Читать книгу Endgame - Ahmet Altan - Страница 12

VII

Sometimes I listen solely to my instincts, like an animal.

After that night we corresponded almost every night on the internet, an infinite universe beyond reality, where everything is possible – fantasies forever unfolding – and there is nothing to stop you or ever slow you down.

Every day and every night you are born again online to live a completely different life. Hurtling through endless space, far from the rules of the world, its standards and routines. Seeds sprout faster there, relationships develop more quickly.

I was new to this world but I soon discovered the possibilities. Although we became more intimate day by day, I never suggested that we should see each other in person.

My instincts told me that we should first spend time in ‘space’ before we met again in the real world.

So I led a double life.

At night it was a life with a woman I never saw and never touched, sharing secrets, nourishing an intimacy – a life that was ours alone.

I spent my days in the coffeehouse next to Remzi’s restaurant. It was the heart of the town, absorbing stories and then pumping them back out.

The proprietor of the coffeehouse had a limp and wore a perpetual frown. They’d given him the nickname ‘Centipede’. I never learned his real name.

At first they kept their distance from me. They didn’t reject me altogether – I suppose because of what Remzi had said about me – and they certainly weren’t hostile, but they didn’t invite me into their circle. And I didn’t try to ingratiate myself with them. I just sat there on my own, reading my newspapers and books.

My first real contact with them was through the newspaper. They’d come over one by one to ask if they could see the newspaper I had just finished reading. And I was always happy to pass them along. Every day I bought new ones. I would read through one, put it down on the table then wait for someone to come and pick it up.

They weren’t in the habit of buying newspapers, but if they came across one they would flip through it. They especially liked reading the paper the day after a football match. They would pore over the sports pages, exchange papers with each other and then lose themselves in a heated discussion. Eventually they even started reading the front pages, and the magazine section.

Coming into the coffeehouse every morning with newspapers under my arm, I could sense they had been waiting for me. Centipede would scamper over to me with a coffee. There was silence until I had finished my first paper, but as soon as I’d put it on the table the person closest to me would ask if he could read it.

I used to enjoy watching the way they would read, studying their movements and reactions.

Soon I had my regular table – it seemed they had made some kind of agreement, because no one ever sat there – and when I came and sat down people would scramble for tables near mine. The person closest to me always got the newspaper first. Tables near mine were like prime opera boxes. I was startled to see how I’d become the most esteemed customer in the coffeehouse just because I bought newspapers.

Later they started to ask me questions when they discussed politics. I gave them brusque answers and they could never quite work out what I really thought. But there was a sea change when they discovered that I knew more about football than they did. I told them I used to play for the Beşiktaş youth team but had to give up football because of a knee injury. It was a lie. But they didn’t doubt me for a second.

I had become the coffeehouse sage.

They consulted me about almost everything.

That’s how I managed to seep into the inner workings of the town.

They told me all the gossip: tragedies and trivial misfortunes, sumptuous weddings and fiery disputes over land – some even said that the entire town would be razed to the ground and rebuilt – the project for a monumental hotel on the beach, the church on the top of the hill, supposedly built by an apostle of Jesus Christ, whose body was rumoured to have been buried there, and how there was a vast treasure beneath the church; they told me about promiscuous women and the strained relations between various gangs, murders and blood feuds, now and then stopping to roll a joint and offering me a drag. I would smile and politely decline.

One night I imagined the town rising up on a cloud of marijuana smoke before it vanished into the sky. I wanted to stay sober so I could see that day.

Everyone was always a little stoned. Even the women in town. ‘What do you expect, abi? Even the kids smoke,’ they would tell me.

But they were always guarded – even when they were a little high – and only gave me half the story, repeating the same rumours over and over, never touching on what really piqued my curiosity, never telling me what was happening on a deeper level.

Then I met someone who would lead me to the other world.

He was a young man who occasionally came to collect Hamiyet in the evening. I wasn’t sure of their relationship, but he called her his ‘aunt’. And supposedly he was staying with her.

I often saw him at the coffeehouse. He hardly spoke to anyone there. He would sit alone, never joining the discussions or arguments, never laughing at other people’s jokes. He just sat there and smoked. They used to say that he was smoking away all the money that I paid his aunt.

