Last Train to Istanbul

by Ayşe Kulin

“Love is like a flame; it burns itself out eventually,”

“I had thought that my education was meant to expand my horizons, that you wanted me to be an equal, Father.” “I had you and your sister well educated hoping that one day you would present me with grandchildren, not so you’d rebel against me.”

Tarık had thought that abandoning oneself to fate was a trait of people from the East, but here this Istanbul driver thought along the same lines.

It’s interesting, she thought, that one isn’t scared of death from a distance, but when it is staring you in the face it feels like a merciless enemy that you desperately want to avoid.

Sabiha was going to see him twice a week and she was very pleased with him. He wasn’t judgmental, he didn’t apportion blame, he didn’t even give her advice; he simply listened to her.

“He who falls into the sea will cling even to a serpent.”

But now she began to realize that forgiveness and concern were two entirely different things.