I’m the one who should have died. That was the most important thing I realized.
B I heard a noise. That’s what interrupted my sleep. When I opened my eyes, I was in my room in the darkness. As I rubbed my eyes, I heard it again. It sounded like someone shouting. The first thing that came to my mind was my mum, where was she? I felt a little shiver. I was having trouble seeing inside the room in the dark. I switched on the night light on the bedside table. I heard the shouting once more. It sounded very familiar, but I couldn’t be sure. I rubbed my eyes once more and got out of bed. I was moving towards the door. I approached the door as my shadow was casting on the door. When I poked my head out of the door, I looked at the staircase. There was a dim light. My father must still be awake. I started to approach the staircase silently. The shout filled my ears again.
At that moment, I was filled with great anxiety. I ran up the stairs and went down fast. I didn’t care whether I made a sound or not. I had left him behind while I was sleeping to escape from my father. He should be beating me right now…
I passed through the dim light of the television and went into the bedroom. When I opened the door without thinking, I was stunned. I couldn’t move in the face of what I saw. My mother was under my father’s feet. He had her pinned to the edge of the bed and was beating her mercilessly. When my father looked at the door, I saw his horrible eyes.
“Theo-dore… ho-honey, please go…”
When I heard my mum’s voice, I started to tear up. I should have been there. If he was going to beat me, he should have beaten me. It hurt, it hurt to see her like that! I didn’t want that monster to do that to my mum. I hated him. I was going to kill him and make him pay for what he did.
“You heard your mum, Theo, now you must go…”
My eyes were blurred. I couldn’t hold back my tears. I could feel anger bubbling up inside me. The fact that I was wiping them away meant nothing. They were quickly replaced by new ones. I was looking at the monster called my father. He was telling me to go, telling me to leave my mother in his hands.
“How dare you look at me like that?’’
I felt myself losing control. I just wanted to kill him. I started running at him. I was going to kill him. “Leave my mum alone!”
The blow with the back of his hand was enough to knock me down… “Are you a man now, you bastard?”
When I was on the ground, he kicked me in the stomach. I let out a big scream from the pain. I didn’t have the strength to resist him. He kept kicking me without a care in the world. I tried to defend myself by pulling my knees to me. It was no use. Then the kicks stopped. When I opened my eyes, I saw my mum standing over me.
“Didn’t you tell me yesterday you wouldn’t be late, Theodore?’’ Simon was in front of me, thinking about what to say. “Listen, you’ve really betrayed my trust in you. How many times is that you’re already working part-time. Oh… God.’’ He took a deep breath. He was looking at the ceiling and at me. He had so much to say, but he was holding back. “Get to work, Theodore.”
I left the storage room without a moment’s hesitation. Simon, besides his harsh tone, had shown mercy to me.
As noon approached, the café was quiet. Being like them was nothing more than a dream for me. I would never have a normal life. I would always be scolded by someone.
I had to hold on a little longer.
I lifted the napkin holder and started wiping all over the table. The café was full except for two or three tables. I kept wiping the table while people around me were laughing and talking. I had a great discomfort today. I didn’t want to work at all today. Of course, no one asked me whether I wanted to work or not. It was my obligation to work. When I finished wiping the table, I put the napkin holder back. I was going back to put the cloth back. As I was about to put the cloth back, Zack called out to me.
“Empty the dustbin later.” Zack handed the coffee to the customer and started to prepare the next coffee. I put the cloth in my hand and went to the garbage can. I was about to grab the blue garbage bag and tie it. “I didn’t tell you now, get out from under my feet.”
I stopped tying the bag and stepped aside. I was waiting with the customer for Zack to finish the coffee. He was looking at me from time to time as he prepared the coffee. Next to him, Alexis was taking the last customer’s order. After preparing the coffee for both customers, Zack walked past me to the warehouse. His last look was no different from his usual look. I silently passed him in front of the dustbin.
