Of course, I thought, birdsong glows like sunlight. A strange thought, which was snatched away from me as sleep tried to catch me. I stood, by the window, making sure to stay awake.
When Nisha woke up around five o’clock, I was seated upright on the bed beside her.
‘Good morning,’ she said, with such sadness that it broke my heart.
‘Good morning. Did you sleep OK?’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘How are you feeling?’
‘The pain has gone. I’m tired.’
I nodded, kissed her on the cheek and went to fetch a glass of water, which I held to her lips. She had a few sips and handed it to me.
‘I’m empty,’ she said. A clear and quiet truth.
The air in my apartment was heavy and humid. I had sweated through my clothes. There were a few items of clothing that Nisha had left over at my place – some underwear, and a red beach dress with yellow flowers that she often wore in the garden. I helped her to get dressed. It was as if she was half-asleep, her arms and body malleable, like soft clay – she allowed me to move her without resistance. It was the first time I had seen such vulnerability in her. Nisha was always strong, fearless, practical. Now, she had handed her power over to me.
She said only a few things. Namely that she would tell Petra that she was unwell with a stomach bug and that hopefully after a little more rest she would be able to return to her duties. With every word she spoke, every small decision she made, I could see her strength returning, her back straightening, the colour gradually returning to her face.
We walked through the garden to her room. The red dress kept reminding me of her blood-soaked blue dress. I tucked her up in bed in order for her to get some rest before Petra and Aliki woke up.
‘Stay with me for a few minutes?’ she said, quietly, and I heard the deep sadness in her voice again.
‘Of course.’
I sat beside her on the bed and stroked her hair.
‘You know,’ she said after a long silence, ‘every person comes into this life with a certain amount of breaths. You live until those breaths run out. It doesn’t matter where you are or what you’re doing, if you have no breaths left, your energy will pass. This baby just didn’t have enough breath to come into this world.’
I took in her words but said nothing. There was a stillness in the room; the fan was off and the heat was immense.
‘When you die,’ she said finally, ‘your energy passes into another form. Imagine having two candles. You pass the flame from one candle to the other.’
I knew she was talking about our unborn child, the child that would never be born as our daughter or our son. But I didn’t respond. I found it hard to speak, to know what to say. I simply listened and stroked her hair. Soon she was asleep.
I looked around the room. On the nightstand was a religious statue and her reading glasses. On the old wood dressing table, her makeup and jewellery. In the far corner of the room was an ironing board next to a laundry basket filled with clean and fresh towels and bed linen that had already been ironed. Behind this, a feather duster and a couple of multicoloured aprons hung on a hook on the wall.
Of course, I’d seen her tending the garden, but I had never, ever imagined her life beyond her bedroom door, her life as a maid in this house.
I gave Nisha a soft kiss on her forehead as she slept and left her room through the glass doors. Back in my flat, in the bathroom, the toilet was still full of Nisha’s blood and what looked like clots and grey tissue. I heaved. There was nothing else I could do but flush the toilet and leave the room.
The meal we had not eaten was still in the kitchen, the glasses empty on the counter. The ring was in my pocket. I took it out and stared at the light bouncing off the diamond. Then I put it away in the cabinet. I knew I couldn’t propose now: I would have to wait until Nisha was better, wait for the right time.
*
The sun was setting as I made my final delivery. I was ready to return to my apartment, the spare room now empty and, well, spare. But not for long. Seraphim and I would be hunting again in just under a week. And I had a lot to ask him.
15
Petra
O
N MONDAY MORNING AT THE shop, I showed Keti the bracelet. She examined it closely, turning it over in her hands, her brow furrowing at the broken clasp. ‘It doesn’t look like she took it off herself, on purpose,’ she said.
‘No.’
‘Will you take it to the police?’ she asked.
‘What’s the point?’
Keti nodded in understanding.
‘Why don’t we make posters,’ she suggested. ‘Maybe someone saw her . . . I could draft a flyer on the computer,’