Why I’m Writing This Anonymously

I´m afraid my mom will find out. This is about sex. And politics, which are both taboo in my family and the culture I come from. Welcome to my first post.

His name was Can.

The Berlin morning felt absurd—me, tangled in the arms of a Turkish-German, tattooed, gorgeous, sun-bronzed man. As dawn broke, he knocked on my guest room door, as if summoned. I lay there, naked and half-asleep.

"Can I lie next to you?"

"What?"

"Can I come and lie next to you now?"

"You can, but I'm naked."

"No problem."

And so he slips into bed beside me. I am barely awake, still bedshaped into the mattress, convinced this must be some kind of joke. He kisses the back of my neck, nuzzles into me, his hands gliding down my back, over my hips, settling on my bare skin. His lips return to my shoulder. I feel him, pressed hard against my lower spine.

I am floating somewhere between sleep and disbelief, and honestly, if I had a choice, I’d rather take a coffee inside me than a man.

He turns me over, pressing his lips to my neck. He smells intoxicating—a mix of bergamot oil, bright and sharp, its bitter citrus tang softened by the golden sweetness of ripe peaches. It’s fresh and decadent, like a late-summer orchard, thick with citrus blossoms and dripping fruit.

It feels calculated.

I am suddenly alert, embarrassingly aware of my unshaved armpits, the remnants of stale airport sweat, the third day of my period. My mouth is coated in yesterday’s döner onion and the cheap beer that washed it down. The perfect Berlin experience.

Still, I kiss him back. I feel the moment he registers the taste—his subtle shudder, the barely perceptible hesitation. Without a second thought, I shove him aside and bolt to the shower.

Hot water scalds away the night. Borrowing my friend´s Gillette, I shave my armpits with the precision of a sewing machine, rinse my body, willing away any trace of blood. With my forefinger, I scrub my teeth furiously, staring at my reflection—pale, barefaced, slightly wrecked, like a prayer left out in the rain and then out to dry.

And then, like a mindess slave, I return to bed.

I let the Turkish tide wash over me, carried by his certainty, his steady hands. I close my eyes, hoping my body won’t betray me. Should I touch him too? The thought flickers, but laziness wins. I prefer to just lie there like a fish on barren land.

Surrendering to the rhythm of his movements—embracing when he embraces, kissing when he kisses, letting myself dissolve into a dance between deep, hungry mouths. Our tongues battle like snakes, looking for food and traces of the enemies inside ourselves.

Then his tongue reaches so far into my soft palate that I nearly gag, the taste jolting me back to last night’s dürüm-halloumi.

He finishes on my lower belly. The regret quickly creeps in, yet there’s a strange pull—seductive and intoxicating. I am fully aware of the power that my body exudes, a force that both overwhelms and draws me deeper into its own current. It's a delicate tension—both shame and allure intertwining, as I stand at the edge, tangled in my own contradictions.

This is my first morning as a different woman in Berlin.