I was going towards the door with a trash bag in my hand. When I opened the door, I heard the bell. Dark clouds were gathering in the sky. They were gathering for me, they understood me. They realized the restlessness in me. At that moment I felt like running away. On the street, I looked at both the rubbish container on the right and the café. What more could I lose after all this? I was standing in front of the café, facing my thoughts. Good, bad, right, wrong; to escape or not to escape…
I started to move towards the container among the people on the street. When I reached it, I threw the bag into the container. I had lingered long enough; I had to go back immediately. A person I never expected to see on the pavement blocked my way.
“Hey, Theodore, right?” She was the girl who came to this café every day. I was stunned. “I’m Layla, nice to meet you.”
I ran into the toilet and closed the door behind me. I locked the door and leaned against it. I was breathing fast in the darkness. He was coming from behind me, and when he opened his mouth, all hell would break loose. I feared him. That’s why I took refuge in the nearest place, the toilet.
“Get out now!’’ Dad was banging hard on the door. “Get out now! I can’t clean up your mess. Get out and clean it up!”
I got down behind the door. I was pulling my knees further. I’d just dropped a beer and broken it. It was just a beer. He kept banging on the door. It wasn’t just a beer to him. I could hear the TV as he kept banging. He was going to beat me when I opened the door. I was never going to come out until he left the door.
The door knocked slowly. “Theodore, are you okey?”
I was relieved when I heard Simon’s voice. I was looking around, trying to figure out where I was. When I stood up, the sensor light came on. As my eyes adjusted to the light, I realized I was in the toilet. I remembered that I had run away from the girl who had reached out her hand. I saw myself in the mirror. I looked bad. Why had I run away? She had just held out her hand, trying to meet me. I wasn’t myself. My restlessness was increasing, I could feel it.
I washed my face and went outside and there was Simon. Those two words came out of his mouth. “Are you okey?”
I didn’t want to be seen by the girl after my run, but I couldn’t stay in the toilet until she left. I moved towards the front of the cafe with heavy steps. When I came to the counter, I looked for her out of the corner of my eye. First, I looked where she mostly sat. A group of young people were chatting with each other. When I looked at the other tables, I saw her. She had her coffee and was writing something in her notebook.
“Alexis, get Theodore on the checkout, you can help him if he’s having trouble. I’m going out for a smoke.”
I kept one eye on Simon as the next customer ordered his coffee. I imagined him putting the lit cigarette in his mouth. I was in a bad situation. I was worse than worse. I was suffocating and I was the only one who was aware of it. I was trying to focus my attention on the screen in front of me. I had to make the coffee the customer asked me for without fail. I confirmed his order and directed him to pay.
The bell was echoing in my ears. When I looked up from the screen, I saw him. He was standing right in front of me with his huge body. I was staring at him with my eyes wide open. There was no way he could be here. He would never know where I was. I had come here running away from him. I didn’t want to go back to him once again.
The new customer was repeating his order. I rubbed my eyes hard. I had to snap out of it. I was hurting. I was hurting so badly. I was looking at the customer’s face. I was having a hard time hearing him. When he didn’t get an answer from me, he looked at Alexis. I could feel all the eyes around me, every one of them looking at me, saying false things. They didn’t recognize me; they didn’t know anything about me. They didn’t realize I was hurting.
I must hold on a little longer.
In the middle of the night, I carefully closed the door to my room. I leaned my head against the door. This time it would be sweet and painless. This time, this time I was going to do it, I was going to let myself fall asleep. When I opened my eyes, the moonlight seeping through the window illuminated the room a little. I looked at the pill box in my hand. When I looked a little more, I realized that I was delaying the inevitable. I immediately opened the box and poured all the pills into my empty hand. These would take me to my mum. When I had taken them all, a sweet sleep would greet me, and I would finally open my eyes next to my mother. It would be painless.
