I woke to Muezzin Rashid’s morning prayer Fajr Adhan. It had been four weeks since Papa died—an eternity. With my eyes closed, I saw a lark flying in the blue sky between the sea and a rainbow, fluttering her wings in rhythm with Muezzin Rashid’s vocal trills. If I could only stay like this forever in the haven of my bed. No comrades wagging their accusing fingers in my face. No college peers making nasty grimaces behind my back. None of Mama’s muffled sobs nibbling at my heart from across the hallway. Nothing but my little blue universe.
I pulled the blanket over my face.
A mistake. The blanket’s camel hair muted the chant. Darkness swallowed the blue. Silence trapped me in its cave, with tritones of shame and regret creeping inside my ears.
I threw the blanket to the side. A cold draft brushed against my body, seeping into my skin. The balcony door was ajar; the rain pattered against the glass. Droplets streamed down, filling a puddle underneath the door and continuing along the gaps in the parquet floor. The curtain was soaking wet like the sail of a boat flapping in a crosswind. Outside, nothing but dull skies and Muezzin Rashid’s last inflections fading away like autumn leaves.
A knock on the front door. I wrapped a scarf around my shoulders and ran barefoot through the hallway.
“Who’s there?”
“It’s me.”
Almaz. Shrunken to bare bones and skin since I last saw her at the Seventh Day ceremony after Aunty Zeinab’s suicide.
“Can I come in?” she said, looking down at her feet, blinking.
Her face was pale, her lips as shredded as if she’d been chewing on broken glass. In her arms she held a large bundle wrapped in a yellow tablecloth. She knew Mama had left for work. Otherwise she wouldn’t have dared to show up.
I hesitated. She slipped in anyway, closing the door behind her.
“We need to talk,” she said.
“I have nothing to say to you.”
“But I have something to say to you. Something I have to say…before I leave. Because we might never see each other again.”
Never see each other again?
“Why? Where are you going?” I said in a flat voice, holding back anxiety.
“Papa is taking me to Kishlak Gadzhi later today to marry me off to a cousin. A widower. To wash his hands of my shame.”
I thought of a small, desolate village high in the Caucasus Mountains where Almaz and I once spent a few days in the summer. Even then it was cold, in a rocky cavity surrounded by glaciers, with toilets outside and no plumbing. My heart shrank with sorrow.
“I know you hate me,” Almaz said somberly, looking down, “and there is nothing I can do to make up for what happened. All I can say is that I am sorry…so sorry…that I wish I had never been born. I wish your mama had never saved me.”
“What do you expect me to do? To forgive you?” I choked back tears. “I always knew that you were jealous of my family. But never did I imagine you would sneak behind my back, bewitching, destroying Papa. Making him love you so madly that he completely lost his sense of judgment.”
“You’re wrong, Leila. He never loved me. And I did nothing—nothing—to entice him. Yes, Mekhti Rashidovich was my idol. Yes, I was jealous that you had your papa and I had mine. Because I always wanted my papa to be like yours—important and powerful. And yes, I wanted to get approval from Mekhti Rashidovich, to impress him—”
“Well,” I uttered bitterly, “you obviously succeeded—”
“He made me do it,” Almaz cried. “Right here, in his smoking room…the first time… It happened three years ago, when you went with Mama to Swallow Nest in the summer. He called on the phone and asked me to bring him some coriander for his tea. I came over…and he asked me to kiss him, the way we did when we were kids, when you and I climbed in his lap and kissed him on both cheeks. I felt embarrassed, but I was afraid to disappoint him.
“And then everything happened so quickly…fear…pain…feeling both special and dirty…” Almaz paused, staring into space, her face shadowed by hurt and shame. “Afterward, he blamed me for provoking him, for unleashing his male instincts. He threatened to send me away for spreading malicious lies and ruining his reputation if I ever opened my mouth to anyone about what had happened. I started crying, and suddenly he became his old self, kindhearted and caring, telling me that I was his beautiful little girl. Which made me feel guilty, as if I had caused injury to an invincible man. I thought he regretted what happened and would never do it again… Only I was wrong.”
I stood still, with my head down, afraid to look at Almaz, feeling the intensity of her eyes on me. I knew that Almaz had told the truth. I remembered how Papa blamed me for provoking Farhad. That’s the wicked power that you women have over men, he had said.
What wicked power could a twelve-year-old girl have?
But what could I say? I was trapped, torn emotionally. If I accepted Almaz’s truth, then I would be disloyal to Papa, betraying his memory.
