

“If she’s what he really wanted—a porn star with fake boobs—then why was he ever with me? It’s my self-image.”

“Ay, siktir,” Gabriella hissed. Like most Rums, she preferred the Turkish phrase for fuck to the Greek. “This is ridiculous. Your self-image comes from yourself, little mama, not from any Paul, nor any Kosmas. Who cares whom that monoglot American is doing? You gave him the road, now shut the door and move on. A man with such bad taste is not worth any woman’s tears. So stop that sniveling, make yourself pretty, and go see Kosmas. He’s the perfect cream for your sunburn.”

That same afternoon, Kosmas took a short break while waiting for Mr. and Mrs. iPhone’s icing to set in the refrigerator. He made himself a double Turkish coffee, took the first volume of Recipes of Hamdi the Pastry Chef from the safe, and set it on the office desk to peruse while he sipped his coffee, but he soon found himself lost in a labyrinth of recipes without any sort of organization. Some of the titles and directions were blotted out by liquid and food marks, and what Kosmas could make out was so interesting that he couldn’t resist taking notes. Losing track of time, he studied the recipes of mysterious confections such as a thirteenth-century quince murabba preserve and a Crimean kaysefe made from fresh apple boiled in water and butter along with dried white mulberries, figs, raisins, and cinnamon. Kosmas was completely taken in by a recipe for memuniyye: fried dumplings made from shredded chicken, almonds, rosewater, rice flour, and honey. Mehmet the Conqueror had so enjoyed memuniyye that they had become a standard dish at Topkapı Palace and the crowning delight of a banquet given in honor of the Venetian ambassador, Andrea Badoero, in 1574.

“How’s it going?” asked Uncle Mustafa, poking his head into the office.

Kosmas jumped to his feet. “What time is it?”

“Twenty past four.”

“Damn it. I’m going to be late with that cake.”

Kosmas wheeled the cake trolley out of the freezer, drove lollipop sticks into the fourth tier, settled the fifth on top, and gave the cake a slight jiggle to test its structural integrity.

“Finding that recipe is going to take a while,” said Kosmas to Uncle Mustafa. “It’s almost impossible to skim Hamdi’s books because you might miss something, so you have to really read, and his writing is so fascinating that you get swallowed up by the palace history and completely forget what you’re looking for.”

“All things in good time,” said Uncle Mustafa. “Except that cake. If you’re late with that, we’re in big trouble. Because we want to expand, remember?”

Kosmas nodded and began sticking prepared lilies into the dowel-enforced green florist foam at the base of Mr. and Mrs. iPhone’s cake. He nestled some flowers close to the foam while allowing others to extend slightly over the black-rimmed plate. Another masterpiece. He was going to get that next-door shop space. And he was going to find the Balkanik as well. It was simply a matter of perseverance.

Kosmas folded the protective box flaps up and over the cake and suddenly realized he hadn’t given any thought to where he would take Daphne that evening. It had to be something special. Things were going well, better than he could have expected, but every time he hinted that Daphne should stay past Sunday, she changed the subject. He loaded the cake into the refrigerated delivery truck, returned to the kitchen, and picked up his cell phone. Just as he was about to push the call button, he heard a knock at the back door. He opened and found Daphne wearing dark sunglasses even though the sun had already slipped behind the buildings of Sıraselviler Avenue. He wrapped his hands around the base of her neck and pulled her toward him. “This is a pleasant surprise,” he said.

“I gave Paul the road, as my aunt says. We broke up.”

“Are you okay?”

Daphne took off her dark sunglasses. Her eyelids were swollen. “I’m fine. I was just a bit shocked when I found out that he’d taken up with somebody else. A putana. Literally.”

Kosmas felt as if his chest were being wrung out, like a towel. What was wrong with him? This was what he wanted, but . . . Plan B. That was it. He wanted Daphne, but not if he was her second choice now things hadn’t worked out with the American.

“My aunt said I shouldn’t tell you because it would lower me in your eyes,” said Daphne, “but I can’t help it.”

“Nothing would ever lower you in my eyes,” said Kosmas. He bit his bottom lip. There was no longer a rival, he repeated to himself. This was no longer a fling. But she’d been crying for another man. He felt a burning sensation in his stomach. He released Daphne and grasped the counter.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“It’s probably just indigestion . . .”