Mum was out there somewhere. I didn’t want to wait any longer. When I was about to put all the pills in my mouth, I couldn’t move. I was trembling. I was locked on the pills in my palm as my trembling continued. The trembling was starting to turn into a shaking. My breathing was out of control, my nostrils were enlarged. My eyes started to blur. I wanted to put the pills in my mouth and end everything, I didn’t want to stay here anymore, this awful life was hurting me but… As I continued to shake, the pills fell one by one from my palm to the floor. I couldn’t hold back my tears. Now the sound of my heart was echoing around the room.
My feet couldn’t take the strain, and I fell to my knees. The pills in my hand were scattered on the carpet. I was looking at the scattered pills, each one telling me that I had failed. I wiped my tears. I attacked the three or four pills in front of me and grabbed them. Why! Why am I so incompetent? There is only one thing I’m trying to do, and I can’t do it. I fell to the ground and started crying. I cried for a long time without stopping. When my heart calmed down, I lifted my head and looked around. I was unconscious. I wiped my tears and I was still here. I opened my tightly closed palm. Three pills were in my palm. I looked at the other pills scattered on the carpet. I failed, Mum. I couldn’t come to you; I was suffering here. My eyes filled up a little more. I wiped them and started to collect the pills scattered around. I was adding each one to the pill box. After putting the last one in, I closed the lid of the box.
I was looking outside. It had started to drizzle. One by one, they descended to the ground and soaked everything. It was like they were carrying a piece of me. They didn’t realize it at all. The only thing the people outside realized was that they were getting wet. They were speeding up their steps to escape the rain, some were taking shelter under the shops. No one realized that I was there. It was always going to be like this. I went back to the café and started moving towards the counter. They were busy talking to the people next to them. As I glanced around among the customers, I saw a girl with blonde hair looking at me. I didn’t intend to look at her for long, so I averted my eyes.
When the man sitting at the table on two sides of her got up, I took the cloth from the counter and went to the table. When I went to the table, the man was leaving with his bag in his hand. I immediately started wiping the table.
When I finished cleaning up, someone called out to me. “Excuse me?’’
I was looking around to see who was calling me. I couldn’t see the person calling me. When I looked a little carefully, I saw the blonde-haired girl gesturing to me. She was calling me to her. I was starting to get excited. I was forcing myself to be calm. I wasn’t going to run away this time. I breathed in and out of my mouth a couple of times to calm down. Finally, I walked up to her.
“I’m sorry I made you worry this morning. I just wanted to talk to you.” I was tempted to say why did you want to talk to me, but I always kept my thoughts to myself. It’s always been like that. Her blue eyes reminded me of my mother’s eyes, my mother’s eyes weren’t even blue. “If it’s all right with you, why don’t we do something sometime?’’
Before I could think what to say, there was a small commotion. We were both looking at the source of the commotion. A woman had spilled her coffee. It wasn’t just the two of us looking, she was the center of everyone’s attention. Zack rushed over to her.
“Calm down, madam, it’s just a spilt coffee.” Zack looked around briefly, then his eyes fixed on me. “Get the mop from the storage room.’’
After a quick glance at the blonde-haired girl, I made my way to the storage room. Once inside the storage room, I grabbed the mop and bucket next to the cleaning products. With quick steps, I made my way to Zack. Zack was still trying to calm the customer down when I walked past the counter and between the tables. I put the mop down next to Zack and he looked at Simon at the counter, holding the mop in one hand. The look was a cry for help because he couldn’t calm the customer down.
“Madam, would you step away from there and come to me?’’
In the toilet, I emptied the dirty water in the bucket into the toilet bowl. Then I went to the storage room and got to the cleaning products. I put the bucket back with the mop. As I headed for the door to leave, I tripped.
I fell hard. Hurting myself was the last thing I should think about. I got up with the pain and started to run. I entered my room and hid under my bed. I was pressing my mouth with both hands to stop my sobs. When I entered the room, he was coming up the stairs. Soon the door of the room would open, I knew it. My tears had soaked my cheeks. I wasn’t bothering to wipe my tears. I couldn’t take my hands away from my mouth out of fear. I saw the door opening slowly in the dim room. At that moment I felt all my hair standing on end. Fear was taking over my body. As the door opened halfway, I could see the light coming from the corridor. When the door stopped, a pair of feet approached the center of the room.
