No matter how many times I read the letter, I didn't think I understood a thing. Except for that one detail: the person in the photo. The wild exhilaration glowing in Sis's eyes felt as if it had been imprisoned within a simple portrait. When I finished my business in the restroom and stepped outside, I saw Hülya watching me. "We can go," I said, and she gave a slight nod of approval. In truth, I needed someone to tell everything I knew to, but there was no such person. I trusted no one.
But what about Hülya? Did I trust her now? I suppose so. Yet, I still couldn't know her true intentions. Here, the slightest lean meant falling into an ambush. As we turned and began walking in the opposite direction, Hülya asked, "Four hundred... what does that mean?"
Hmph! The Mechanism had called me "four hundred" in front of all those people. It must have been doing it just to mock me.
"I don't know," I said gently. I thought if I were even a bit rude, I would lose everyone around me. Then I remembered the letters. Hülya looked at me again and said in a low voice, "This has never happened here before." There was an anxious expression on her face.
"What has never happened?" I asked, shrugging my shoulders.
After licking her lips, she answered, "Defiance. Even if it's just a small rebellion..."
"Everyone follows the rules," I said, wanting to prompt the rest.
"Forget the rules," she said. "It's not rules that bind them. It's the fear of death that binds them."
"Most of the patients who come here must be suicide attempters," I said in surprise. "In that case, if they wanted to live, would they come here?"
Hülya seemed to have a deeper insight. "Actually, a suicide attempt is something done in order not to die," she spoke. "Maybe I can't explain it, but it's just a cry for help. Sometimes you call a support line and talk to them for minutes because you think they will protect you..."
My face fell at the mention of support lines. I had called psychological support lines more than a few times. My voice would always be thin and full of fear. Yet, I would be firm, as if using the last shred of my strength. "That's true," I muttered; we had approached a few scattered people. For the first time, I noticed something. Two men passing by were talking to each other. In that moment, my feet faltered. Hülya stopped with me and looked where I was looking.
One of the men showed a photo he took from his pocket and said in a pained voice, "This is my daughter." But the cloud of a smile on his face was a fake cloud overshadowing his pain. I knew it. I had felt that way too.
The other man brought a portrait he held in his own hand next to the photo and spoke, "This is mine. How much they look alike..."
As I saw them talking, my astonishment continued. Had these people not swallowed their tongues? I had thought they lived only as points standing on a plane, taking action. Perhaps the situation was different. Perhaps... Before I had time for a thought to pass through my mind, "Your resistance inspired them," Hülya said.
"Pardon?" I said as a reflex.
"I'm saying you showed them that there is a way out." I noticed a sensation of a forced smile buried within her expressions. Her lips seemed to insist on not curling to the sides. "They liked this exit. Though, who wouldn't?"
"Me? Did I do this?" I lowered my head in shame. My family had taught me to hang my head in shame. Even for behaviors where I shouldn't have been ashamed.
"How I did what I did... even I don't know that," I confessed. Hülya looked as if she were aware of everything.
One of the men explained what grade his daughter was in when she came here, which school she went to, how good her grades were, how well she suited the school courtyard in her uniform, and how the mother carefully tied the child's hair every day. The other nodded as if going to a distant land while listening to him. Yes, this wasn't mere talk. They were truly sharing their feelings. The narrowing of the eyes, the sinking in of the cheeks, the shaping of the lines on the forehead... these were all representatives of a real conversation.
The men stepped slightly aside to let us pass and lowered their voices as if not wanting to disturb others. But I wasn't disturbed at all. I wish I could have witnessed more of this. Their resistance, no matter how much I started it, encouraged me.
"How strange," Hülya said, "Everything here has almost changed."
"Only until we return," I replied.
In the other corner, one of the women was sleeping with her head resting on another woman's lap. This... it was as if a connection woven by the thread of fate had been established between them.
"We must go down to the tunnel," Hülya said suddenly.
That's right! We had to eat something. That place matched perfectly with the tunnel. As soon as she said "tunnel," I realized how much I needed it.
"I'll go down," I spoke.
Hülya smiled. "They don't like the tunnel... yet you want to go there."
"The tunnel is what's realistic," I said; "It's like going into the depths of one's own soul."
"I have claustrophobia," she said; "That's why always... our old group leader would send someone to bring food."
A sorrowful expression passed through her eyes. The group leader Sis had killed. I remembered that letter I saw again.
We came to the place where the tunnel cover was. When the cover was lifted, a lot of dust rose; the mechanism creaked like the wheels of a car. The ladder went all the way down. "I'll be right back," I said and took action. There was a grateful expression on Hülya's face. The stairs felt like the curves of my own soul. I went down; the cover closed over me. When I wanted to get out, it was enough to just knock on that cover again.
