Istanbul, Türkiye
-I. Dawn-
It was five in the morning. His name was Kaan.
His home stood beside an old mosque. Rising with the rhythm of decades of habit, he stepped onto the cold stone floor. The chill he felt came not from his skin but from somewhere far deeper. He was the Imam of this small district — the one who called people to God, who led them toward the divine. These hours had always been his most intimate moments with the Creator.
He washed. When he bowed in prayer, the first words that escaped his lips were the same whispers of surrender he had uttered for years.
Then he stopped.
There was a void within him — so vast that if he screamed, its echo could fill the universe… and still, there would be no answer. Once, his prayers had flowed like warm rivers through his veins, filling his chest with peace.
Now, the words drifted into the air and never returned.
He tried again, desperately. When he lowered his head, the weight on his shoulders was not loneliness — it was abandonment.
And then, from outside, the adhan rose. "Allahu Akbar," the muezzin's voice echoed through the dawn, but Kaan's heart did not stir. What had once been sacred melody now sounded like the echo of a broken promise.
"All these years… I chased that sound," he whispered. "Did I lose myself? Or were You only a habit?"
The first rays of sunlight pierced through the window. It was the beginning of a new day — yet the darkness within him remained.
He dressed quickly. Somewhere in the heart of faith, he needed to find an answer. He could not live with this silence.
-II. Noon-
Kaan walked briskly toward the mosque. The scent of leather and dampness drifted from the shoe racks by the entrance — a reminder of the faithful who had come before him. As he stepped inside, the softness of the carpet did nothing to ease him.
He approached the mihrab and knelt. When he lifted his head, his eyes wandered to the high dome and the still calligraphy circling it.
"A sign, my Lord. A whisper. The faintest warmth."
Minutes passed. No answer. The silence of the place, once sacred, now felt like the stillness of a tomb. The life he had devoted to seeking God now brought him face to face with nothingness.
Perhaps I spoke too much, he thought. For years, only my voice echoed within these walls. He grew silent to rest — and I mistook His silence for abandonment.
He rose. If no answer came from the heavens, perhaps it would come from the earth — from the world God had made.
He stepped out of the mosque and descended one step from faith's hierarchy into the chaos of the city.
Soon, he found himself in the bustling streets of Sirkeci. The rush of travelers, the clanging of trams — everything moved in a rhythm that seemed both chaotic and precise. He searched for a pattern, a message, a sign. But there was none. The divine order he once saw in the world now appeared as pure coincidence — nothing more, nothing less.
-III. Dusk-
His search continued. By afternoon, Kaan reached the heart of trade — Eminönü.
In the crowd, he saw the hurried faces of merchants and fishermen, people who trusted not in miracles but in their own hands. A fisherman repaired his net with calm precision, unaware that his act itself was faith — faith in labor, not in heaven.
As evening drew near, Kaan walked toward Eyüp, the sacred district. Faces there were filled with reverence and hope, yet for him, they mirrored only his own emptiness.
A mother held her child's hand and prayed softly. They found God in their smallest desires — a cure, a chance, a blessing.
But to Kaan, it was an endless imitation — countless people whispering to a silence.
Are they all mistaken? he wondered. What if everything we believe is a lie? Or worse… what if God has left us?
Perhaps His silence is the void He created so that we may hear ourselves. Or maybe… He never existed at all, and we simply needed someone to listen.
Anger tightened in his chest.
"All these years I served You! I gave You everything! Not even a whisper?" he cried to the west, toward the dying sun.
No answer — only the frail echo of his own voice.
As night fell, the warm lights behind curtained windows disturbed him. Families ate together, doors were closed, prayers were whispered. He was an outsider, a man whose door could no longer be knocked.
Sitting on the pavement, he buried his head in his hands. His shadow stretched, distorted, and finally vanished under a flickering streetlight. Its disappearance felt like the loss of self. He was no longer a man of faith — just flesh, bone, and exhaustion.
-IV. Midnight-
By night, Kaan had wandered to Karaköy — to the docks, where rust, salt, and solitude met the sea.
He sat on a bench. He no longer sought, no longer hoped. The search had become its own grave. Whether God was silent or absent no longer mattered. Both meant the same thing: his life had been an echo chasing an echo.
He closed his eyes. Death seemed peaceful — a release from meaning.
"End it," he whispered to the wind. "Please… just end it."
He waited for the darkness to claim him.
-V. Sunrise-
Then, from a narrow alley nearby, a faint trembling light appeared. It was not from a lamp — it burned differently, more intimately.
He forced himself up. Was this another illusion, another cruel trick of hope? Slowly, as if finishing this walk would erase his existence, he stepped toward the light.
He saw it then — not an origin, but a reflection.
A large, cracked mirror leaned against the crumbling wall of an abandoned warehouse.
Kaan stopped. The light bounced off its fractured surface.
He looked — and what he saw was himself.
The reflection of a weary man, hollow-eyed, who had spent his life searching for a God that never answered.
There was no divine figure, no celestial glow — only the broken symmetry of his own face.
He stepped back. It was more terrifying than silence itself: facing his own fragmented being.
Kaan took a trembling breath and whispered, the words both confession and revelation:
"I spent my life searching for God… and that's why I no longer know who I am."
He gazed into the cracked mirror — into the stranger he finally recognized.
As dawn broke, the light that filled the alley did not come from above, but from within.