After listening to Adichie speak on the ‘Danger of a single story’, I remembered the importance of a story in the centre of my thoughts. The way it cracked open like a nutshell well hidden from my grasp, pouring out the important detail that makes any experience comprehensible. My time of grief sits arched amongst the others; its long, strong limbs spread between four distinct periods of my life. Between being stuck and growing faster than it was possible to trace, their echoes resonate amongst themselves in times of longing, despair, confusion, and rebuilding what was never lost. To force myself to remember has become my objective for a long time, as the fear that I no longer hold their firm memories in my hands overcomes me every time. It is difficult to lose the memory of losing and being lost. The understanding that underlies all of the periods that are colonised by grief is that they are shared amongst the experiences of many others who have walked through similar situations. Perhaps there comes a time that sees this experience fully explored through repetition and singularity. But, excuse the repetition; I have come to accept that if I will write about this I will have to do so in a manner which will help me come to terms with the memories I have thought of myself as inadequate to occupy.

My brother was born when I was six years old. This happiness rings of baby milk and endless petty jealousies. It also brings to memory the germs, the fear which began and never ended. The word ‘fear’ was not as apparent as the word ‘wrong’. I washed my hands religiously because I was afraid. I saw the fragility in his veiny forehead, his powdered, translucent skin. How can something so unaware stand at the forefront of so much fear? I barely breathed around it. This grief spreads itself throughout the others; the fear of hurting. Panicked calls home, the palm of my hand moving between me and the object of infection to pull up a barrier; constantly stirring, never succeeding. Getting used to the whites of eyes, the white of teeth, all gleaming with mockery. Periods of calm followed by awkward movements of the body attempting to dodge the intrusive thoughts. Rude guests, always in my mind, spilling their tea leaves on me as if I invited fear to make me its permanent home. This period is all in retrospect, pulled out in clumps: as long as it is present I will narrate it as the past. The first grief was powdered milk and antibacterial hand soap.

We moved to Istanbul when I was eight years old. I had no picture of the city. The richness of colour and smell, money and the lack of it, overwhelmed me. The old meshed with the new felt like a recently bought coat, unworn and warm; soft to the touch. The loss of leaving home behind was tinted and exciting. I remember leaning on the ledge of my window, from which I could see a playground of a school located near my home. The brick coloured parquet sprang up stories of other children who grew up with the skyscrapers in near view. Their friendships would last a life time as they already had in comparison to the ones I had made and lost in the process of moving countries. Loss smelled of a clean white pocket square I had asked my grandma to give me. It sat in one of the plastic files of a grey folder in which she had incorporated a collection of satirical cartoons from the newspapers she read. I would recall then the times we had read those cartoons together, the sting of past laughter cutting with an edge sharpened by my vibrant childhood imagination. Magnified memories were experienced without the impulse to compartmentalise. Loads of sniffing of the clean pocket square, looking for the edge of the plastic sleeves to turn the page. Each image of satire would bring the welling of tears. I would tell this to my grandma on the phone, only to hear her voice: ‘I put those in so you could laugh!’ But she never mocked me. She listened and filled the corners of my sadness with the clichés and practices which made the experience bearable. I looked at the moon as she told me to, believing she was looking too. My second footstep of grief is on the moon.

The third grief had a face with cheeks full of life. Cheeks rosy and eyes blue, and the warmest hazel you have ever seen; my mother. The third step of grief was in the room with the box, the air thick with three presences. Steps towards the box, the screams I need to discuss three years later, and then acceptance. Gradual, cold knowledge of reverse time, grief thick and slow. Every time I looked into my father’s eyes we were both looking into the same face. This grief smelled of old gardenia and orange bricks: construction of memories and decomposition of fear. It was not the rosy image of tears and holding hands. It was learning to speak to each other about deep discomfort, shifting our body weight to find a balance thin and worn out. It was the blue and pink marks turning nude in the face of an audience who offered their clueless support. The loss of immense presences pervading the extreme movement of our lives. It was tears, rare and welcome. Release from the repeated routine of forgetting to move on. A very heavy baggage that always seems empty in words. Kicking and screaming before moving and dancing was the third step of grief.

The last step of grief, for now, is moving and leaving behind. Nostalgia rings like the sound of my fork tossing back and forth the remnant crumbles of feta I bought from Tesco.  The clink of my dishes in the sink rings of my grandma’s trembling hand as she serves you some more fish. But I have felt nostalgia before I tasted it: as soon as I set foot on the plane I realise I am driven out and away through clouds more confused than me. A constant state of wishing to leave in wishing to stay cycling my mind like my twelve-year-old brother through the streets of home. They stole his bike last winter and I was not there. The three weeks I tread time always erode away into cramps of leaving behind those others I walked on sand with during those scorching afternoons. I know to wish for nothing more because my home may be elsewhere but at least I have embedded its details in me. Don’t forget to soak the lettuce in vinegar to kill the germs. Make lentils now and then. Home is grey in black and white- spikes of representation. And my eyelids mirror it all, aching with the light and wishing for nothing else but that. The fourth face is tired, like those I leave behind. This grief is spread most geographically. I trace its outline from wherever I find myself in wherever I am not.

All four steps leave complex imprints that are better written before they are quickly let go from fear of loss. I have not dared do this before, but here it is. Retrospect gives the strangest shades to grief. I am willing to accept this.