The Island of Missing Trees(86)

‘Hello?’ the scientist said into the receiver. ‘Hi, Defne, hello. It’s Eleni here. From the lab, yes. Good, thank you. How is work at the site?’

They chatted a bit, boring human talk, until something Eleni said piqued the bee’s attention.

‘Look, uhm, the couple you were asking about, your friends … We might have found them. We have a DNA match, for both.’

Intrigued, the bee flew closer to listen.

‘Oh, no!’ Eleni screamed and grabbed a newspaper, waving it wildly about her. Who knew she was terrified of honeybees, this woman who spent her days with cadavers and skeletons?

My poor friend, once again misunderstood and mistaken for something she wasn’t, suffered a blow to the head. She tumbled into a coffee mug, thankfully empty save for a few drops of coffee. As she rose to her feet, weak and dizzy, she heard Eleni mutter: ‘Where did it go …? Sorry, Defne, there was a bee here. I’m a bit scared of them.’

A bit? my friend thought to herself. If this was what humans did with a bit of fear, imagine what they were capable of doing with loads of it? She managed to scramble up the side of the mug and dry off her wings.

‘Yes, of course you may come and see,’ Eleni was now saying. ‘Oh, really, you’re going to England tomorrow? I understand. That’s fine. This afternoon is good. Okay, we’ll talk when you’re here.’



Half an hour later, the other scientists not yet back from lunch, the door opened and a woman rushed in.

‘Oh, Eleni, thank you for your call.’

‘Hi, Defne.’

‘You’re sure it’s them?’

‘I believe so. I checked their DNA results twice with their family references just to be sure and both times they were above the threshold.’

‘Where were they found, do you know?’

‘In Nicosia.’ Eleni paused, hesitating whether to share the next piece of information. ‘Inside a well.’

‘A well?’

‘Yes, I’m afraid so.’

‘All this time they were in there?’

‘That’s right. They had been chained to each other, neither could surface. We were told that the well had collapsed recently and when the builders started working, they found the remains,’ said Eleni, her tone subdued. ‘I’m so sorry for your loss. I must say, we have never seen anything like this before. Usually it’s a Greek Cypriot buried here, a Turkish Cypriot buried there. Killed separately. Buried separately. But never before a Greek and Turk murdered together.’

Defne stood still, her hands hovering above the table before clutching its edge.

‘When will you inform their families?’

‘Tomorrow, I was thinking. One family is in the north, one in the south.’

‘So now they will be separated,’ said Defne. Her voice was soft, reedy. ‘They can’t be buried side by side. How sad – all this time we spent looking for them and maybe it would have been better if they were never found … if they could have remained lost together.’

Eleni laid her hand kindly on her shoulder. ‘Oh, before I forget …’ She strode to her desk and took out a plastic case. ‘They also found this.’

A pocket watch.

Defne lowered her eyes. ‘It belonged to Yiorgos. A birthday present from Yusuf. There should be a poem inside … by Cavafy.’ She stopped. ‘Sorry, Eleni … I need some fresh air. Can we open the windows?’

Instantly, the honeybee perked up. This was her chance, perhaps her only one. As soon as they opened a window, my friend gathered her strength and zigzagged her way out. She flew as fast as she could and did not stop until she had reached the safety of the flower fields.





Little Miracles


Cyprus/London, early 2000s


When Kostas returned, he carefully examined the Ficus carica. With a pair of secateurs he made one straight cut and one diagonal across a single clean stem. Although he knew it was best to use several shoots in case some did not survive, the tree was in such a poor condition he could only secure one, which he carefully wrapped and then put in his suitcase.

It would be difficult, but not entirely impossible. Little miracles did happen. Just as hope could spring from the depths of despair, or peace germinate among the ruins of war, a tree could grow out of disease and decay. If this cutting from Cyprus were to take root in England, it would be genetically identical but not at all the same.



In London, they planted the cutting in a white ceramic pot and kept it on a table by the window in Kostas’s small flat, overlooking a quiet, leafy square. It was here they found out that Defne was pregnant, the two of them sitting cross-legged on the bathroom floor with their heads bent over a home-testing kit. A bulb buzzed and flickered overhead, the wattage fluctuating. Defne would never forget the joy that spread across Kostas’s face, his eyes blazing with something akin to gratitude. She, too, was happy, but also apprehensive and slightly frightened. Yet so pure was his joy that it felt like betrayal to tell him about the needles of anxiety that were pricking her skin, splintering her mind. One of her recurrent dreams in those days would be about getting lost in a dense, dark forest with a baby in her arms, crashing through the trees, unable to find a way out, as branches scraped her shoulders and scratched her face.

Only once, about a month later, she asked, ‘What if it all goes wrong?’