28-07

The woman lifted her to her feet with an icy hand. Her emaciated fingers gripped her wrist tightly, as if in a vice.

Her fingernail had cut into the skin, highlighted by the blue of her veins.

Fine dust particles swirled around the cave's gas lamp, its flickering light casting shadows in every corner.

Despite the cave's seemingly enormous entrance, they had crawled in.

Their voices echoed off the cave walls.

Berivan had quickly pushed her inside, saving her life. She reached out from under her shawl and grasped her with a skinny hand.

Ayşe tried to close her eyes as best she could. When she touched her face with her hands, it felt cold, her fingers numb.

Ayşe ran her fingers over her eyes; Berivan's cheeks were flushed, but they were hot, and her hands were beginning to tremble.

"Your hands are shaking," Ayşe said.

"It's because of you, Berivan," Berivan said.

Berivan felt as if every part of her was rusted. The gears that made her body tick began to grind against each other. M. had already begun to snore. He began to caress her hair, dimly lit by the gas lamp. Berivan looked into her eyes and said, "How beautiful you are, Ayşe."

Can I kiss you?

Is this how your life goes?

Do you embrace each other and have lesbian relationships for warmth while hiding from the bombs in the cave?

What about you?

Have you ever been with a woman in your life?

I'm grateful to you for saving my life, but that doesn't mean I'm going to have a relationship with you.

"Come on, Ayşe," he whispered, "you can do it."

Then he squinted his eyes and finally saw.

The wall Ayşe was leaning against was like a giant mirror, reflecting everything inside, as well as the memory of those voices. It was like a giant mirror, hiding everything in the night as she wandered through the forest. It was as if she had worn a sock of wet mud on the toe of her boot; the mud was slowly hardening.

Berivan pulled blackberries from her pocket; the black ones were plump, the red ones in small pieces.

They had entered a new phase of hunger; she couldn't eat even if she wanted to. A few blankets lay in the corner, and a quilt with indistinct patterns. It had been placed in the cave by members of the organization during the summer.

The woman came and knelt before Ayşe, her green shawl wrapped tightly around her body. The other voice she heard came not from a man, as she had thought, but from a young, inexperienced Turkish soldier.

Berivan's hair was messy and long, shiny with oil; she needed soap and water. Fine, threadlike capillaries protruded from the whites of her eyes, her gaze fixed.

Her face was thin, her mouth always slightly ajar. She wore a jacket with the zipper pulled up to her neck. Dirt was running down her body, and the places where she wiped her hands on her trousers when she touched something she didn't particularly like were visible. Finally, she slid over to the pile of blankets and sat there, watching Ayşe.

"Have you calmed down a bit?" Berivan asked.

"Please," Ayşe said, "I don't want to upset you. I just want to be alone."