As soon as I entered, the familiar sound was the sound of water dripping, drip-drip. I deeply felt the moment my footsteps touched the ground. Going underground, even further down, had put me in such a strange mood that I felt my hands trembling. Also, there was a sharp, intermittent pain in my ribs. Perhaps I had experienced dozens of emotions at the same time, weighing them heavily upon my heart.
After a few steps, the sound of water was pulsing like a heartbeat right inside my ear. I realized I didn't hate the tunnel. Perhaps it was because I had spent my life as if I were inside a tunnel.
"You've come again!" He was looking at me from the small carved-out section on the right side of the tunnel. Again, he had taken that divine light behind him, sitting perfectly upright where he was. It was possible to recognize him immediately by the scar on his face. His wound was like a smile intertwined with fate. While his single arm hung from inside his sleeve, it didn't take long for me to realize that smile was a piece of pain. He was unhappy; his soul had been ripped away. Just as he told it himself that day, even his arm had been torn from him. But he was acting as if he were happy here.
What would happen if I told him, if I mentioned the letter? Naturally, no one else but him could help me.
"I've come," I said in response to his words. "Are you pleased by this?" I had asked this question just for the sake of talking.
"I like solitude," he replied. "In solitude, every person finds their essence."
"Or a letter," I said, remembering the moment I found the box in the tunnel with my eyes. That was the first letter that came into my hands. I had thought that letter was special to me. But according to the latest connections, the matter was closely related to Sis. How was I going to explain this to him, to this old lamplighter?
"A letter?" When he raised his head heavily, I noticed the scar on his face seemed to deepen. Shouldn't wounds heal over time?
"Yes," I answered. "Sis... do you know them?"
"I've never gone up," he said, staying true to his previous words.
"But you know what happens there?"
"No," he said with a very clear attitude. "I don't know."
"In that case, there must be something else you know."
He used his single arm to wipe over the scar on his face. "I suppose you're going to ask me for something..."
"Can you help me?" I asked openly.
"Depends on what it's about, little girl..."
"I wish I were a little girl, but I'm not," I said; "I can't breathe. I need the answer to this question."
The majestic expression in the old man's eyes had faded. "It must be a difficult question."
"Perhaps..." I said; I wasn't going to hide from him that I didn't know. "But if you help me, I'll give you what you want."
He laughed out loud at these words. "You can't give me what I want..."
"You never know," I smiled; my heart was beating fast. "There is always a mutual agreement between people."
"I agree with that word of yours," he said, taking his index finger off his wound. "Ask then."
I walked far enough to take the light behind me and took out the papers I had tucked inside my clothes. No matter how hard I struggled to look strong, I couldn't find that energy in myself. Only my temples were burning fiercely. I was sitting on the edge of a new emotion. Sweating from the roots of my hair to the nape of my neck, I showed the paper dangling between my hands.
In that moment, there was a faint expression on the old lamplighter's face. Without taking his eyes off me, he took the letter with his single hand and glanced at it quickly. "I don't know how to read, read this to me."
I took the paper from his hand again and read what was written to him aloud. My voice was trembling like a broken microphone. As I read the words, the expression on the old man's face became ambiguous.
"Exactly what is the problem?" he asked, as if wanting to hide what was being read from his face.
"My question is this," I said; "Who is the woman who wrote these letters?"
The old man laughed. "That is a difficult question. But I can tell you this..." He fixed his eyes, which resembled misty glass, upon me. "Before this, here—"
"You said a woman was imprisoned here before. The woman wanted to save her son from the mechanism, but the mechanism killed her son. Because the woman found a way out of the mechanism..."
"Look how strong your memory is," he spoke mockingly.
I frowned. "What do you know about that woman?"
His eyes seemed to dive into a distant point. "She was locked in prison."
The woman I saw when I first entered here... he must be talking about her.
"Do you know her son's name?"
He lowered his gaze. "His name isn't clear... but his name started with A. A-alan... no, Alem. I think." Before I could understand anything, he grabbed my arm. "What will you give me in return for this?" His eyes were more terrifying than I had ever seen. It hurt; I pulled my arm away. I recoiled in response to his wild gaze. "F-food, maybe?"
The hardness in his gaze softened, and he nodded slightly. Could I trust what he told me?
This name... it didn't sound familiar to me at all: Alem. While I was expecting something related to Sis, this absurd name had appeared before me. It felt like I had hit a wall. Now I had to re-establish all the connections.
"The moon is on the acrobat's back!" said the lamplighter, and he laughed, showing his teeth.