Wherever You Go

Chapter 8

The shops downstairs are open to cater to the steady stream of travelers coming in and out of airport. She hurries through the shops, careful to cover her head and most of the face as she buys random things she would need and runs back to the lift. After ringing the bell of the apartment for what seems like an age, Hazan turns the knob, convinced that Yagiz has left whilst she was gone. It is not locked and the first thing she sees is Yagiz coming out of the room, buttoning a dark blue short sleeve shirt which she has never seen before. He looks like he had a wash and his hair is all messed up and despite the grim circumstances it is doing things to her heart. So is the almost naked perfect chest visible through the unbuttoned shirt. Hazan stops and gulps, unable to move any further from where she is. He stops too, and his face slightly reddens, maybe what she is thinking is visible in her face, Hazan thinks, desperately trying to appear normal.

"um.. Hazan you can sleep on the bed. I will sleep on the couch. I don't plan to sleep much anyway" he mutters the last part as his long graceful fingers continue to button the shirt. Hazan glance at the coffee table and sees a liquor bottle and an empty glass on it. She just nods and goes in to the room , too rattled to protest or say anything at all. In the bathroom she splashes water over her face and hands, in an attempt to cool down her burning body. But five minutes later she cannot sleep or stop phasing in the room back and forth. 

She is worried about Yagiz, his indifference and his statue like silence. He has faced the biggest shock a man can face and he is unnaturally calm and quiet about it. She knows that he has done enough arguing with Mr. Hazim, but nothing else. Hazan peek at the mirror to ensure she looks ok and goes to the living room with the new found courage. Yagiz looks at her in surprise, the glass midway suspended. Hazan almost laughs out loud when he gives her a look that can only be described as "what now?". Hazan sits on the couch, away from him, but near enough for her to lose all ability to speak and think coherently. Yagiz completely stills and after few seconds place the liquor glass on the table, fearful that it will crash to the ground through his unsteady fingers. Nothing seems to have changed, he thinks ruefully. Even when he no longer trusts her, he still is helpless as a little boy next to her.

"You cannot sleep?" Yagiz ask her finally, since she doesn't seem to be able to say anything, despite coming and sitting next to him.

"No I can't. Not when... " Hazan was going to say not when you are awake and drinking...but she checks herself just in time. Yagiz lets out a sigh and leans back in the couch. His desire to drink and reach oblivion gone. It might not be prudent anyway, if he is to get married and fly back to US on a 6 hour flight. Once again he is amazed at how casual he feels about getting married in few short hours. Love and marriage were not things that he had ever dwelled on growing up. Not even his loneliness in growing up in a country where people were decidedly frosty and unemotional has fostered a longing in him for a soul mate and a companion. He has instead grown up to relish his freedom and not having to answer to anyone. Though they were always loving to him, his family's distant and sometimes different behavior, which he could never understand before today has also contributed in making him the proverbial refrigerator that Hazan called him. As he became an American, more than he was a Turk, he had only a handful of close relationships with people. Really he cannot remember any of his handful of girlfriends anymore, they were really fizzled out physical attractions, more than actual relationships. And he had only couple of friends, Farah and two others whom he met while he was at Harvard University.