Timur could not tell how long he remained on his knees before that old door, the paper trembling in his hand and his spirit shattered. The gentle spring breeze carried the scent of wet earth and wildflowers, yet he felt only a vast emptiness. Time had slipped away, and so had his mother.
Sabina, with a tenderness unusual for someone so young, said nothing. She stayed nearby in silence, letting the quiet speak for her. At last she offered him a cup of water.
Do you want to go inside? she asked.
Timur lifted his eyes. The house looked smaller than he remembered, still modest nonetheless. The wood was worn, the curtains handstitched, the floor creaked with each step. Every corner echoed his childhood.
In the kitchen, the pendulum clock ticked lazily. On the table lay a basket of stale bread and a napkin embroidered with flowers, one of those his mother had woven with endless patience. Beside it, a yellowed photograph showed him, barely six, perched on Ranias lap, both laughing.
Grandma talked about you all the time, Sabina said while preparing tea. She always said that if you ever came back, she didnt want you to feel guilty. She knew where your home was.
Timur stayed silent, his wounded eyes scanning everything, searching for traces of his motherin the furniture, the teas aroma, the cloths pinned up, the way light filtered through the window.
She kept your letters in a cookie tin, Sabina added, pulling it out. Inside were Timurs old letters, yellowed and creased but still readable, even the brief ones that simply said, Im fine. She had saved every single one.
And her grave? he finally asked, voice low.
Its on the hill, next to the apple tree she planted herself. She used to climb up there every afternoon, even in winter.
That afternoon Timur walked to the hill, gathering wildflowers along the way. The tomb was plain, unadorned, bearing only a name: Rania Aslanyan, mother of Timur and Saida.
He knelt, placed the flowers gently, then, without a word, slipped a small cashmere scarf the one he had broughtfor her and laid it on the stone. He remained there until the sun set.
When he returned, Sabina waited with a notebook.
Its hers, she said. She used to write at nightsometimes poems, sometimes just thoughts.
Among the pages was a note dated a year before her death:
I dont know if youll return, my son. But if you ever do, know that I never stopped loving you. If this house still stands, it will always be yours. If this family lives on, its because of you. Though you were absent, you were always part of us.
Timur spent the night in his old childhood room, and for the first time in sixteen years he slept without fearing the past.
The next morning he left early, went to town, spoke with the mayor and neighbors, commissioned the houses restoration, donated books to the local school, and funded a small park by the apple tree in his mothers memory.
He did not stay to live there, but he returned each month. Every spring, on the anniversary of receiving that letter, he brought fresh flowers and sat by the tomb, reading aloud passages from Ranias notebook.
He had learned that a mothers love never diesit simply waits.
