A Turkish Delight☆

Chapter 3: As Fate Would Have It

Nadine:

As I reached my window seat I saw someone already sitting on it, facing towards the window. At first I thought I was at the wrong seat, but after reconfirming my seat number, I tapped on his back:

"Excuse me sir, but I think you're sitting in the wrong seat."

"Oh, I'm sorry," he replied with a very strong Turkish accent, while he unfastened his seatbelt to get out of the seat, "I thou... is... is that you, beautiful eyes?" He stopped as he looked at me. His eyes widened.

I, too, shared a very similar feeling. My pupils dilated, my heart started pounding, my jaw dropped. I turned white as if I've seen a ghost. It was him! The 'good-looking Turk in his 20s'! I could not believe my eyes! Just moments ago I was reminiscing about the time I met him, regretting that I didn't ask for his name that day, and now I see him sitting on my seat, on a 5-hour flight.

"Y-yo-you're that guy fr-from the shop in the Grand Bazaar, aren't you?" I stammered. I didn't normally stammer, it was only in cases like these when my nervousness showed in my words. My mind had stopped functioning.

"Yes," he replied immediately, "beautiful eyes."

"Haha, you still remember me?" As puzzled as I could be.

"How can someone forget these beautiful eyes?" He said in his same, polite voice.

I was still in shock at the sight of him when I got rudely interuppted by the stewardess:

"Ma'am, please sit down, and fasten your seatbelts. We are preparing for take-off."

"Yes, yes." I hurriedly kept my carry-on in the overhead cabin and sat next to the Turk.

I was a mixture of tens of thousands of emotions at this point. I was happy, excited, awestruck. I felt sick to my stomach though. I didn't know what to do or what to say. So I stayed quiet, hoping that he would initiate the conversation, hoping that he would only say hello. But he didn't. Typical men.

"I don't think we've properly met," I said, when I finally mustered up the courage to ask him. "I'm Nadine."

"Its nice to meet you Nadine, I'm Mehmet, Mehmet Gülsoy."

And with this, began their 5-hour long journey to Turkey, and probably a lifetime together. As fate had it, they had to meet.

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So far, two hours have passed and he still hasn't said a single word except for mentioning his name and asking for the sachet of pepper when our breakfast was served.

He's watching some French movie on the little TV-monitor type thing installed. I can't help but stare at him. I notice he has aged, his hair is a mess, and it seems a shade or two darker than I remember. It shows a few streaks of silver and grey, probably the water in Karachi didn't suit him or probably he has aged. I see a few wrinkles on his face. His voice has deepened. He wore an original Rolex Explorer II on his left wrist, showing how successful he was now. Occassionally we would share glances but we'd just smile it off and he would return to his movie, while I would stare outside the window, looking at the beautiful sunrise.

It was so magical, the sunrise, that is. As I stared outside the window looking at the fluffy marshmallows, the seven colours of the rainbow all apparent, I saw his reflection on the window staring at me.

It was as if he wanted to say something but wasn't courageous enough to. Or maybe it was his ego. Ugh! I couldn't take it anymore. So I turned back and tried to make small talk:

"Umm, so what brought you here, to Karachi?"

"You," he said flirtatiously.

I couldn't help but laugh, trying hard to hide the facial flush I had.

"Just kidding, I had some business."

Business here? In Pakistan? What sort of a business was it that made him travel from Istanbul to Karachi on a first class air ticket? His next sentence answered that.

"Remember the shop where I worked as an apprentice? Well guess what? I own that shop now!" He said excitedly. "We started off in Istanbul, gradually spread it over the entire country including the Asian side, then we moved to our neighbouring countries and finally our brother-Pakistan." He was really passionate about his business, the sparkle in his eyes confirmed it when he talked about it. But it suddenly disappeared, as if he remembered something really painful.

"Oh! Wow! That's amazing!" And although I had just met him, I felt so proud of his accomplishments, partly because I had seen him 7 years ago, when he only worked as a salesboy.

"Yeah, our outlet in Karachi opens in January 2023, I'll have to come back for that."

"Oh that's great! I'll be visiting Karachi during that time too, who knows we might hop on the same plane like today?" I chuckled.

"Haha, who knows?"

There was a complete silence to the point it got awkward. I opened my mouth to say something, but some unreal force stopped me. Hence I didn't say anything else. Also because I didn't want to keep him from watching his French movie. And the conversation ended there.

And there we sat again, in silence for the rest of the flight, stealing a few glances every now and then.