“Where are you, Theo?”
He was moving past the bed and in front of the window. I was watching his every step with great attention. My mouth, which I had suppressed to keep silent, was hurting now, but this pain was nothing. When he stopped in front of the window, I looked at the door. I was thinking of escaping through the door. I couldn’t move, realising that this wasn’t a solution, just an escape that would postpone my capture. He could catch me anywhere in the house. On top of that, it would have cost me more to run away from him, he opened the door of the cupboard in the corner. My tears were getting stronger, it was hard to keep my mouth shut. I wanted to run away, as far away from him as possible. I took one last look at the light in the corridor. When he turned round, his feet were facing the bed. There was only one place to hide in my room, outside the wardrobe. A weight fell on the bed. And with it, I gasped for breath. Aware that I was under the bed, he lifted the hanging blanket.
“Get out of there, Theo, and I promise I won’t hurt you too much.” The light was telling me to run away. It was impossible. I couldn’t run, not anymore. I was his punching bag. He was going to beat me up so he could make up for it. I slowly took my hands away from my mouth. I started crawling out from under the bed. I knew for sure that his promise wasn’t true. “Well done.”
I got my reward when he pulled my whole body out from under the bed. I felt an incredible pain in my body. I started shouting in pain. He kept shouting and hitting me to make me shut up. I was pushing myself with my feet to avoid with my remaining strength. I finally squeezed between the cupboard and the wall. Every time he hit me, at first, I couldn’t hold myself back and shouted, and then I tried to close my mouth as best I could. At some point he stopped hitting me and started shouting.
“You won’t do it again, will you?” I couldn’t control my body, which was shaking with pain. My hands, which I covered my mouth with, were soaked. “Will you?”
I could barely nod my head out of fear. He swore and walked out the door. My whole body was in pain. Trembling, aching, shaking. I was lying on the floor in the corner, doubled over, motionless. My tears hadn’t stopped, all I could do was keep crying.
I must hold on a little longer.
As I put the plate I had lathered aside, I took another one from the sink. As I washed the dishes, I was thinking about getting out. I will be leaving work soon. It was finally four o’clock. Maybe it was my last job of the day, washing the dishes. I was getting a new plate when someone came into the warehouse. I glanced over and saw it was Alexis, talking on her phone.
“Mum, how’s Dad? He’s all right, isn’t he?” Without seeing me, she moved to the chair next to the coat rack. “That maybe it, he’ll get better in time.”
As soon as I turned on the tap, I put all the dishes under the water and then put them aside. When I finally took them in my hand, I started drying them with a cloth. I hoped it would be four o’clock when I put the last plate back. I was eager to leave. What was the point of being so impatient? The restlessness I felt inside was different from other days. It didn’t matter how I was. I will be here again tomorrow. I left the sink and looked at the clock hanging in the entrance of the warehouse. I could see what I was waiting to see, but I couldn’t be happy. Not wanting to stay here any longer, I went to the coat rack. Alexis was still talking on the chair.
“…don’t overdo it.” As I was about to hang up my apron, Alexis and I caught each other’s eyes . She ignored me and kept talking. “If anything happens, tell Mum.”
I grabbed my jacket and left Alexis alone. I was on my way to Simon’s. I was going to make one last appearance and leave the café. When I got to the counter, I saw Zack alone. When he saw me in my jacket, he looked at the clock. I was looking around for Simon. I couldn’t see him among the customers, I had just come from the warehouse. When he looked a little more, I saw him in front of the cafe. He was smoking. When I went out, Simon looked at me because of the sound of the bell.
“Is it four o’clock?” I acknowledged him with a nod. “All right, don’t be late tomorrow.”
Something inside me was screaming that there would be no tomorrow.
