Two lines

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"there are two perfect people in the world: the one who is dead, and the one who has not been born yet" (William Shakespeare)

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Ceylin doesn't think she has ever wanted to have a baby before Ilgaz. Between being the only source of a stable income in her family, desire to exceed everyone in her profession and causing trouble in the courthouse, she hardly had a time for herself, let alone for someone who will need her constantly. She never considered herself to be a mother material, and everyone told her she was too reckless, and emotional, and an adrenaline addict, and definitely not someone who was suitable enough to take care of a baby.

She desperately needs one after her father's death. There is a huge void inside her, dark and unbearable, and she's afraid it will swallow her whole. She's ready to do anything, everything, to fill it, and she thinks nothing will help her more to cope with the death than giving a new life. She didn't want to have a child before, but the idea of creating one with Ilgaz thrills her. At the end of the day she is grateful when life didn't grant her what she was wishing for, as the time and reason behind it was wrong, but when they sign the divorce papers she mourns this unborn baby as much as she mourns their marriage.

Ilgaz returns to this topic on their get-away in Cappadocia, re-checking with her whether they still were on the same page on this matter, and they are, but it's the worst time he could have asked her about it. She is already burdened with her lies and the crimes of her family, and she understands he will find out about everything, sooner or later. She is dreaming about having a baby with him, but she doesn't think he will want to share something so valuable with someone like her when he reveals the truth.

When Derya thinks she is pregnant, and Ceylin is staring at the two bright dark-blue lines of her pregnancy test, she feels happiness for her friend, but also a pang of not-so hidden jealousy. She wants it for herself, to look at her own test with two distinct dark-blue lines, and feel this joy and anticipation, and of course she wants to share it with Ilgaz. She knows it's not possible anymore, but the hope in her heart doesn't listen to the reasons in her mind.

When she sees the cherished two lines at last, so deep in color there is no doubt what they can possibly mean, she feels no joy nor anticipation. The irony of her dream becoming true when she doesn't have the only person she wanted to experience it with doesn't escape her. She's lost and devastated, and definitely not someone who is suitable enough to take care of a baby, as there is nothing left of her after her husband goes.

~

It's still hard for her to believe.

She hasn't slept for several nights, so worried she's in the middle of one of her crazily vivid visions and Ilgaz is just a product of her imagination, that she dreads to close her eyes. She naps here and there during the day, when her body can't keep up anymore and shuts itself off of the fatigue, and she always ends up in the cemetery in her dreams. She is curled up again on his grave, and the ground under her body is as wet and cold as she remembers, and she can barely breath as the dark abyss of his absence sits heavily on her chest. It's not too long before she shatters awake in the cold sweat with his name on her lips, shivering, terrified this cold grave is the closest to him she'll ever get to be.

She always wakes up in tears, and the smell of the wet ground, rain and sickening sweetness of the funeral flowers is still vivid in her nose. Ilgaz is always by her side, his warm hands soothing the worst of her nightmare away, his voice whispering a sequence of assurances that he is there with her, but it takes a while for her heart to stop beating frantically in her chest. He kisses her tears away, as he did a few days ago, and it's strange and bittersweet to mourn his death in his arms. It hurts, but it also gives the comfort she thought she lost forever, and she's weak with relief every time his woodsy smell replaces the bitterness of grief.