“It’s easy to blame someone who can’t defend himself,” I finally said sheepishly, avoiding Almaz’s gaze.
She took a deep, exasperated breath. “All right, Leila. Then I’d better go. But at least let me give you some advice before I leave.”
“Advice? About what?”
“About your situation. Please don’t be stubborn. Just hear me. There are plenty of people around who’d be happy to see you fall, take Allah as my witness.” Almaz pinched her fingers together and raised her arms in the air, the way Aunty Zeinab used to do. “I wouldn’t be surprised if someone staged this whole investigation about you and the Mukhtarovs.”
“What do you mean?”
“You see, your papa… He had a generous heart and liked to live in grand style. Many people ate and drank at his table and were willing to cut off their right hands if he had asked. He had many friends then. But now he has a hundred times more enemies.”
“But why? Why would they turn on Papa…on me now?”
“An exposed red apple invites a stone,” Almaz quoted an old mesel. “And you are exposed now. Every vulture around has been eyeing a piece for himself: your papa’s collection, your apartment, your mama’s position, the Badalbeili name.”
“You’re ridiculous. Who can take my name away?”
“Your Papa’s cousin.”
“Uncle Mahmoud?”
Essek—donkey—Papa called him.
“Even a donkey dreams of a fancy saddle,” Almaz said. “If your reputation is smeared, he’s the one to wear the Badalbeili crown. And so it goes.”
Maybe there was some truth in Almaz’s words. Since Papa’s funeral, it seemed Mama and I had been living in a lonely desert, as if a forceful Khazri had blown Papa’s high-placed Party-member friends away. Everyone who had something to lose tried to disassociate himself from Papa’s disgrace. Only his boyhood friend, Uncle Anatoly, visited us every day, bringing fresh fruit and roses from his garden, along with his openhearted smile. But he had no connections within the Party and could do nothing to help my situation.
“Even if what you’re saying is true,” I said defensively, “Mama still has many people who love her, who owe her their lives.”
“They might love her with all their hearts, but no one seems to be rushing to attend to a fallen mare. Don’t forget, Leila. We women are mares—to be paraded around grandly so long as there’s a powerful rider on top.”
“Enough. I think you should go.” I turned to leave the room. “I’ve got enough gloom without your—”
“I didn’t come to upset you. I want to help.”
“How? By telling me how awful everyone is? Not much help there. They’ve turned me into a sortu. They’re accusing me of debauchery, immoral conduct, hiding under a chador in order to prostitute myself—”
“I have a plan,” Almaz cut me off. “I’m going today to the Baku Central Komsomol Committee to write a report that there has been a mistake. That they’ve unjustly accused you of my wrongdoing. That it was me—not you—wearing the chador and going to Ashuglar Street. And that when they caught you outside the shop, it was my fault because I begged you to go there and return some money I owed to the Mukhtarovs.”
Tears clogged my eyes. “You’d do this for me?”
“Of course. You’re my sister, for life and beyond,” she said.
Oh, how I wanted to put my arms around Almaz and cry together so our tears could wash the past away, even if only for a brief moment.
“Thank you for wanting to help me,” I said instead. “But your plan won’t work.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’ve already admitted my relationship with the Mukhtarovs.”
Almaz frowned, biting her lips. “That’s not good. Now you have to take action.”
“How?”
“Blame the Mukhtarovs. Write a letter to the First Secretary. Beg for forgiveness. Claim that they poisoned you with their hex, threatened you or something like that. Show yourself as a victim corrupted by the Mukhtarovs.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s all lies. And I’ll prove them wrong.”
“Perverdigara! Oh my God!” Almaz threw up her hands. “They don’t need your proof. They’re foxes. And foxes use their tails as their witnesses.”
“I can’t purge the Mukhtarovs. They have done nothing but good for me.”
“No one cares about the Mukhtarovs. It’s you they’re after. It’s you they’re using as a qapazalti, a scapegoat, to teach a lesson in obedience to others. To show that when it comes to their Communist justice, your privileged background and all your accomplishments don’t matter. As for your Mukhtarovs—they might spend a few days in jail, but I’ve heard Miriam’s kid has a nice krysha dealing hashish and other things for comrades. They’ll keep him out of trouble for as long as he’s useful. So you better worry about yourself. And your mama.”
Almaz sniffled, a sad smile pulling the inside corners of her eyes down. She shut them tight, then opened them, using the eyelids as blotters to dry the tears.
“I better get going,” she said. “And this is for you to remember me.” She laid her package on the table and left in haste.
