Day 13 – Answering a Stranger's Voice
“Are you Fatima’s daughter?”
That sentence echoed through the phone and crashed back into Zeynep’s whole being.
Suddenly the chill of the soil, the weight of the letter, her mother’s silence…
All of it seemed to erupt from within that voice.
Zeynep swallowed hard.
“Yes… Who are you?” she asked, her voice cracking.
There was a brief silence on the other end of the line.
Then, an older man’s voice spoke again:
“I’m Ethem… The last person your mother entrusted.”
Zeynep took a step back.
Şefika appeared beside her,
her eyes asking, “Are you okay?”
Zeynep gave a small nod, but her gut churned with mixed emotions.
It wasn’t fear.
It was something deeper.
Something caught between curiosity and regret...
“What do you mean, entrusted?”
“She stayed with us for a while after giving birth to you…
But when those who were after her got too close, she fled.
She ran to protect you.
We’ve been searching for you ever since.
But your mother left you in an orphanage.
She even changed your name.”
Zeynep felt the ground shift beneath her feet.
Her entire life—everything she thought she knew—
was crumbling.
“Why now? Why after all these years?”
“Because… now some secrets must be revealed.”
The man took a deep breath:
“There’s something she left behind.
Not just hers—yours too. A legacy.
And the time has come.”
Zeynep’s heart was pounding.
“Legacy,” “secret,” “those after her”...
These words were starting to take shape in the fogged mirror of the past.
“Where are you?” she asked.
“In one of the old princely mansions.
Your father’s roots lie here.”
the man said.
“In Gallipoli…”
Zeynep looked up.
Gallipoli...
She had never been there.
But a voice inside whispered that once she did, her life would never be the same.
As she pulled the phone from her ear, Şefika leaned in:
“What happened?”
Zeynep answered softly:
“My mother’s last trace…
is calling me to Gallipoli.”
Şefika narrowed her eyes.
“Then the time has come to set off.
But you won’t go alone.”
“Who?”
“There’s someone else waiting for you.
Someone sealed with your father’s name…”
Zeynep’s hands trembled.
She had never known her father.
Just like her mother, no one had ever even mentioned his name.
That night, before setting out, Zeynep wrote her first prayer for her mother in her journal:
> “O Turner of hearts,
Fill mine not with anger toward my mother,
but with understanding and mercy.
Forgive me for her sake, and purify her for mine.”
Just before dawn,
she would leave on the first bus to Gallipoli.
What she didn’t know was:
on this journey,
she wouldn’t just confront the past,
but a future she never even knew existed.
To be continued…
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