Stay with me

Chapter 34 - Redemption

Fikret entered the office and stopped at the threshold. Defne, folding her arms over her chest, stood by the window and looked at Istanbul bathing in the winter sun rays. Hearing the sound of the door closing, she looked around.

"Good morning," the girl quietly greeted.

"Good morning," Defne replied, staring at her face.

Fikret looked strange. Pale and detached. The feverish light that had burned in her eyes for the past few weeks had gone. Her glance acquired clarity and depth. She was silent, and Defne spoke first:

- Alina said - you want urgently to talk with me. I am listening to you.

"I came to ask you for forgiveness," Fikret spoke in her cold voice.

Defne raised her eyebrows in surprise.

- Аbout what?

- For the story with the letter. For my harassment on Omer. For the stinging ridicule to you. "And for wanting to kill you and your child," she added mentally.

Defne was amazed. But she didn't show it. Remaining calm and collected, she answered:

"Fikret, I don't know what made you suddenly change your mind." And to be honest, I don't want to know. Your apologies are accepted. I do not hold anger on you. But I beg you - leave us, Omer and me, alone. We do not want our orbits to intersect.

Fikret looked sadly into Defne's wary eyes and nodded her head.

- I understand. Don't worry, after the charity evening, I will leave Istanbul. I will work in a village for orphans. I decided to devote my life to them.

- A noble decision.

"You don't believe that I can be noble?" - In the voice of Fikret sounded bitterness.

"I believe," Defne answered without hesitation. She went to the table and began to sort out papers on it. Not looking at the uninvited guest, reasonably continued to say: - In every person, there is both good and bad. It depends only on him on which side he will choose. If you have chosen the side of goodness and nobility, I am only glad for this.

- Mom helped me to choose.

Defne shot her a surprised look.

- Your mother? - asked again. "But she is dead."

- Yes. At my birth. All my life, I thought that no one needs and no one loves me. And yesterday my grandmother gave me her diary. I read, - tears glistened in Fikret's eyes - and realized that they loved me. She loved me more than life, and these are not just words. Mom sacrificed herself so that I could be born.

Tears rolled down her cheeks, but the girl did not notice them. In Defne's chest, pity embraced her heart. She could no longer remain indifferent.

- Was your mother sick? - asked sympathetically.

- Yes. Severe diabetes. Now medicine has stepped forward, but twenty-seven years ago, for such patients, the desire to have a child became a sentence. Doctors did everything possible, but a miracle did not happen.

"I'm sorry," Defne said sincerely. Her hand instinctively covered her stomach. "But, I understand your mother."

"Because you are as bright a soul as she was ... Now I understand why people like you love so selflessly." With all their heart until the last minute.

Defne looked incredulously. Is this Fikret? Although, once upon a time, when they first met, she was like that. Magnanimous and ready to help.

"People love not for something ... but because they fall in love." Just the planets converge. It is fate.