I unfolded the package. Inside lay Almaz the Doll in an Islamic dress with the red Pioneer tie around her neck, her jade eyes pure, her hair hidden modestly under a scarf. Almaz’s most treasured possession and the source of her great vanity. She had left her with me.
I pressed Almaz the Doll against my chest, carried her to my room, and placed her lovingly on top of my piano between the photograph of Mama, Papa, and me, and the marble bust of Sergei Rachmaninoff.
• • •
Like a mouse, I scurried through the back entrance of the Conservatory and up the oval staircase to the second floor, my face buried inside the loop of my scarf. I chose the shadowy corner behind Lenin’s sculpture and hid there, imprinting myself into the wall. Waiting—dreading—the approach of four o’clock. My first piano lesson in four weeks. And the first time I would face Professor Sultan-zade since Papa’s funeral.
Had the rumors of my indecent behavior reached her? And if so, would she scream at me—loud enough for the entire Conservatory and ten blocks around it to hear—before throwing me out of her practice room? It was the worst thing that could happen now, just five and a half months before the Budapest piano competition. I needed this win more than ever—my only real opportunity to redeem myself and make the horror and humiliation of the past few weeks go away.
The light flickered in one of the sconces down the long, dim corridor. One, two, three…one, two, three…one, two, three… How fitting was the pulse of a waltz. Robert Schumann’s Papillons was playing behind the door of Professor Sultan-zade’s rehearsal studio. I listened to the legato passages, smooth and silky, like the wings of a butterfly touching the keys. Who was playing? I didn’t remember any of her students working on this piece. Besides, the performance had something of a Vladimir Horowitz emotional carelessness that could never come from any of her apprentices.
The “Waltz in F-sharp Minor” modulated into the “E-flat Major Polonaise,” the melodies as intertwined as the vines on the frieze running along the vaulted ceiling. I recalled Professor Sultan-zade saying once that Schumann’s Papillons was her cure for melancholy, a masquerade of moods and masks, whirling her into a dance, making her careless.
I squinted, my eyelids trembling. A thousand yellow butterflies dispersed in the air—one for every staccato flying out of the rehearsal studio. In pairs, they twirled in the dance steps of the Papillon’s “D Major Waltz,” leaping across the corridor, luring me to follow, drawing me into a fantasy.
“I didn’t expect you.”
Professor Sultan-zade stood at the threshold of her studio, dressed in a coat and clearly ready to leave. Instinctively, I peeped behind her to see who was playing the Schumann. But no one was at the piano. So it had been my professor herself giving that airy, stirring performance of Schumann’s Papillons. The best I’d ever heard.
“I came for my lesson,” I said.
Without saying a word, Professor Sultan-zade led me inside the practice room and closed the door behind us. Then, still wearing her coat, she lit a cigarette and walked to the window, the pervasive marcato of her heels crashing against the floor. Each step a rejection. Each step a drumbeat of remorse.
I waited near the door, terrified, tears pouring down my cheeks, while she stood at the window in smoke-filled silence.
“Animals,” she muttered angrily. “Absolute animals. To strike you at the time you’re grieving.” Her hand clutched the collar of her coat, tightening it into a fist as if trying to block the air, to restrain her throat from speaking. “Why? Why did you give an excuse to your enemy to destroy you?”
“What enemy?” I asked, confused.
She released the collar, cleared her throat. “You’re so naive, Leila. Don’t you understand that there is a whole world of politics behind every success? Consider this: our new rector doesn’t have any significant connections within the Ministry of Culture. Meanwhile, our former rector—with all his relations in the Party—now heads the rival Azerbaijani State Institute of Arts. And he’s determined to put his institution on the map. To do so, he will stop at nothing.
“I’m almost convinced that he’s behind the hounding to purge you from participation in the Budapest competition. Then they can have their student, that talentless Sharipov boy—or whatever his name—the one who took second place at the regional competition—to represent Azerbaijan in Budapest.”
“But, Professor, I haven’t done anything—”
“You’ve done enough and more to destroy your entire life, Leila. Didn’t I warn you months ago when you showed me the Vladimir Horowitz album? What did I say to you? Stay on course and away from murky waters. Dedicate yourself to building your career and future. Because the only altar for you to worship at should be the altar of music. The rest is mere garbage. But you didn’t listen to me. Do you know why?”
I shook my head.
