Good Morning, Ester (Morning, Day 2)

I missed out on breakfast in the hotel this morning. When I woke up, it was nearly midday. I had become so engrossed in my writing last night that when I finally lay down on the bed and closed my eyes, it was nearly dawn. Not that I am complaining. On the contrary, it gives me a certain sense of pride, as for a few blissful moments I felt like one of those great literary masters falling asleep at his desk in the midst of writing a masterpiece. But joking aside, you have no idea how happy it makes me to write to you, to reach out to you via these letters, to think about you and relive the things we experienced together over and over again in my mind. You dominate my days and my nights and my thoughts and feelings. You were even in my dreams last night. We were strolling along the narrow streets of Salonika. Some old men were sitting by a table in one of the pavement cafés playing dominoes. One was swearing in Greek, another was singing a song in Spanish, while another was haggling with a nearby trader in Turkish.

‘We would never see this in Paris’, I said to you. ‘This is an empire. A garden of intermingling languages, faiths and ethnicities.’ You smiled alluringly and replied, ‘Yes, but this empire also means our relationship can never be realised, Şehsuvar.’ You were, somehow, discreetly nuzzling up to me whilst at the same time edging away from me without even letting us touch. ‘In Salonika, this is the closest you'll ever get to me.’ You shook your head. ‘But in Paris… Don't you see, you dolt? The only place we can be free as lovers is Paris! This is a dying empire but Paris is a whole new world. A world of new hopes and new beginnings…’

Then we were sitting side by side. I think it was the Odeon Music Hall. We were waiting for the operetta The Count of Luxembourg to begin.