“I’ll get you a glass of water.”

And to think that today he’d been going to tell her he loved her.

She grabbed a glass and filled it from the demijohn. “Here,” she said, handing it to him.

He set the glass on the counter without even taking a sip. “I don’t want to be your Plan B.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? I was going to break up with him anyway. I’m upset because my pride was hurt, not because he broke my heart.”

Kosmas stepped backward. They had to leave that kitchen, breathe some fresh air, get some perspective. Otherwise he might say something he’d regret. “Wait here,” he said.

He hurried into the lavatory and put on the blue dress shirt his mother had ironed for him that morning, after he told her he would be going out on his last date with Daphne directly after work. Upon hearing the word “last,” Rea had recovered from the knee pain that had prevented her from ironing that week. She had gone straight to her board, ironed a blue shirt with perfect arm creases, and said, “Tell Daphne I wish her a wonderful trip!”

Returning to the kitchen, Kosmas took Daphne’s hand. “Come on. I want to show you something.” They rode the Vespa to Galata and parked outside a tourist shop that sold hammam towels, soap, and evil-eye charms. He led her through the tower square, which was frustratingly crowded. Western tourists and bohemian Turks sat in the cafés, loitered on benches, took photos, and smoked profusely. They rounded the corner of the old Genoese wall and found themselves at the foot of the nine-story, cone-capped tower whose solidity had always impressed Kosmas. He hadn’t been inside it in years, but he remembered the feeling of pride and certainty that its view had given him as a schoolboy. Up there, he knew that the City belonged to him just as much as he belonged to it. He could look down on the place where his ancestors had lived for centuries and know that, whatever obstacles stood in his path, he could always rise to the occasion. Perhaps Daphne might feel the same way.

They climbed the outer steps, bought their tickets, and took the elevator to the fifth floor, from which they climbed another two flights up a narrow medieval staircase. Kosmas led Daphne along the narrow and crowded observation deck to the side facing the Old City. From there one could observe the Golden Horn, the low tourist boats sliding under the Galata Bridge, the Ottoman palace of Topkapı nestled in the trees of the Byzantine peninsula, the dome of Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque with its six minarets, and the sun descending through the pollution haze. Seagulls swooped, dove, and squawked. Horns honked on the busy streets of Lower Galata. The wind, now salty, clean, and unmixed with cigarette smoke, lifted and tangled Daphne’s hair.

She pointed toward a row of old Ottoman houses at the foot of the tower. “Look at all those beautiful oriel windows. I wonder if I’ll ever get mine.”

“You will if you move here,” said Kosmas, embracing her from behind so that the tourists wouldn’t jostle her. He wouldn’t say how much he wanted her to remain in Istanbul. That was her decision now. She had to make it without his help.

Daphne remained silent. An especially strong gust rushed up from the Bosporus. A seagull on its way past the tower hovered before them, unable to advance despite the energetic flapping of its wings. “I’m in love with the City,” said Daphne.

“Love isn’t a little of this and a little of that,” said Kosmas.

“What are you talking about?”

Kosmas felt the burning in his stomach again. “It’s total and complete, Daphne, no bullshit. Solve your problem with this guy, then decide what you want.”

She reached behind her, took his cheeks in her hands, pulled his head down, and kissed the scar above his brow. “I’m in love with you,” she said.

“That’s not the impression you gave an hour ago.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

Kosmas realized that his jealousy was ruining the moment. He had to get control of himself. “I love you, too, Daphne. But our love has to be steadfast. Like this tower.”

She returned her gaze to the minarets of Hagia Sophia. “I’m thinking of coming back here to stay.”

Kosmas squeezed her more tightly. He didn’t want to let her go, not then, not ever. But he needed to know that she was just as sure. “Moving here requires decision and determination,” he said.

“I know. And my parents are against it. Would you visit me in Miami? If they met you, then maybe . . .”

Kosmas felt his throat contract. “I’m booked for weddings through Christmas.”

“January, then.”

Daphne had the stubbornness of a camel. Which meant that she was Istanbul Rum through and through. Kosmas yielded: “In January.”