“Because everything came too easy to you. When I was your age, I dreamed of becoming a concert pianist. My parents couldn’t afford a piano, so I befriended a janitor at my school, and she allowed me to practice on a broken, out-of-tune piano in the evenings. But no matter how hard I tried, I just wasn’t good enough.
“While you had the perfect hands, musicality, and charisma right from the start. You didn’t have to work hard—you’re a natural. And unfortunately, you are also spoiled and reckless. You wanted to play the piano—your parents bought you an exclusive Bösendorfer. You won the competition—you received costly jewelry. All of which distorted your sense of reality, making you feel impervious to its dangers.”
Professor Sultan-zade threw her cigarette out the window, came over to me, and took my hands between hers, rubbing them softly as she always did before recitals.
“This system can be brutal,” she said in a low voice. “Very brutal. And now you’ve gotten yourself trapped between its grindstones.”
“Professor, please trust me,” I whispered in fast presto, touched by her compassion and desperate to prove my innocence to her. “The rumors, whatever you’ve heard about my indecent behavior—they are lies. Yes, I did spend a lot of time with the Mukhtarovs, but they are incredible people. They are cultural and intellectual and artistic. Tahir is a painter, and his grandmother, Miriam Mukhtarova, used to be a famous mezzo long time ago, before the Revolution. She sang with Feodor Chaliapin. She told me stories about Sergei Rachmaninoff. They were friends. Please believe me. I’m not a sortu. I haven’t dishonored myself. Please believe me—”
“I do. I know who you are, Leila. I know you very well. I’ve known you for six years, since you were a little girl—always inquisitive, adventurous, and oh, so unique. Nothing will ever make me doubt your integrity.”
Professor Sultan-zade hesitated, then put her arm around me—something she had never done before. “I will help as much as I can. Meanwhile, let Mozart heal your broken heart. The way Schumann keeps mine together. Remember—the hurt is the place where the music enters you.”
“I’m sorry, Professor. I’m so sorry.” I wept, her empathy breaking down all my defenses.
“I know you are.”
Professor Sultan-zade hastily removed her arm, as if feeling uncomfortable for revealing her softness, and marched back to the window.
“Why are you waiting there by the door?” she said, assuming her usual pedagogical articulation. “We’ve already wasted ten minutes of your lesson.”
Like Schumann’s Papillons, I took my wings to the piano.
“Czerny, The Art of Finger Dexterity,” Professor Sultan-zade announced. She lit a cigarette and turned away toward the darkening sky, as if losing interest in me.
But she couldn’t fool me anymore. Despite her gruff exterior, I knew Professor Sultan-zade cared deeply about me, vowing me her support while compromising her own position.
• • •
On my way home, I took a shortcut through Mercury Plaza—an old fountain where the Greek god Mercury once stood beneath a large rotunda surrounded by mulberry trees. On a hot summer day, there was no better place in town to hide from the scorching rays of the Baku sun.
But no more. The mulberry trees had been cut, the rotunda turned into a mound of eroded bricks. Mercury lay next to it deposed, still holding on to his wand with two serpents entwined in mortal combat. When Almaz and I were young, we believed that at night, when no one was around, Mercury waved his magic wand, stepped off the pedestal, and flew into the star-studded sky to carry his messages.
Chechen workers sat cross-legged on a rug decorated with peacocks under the only surviving mulberry tree, drinking tea and counting prayer beads. Bulldozers circled the area like hungry hyenas, their teeth bared, juices flowing, eager to finish devouring Mercury Plaza.
One more page of my cloudless past had been torn off. I kicked a pile of dead leaves. The wind followed through, snatching and lifting them high into the air—a pageant of purples, dark reds, flame reds, browns, and yellows flitting in their last autumn dance.
I sped up. I knew what I had to do. To see Almaz before she left. To hold her close, as I used to, to hide my face inside her hair and to tell her how much I needed her. Even now. Especially now.
The rug at the entrance to Almaz’s apartment was in place. I pushed it out of the way. The door behind was wide open. Inside, nothing but bare walls and the scent of Aunty Zeinab’s saffron plov. And in the corner, propped against the iron-cast stove, was their wedding mirror with its Koran inscription. Shattered, with lightning bolts flying across its cracked surface.
I came closer and traced carefully one of the protruding slivers with the tip of my finger. Papa’s eyes followed me, night black, their cradles overflowing with tears.
I closed my hand into a fist and pressed it against the broken mirror, grinding it in, hard, hypnotized by the streaks of red running down the sliced reflection of my face. Papa’s face.
“Why? Why did you do it? Why? And why did you save me? Why didn’t you just let me die?”