The roads were wet with a little rain in the afternoon. I looked up at the sky and the dark clouds were gathering for a big storm. I crossed the road and immediately started to climb the stairs to the station. As I was going up, I looked at Simon. He was smoking his cigarette and looking at me. Who knows what was going through his mind.
I couldn’t take it anymore. I’d barely made it through the day. I’d chosen not to run away in the morning, but to stop. Just to show I was OK, but I wasn’t OK. I’d never been OK. I was stuck in life, tossed back and forth. I’d made a big mistake thinking I’d got rid of him. He’d never let me go.
I took a step back and watched the metro pass in front of me, the wind licking my face. When the doors opened, people were trying to enter one after the other. I found a place for myself among the crowd by passing through the last door. When the subway started moving, I looked at the dark clouds. They reflected the restlessness inside me. I was going to see my mum today. I couldn’t wait for it. I couldn’t live with the lie of this life anymore.
When I got to the stop, I calmly got off the metro. I headed for the stairs and left the station. I was on my way home. The rain was accompanying me drop by drop. It continued to rain vaguely, reminding itself of the drops falling on my head. Continuing my way, I came to the street of my house. I could not see any reason to speed up my steps now. There was nowhere I had to reach. I came in front of the house with slow steps. I turned my head upwards. I was looking at the border where the sky and the apartment building were separated. I entered the apartment building. I started climbing the stairs.
He stopped beating us up and left the bedroom. He’d finally had enough. Mum was lying exhausted next to me. She had blocked all the blows my father had thrown at me. I went to my mother’s bedside with all my strength as the tears were flowing fast. I gently lifted her head and put my leg under it.
“Mum, Mum…’’ I couldn’t say much. I was afraid he’d come again. “Open your eyes, please.”
My mum was lying unconscious. I was afraid that something had happened to her. I wiped my tears with the back of my sleeve and started stroking her cheeks. I wanted her to come to her senses, to talk to me. God, please let my mum open her eyes. As the drops running down my cheek gathered on my chin, a commotion came from the living room. I held my breath and looked at the door, terrified that my father was coming. I focused on the door for a short while. As the flickering light reached the doorway, I heard the television. I turned to my mother with some relief.
“Mum, open your eyes, please.’’
I kept gently stroking her cheek to make her open her eyes. “Theo…”
When I heard my mother’s voice, I couldn’t help myself and hugged her. It felt so good to hear my mother’s voice. I was amazed that my father was inside watching TV as if nothing had happened. What kind of a monster could do that? I hated him. All he did was harm. I looked at my mum. How many bruises she had on her body. How many times he had hit her. I would never forgive him, I would make him pay for all this when I grew up.
When I opened the door, the wind greeted me by hitting my face. I stepped onto the roof. I was going straight ahead. When I reached the walls of the roof, I looked down. I could see the street and the people in it. Everyone was minding their own business. No one knew I was there. I took a step on the wall under the rain. I supported myself with my hands and climbed on the wall. I took a deep breath. I was at the point where everything would end and begin.
I looked down. When I took a step, what was happening was coming to life in front of my eyes. I was falling rapidly. Before I realized how far I had fallen, I would become one with the pavement. The blood would slowly drain from my body and spread around. I would appear in a pool of blood. Then people who had never seen me would not be able to ignore me, even if they did not want to see me. Some of them would immediately leave the place while others would gather around me. The people gathered around me pick up their phones and call an ambulance. I was the most important thing in this situation. While people were gathering around me, I would slowly leave my body and float into the sky. I looked up at the sky. After I had risen high enough, I would meet my mother somewhere among the clouds. I was sure she was waiting for me there.
I started shivering as the wind licked the back of my neck. The rain was crying for me. I closed my eyes. I felt myself rising above the clouds. After passing through the dark clouds, I saw my mother in front of me. I couldn’t hold back my tears. These were tears of joy. It was the joy of reuniting with my mother. My mother was looking at me right in front of me. I continued to look at my mother, not caring about the tears rolling down my cheeks. My mother smiled at me with her warm smile. She held out her hand to me. She wanted me to hold her hand.