He always gave me the impression that a chasm lay between him and all the other regulars in the coffeehouse. He wasn’t cowed or sheepish; he was a strong and powerful young man. He didn’t seem to need other people. He was content with whatever it was that separated him from the others and didn’t want to share it with anyone.

It was the first time I’d seen a state of happiness so completely independent.

Then I realised that every afternoon he disappeared for a couple hours. And not just him: all the other young men disappeared too.

One afternoon I stood up and said that I was going for a walk, and I followed the young men. I didn’t have to go very far: they were all packed into an internet café on the street just behind the coffeehouse.

It was a dim and clammy little shop that reeked of marijuana.

I only had to go to the place a couple times when it wasn’t busy to work out just which chat rooms they were visiting.

Then I started going home in the afternoons. It wasn’t long before I tracked down the young men in different chat rooms, and I would strike up conversations with them using various fake identities. Soon I knew just how each person communicated and I could put a real face to a persona in the virtual world. I got to the point where I had infiltrated the town’s entire online network by tracking everyone’s online address, their usernames, the groups they belonged to and the chat rooms they visited. For the most part, they were chatting with women.

In the afternoons nearly half of the town vanished into this virtual world where they changed their identities and searched for people with whom they could share their secrets, people who were like them, and they would make love.

Over time I came to know who was looking for a man or a woman; and when people found each other they engaged in a conversation full of all kinds of unimaginative sexual banter.

Some had specific proclivities and stronger imaginations; they were looking for someone like them with whom they could share adventures they would never tell anyone.

Discovering all this, I felt like I was in the underworld.

I could see the invisible.

And it tore my life apart.

In the evenings, I chatted with Zuhal and in the afternoons I chatted with the people of the town in a boundless world of realities nothing like the world above ground. The solitary life I led in town was calm and mundane in comparison. The virtual world was dramatically different, full of colour and excitement.

But the unexpected thing was the way the unseen, unspoken and indiscernible truths of the real world cropped up in the virtual world, which was surprisingly familiar.

Looking back, I’m amazed how the half-stoned inhabitants of a sleepy town were able to sink so deeply into sin.

Whose masterpiece made these people? In a small town they lived like kings, openly baring their sins.

Who created all the sins that caused so many books to be banned?

Who is responsible for the sins that people have committed since not long after their creation?

Tonight, on this bench, I see God all around me, and in my mind.

Why were human beings created with souls capable of these sins?

Is the sinner more sinful than the creator of the sin?

Is God a sinner?

If God created sin when he made us, then why punish us for it?

And if God didn’t create sin, is there something in this universe that he doesn’t know? Is there a limit to his power?

Why make me a murderer?

Why have me kill the person he wanted dead?

I see the first light of dawn rising up over the hills behind the town, reminding me that my time is dwindling, and I am restless.

How long would it take them to find out?

I had to do something.

I was so tired. It seemed easier to bury myself in the past than to come up with a plan. When the future was so frightening the past seemed that much more alluring.

Though I spent so much of my time searching for reality in an unreal world, I kept going to the coffeehouse every morning. Sometimes I’d have meatballs at Remzi’s place for lunch and sometimes I’d go to the Çinili restaurant and eat with the bigwigs in their black suits.

They always look at me but never approach me.

I can feel that it makes them tense to see a stranger in town. They have many secrets and every stranger is a threat in their eyes.

One day I was sitting at the Çinili restaurant when there was a flutter of movement and I realised that the mayor had arrived. I had already learned so much about him. But did he know that? Stepping into the garden, he spotted me almost immediately and came over to my table.

‘Hello. Mustafa Gürz,’ he said. ‘I’m the mayor.’

I stood up and we shook hands. Looking him in the eye, I didn’t know what to say. For a second it occurred to me that he could snap his fingers and someone in the restaurant would have jumped up and killed me. I’m not sure where I got that idea but I clearly remember the chill that ran up my spine.

‘If you don’t mind, I thought I might join you. We can eat and have a little chat.’

‘Please, have a seat.’

Waiters arrived at the table with food before he had even ordered.

He smiled. It was a warm smile that offset the harsh contours of his face. Clearly he was one of those rare types who seemed both gentle and cruel. But more surprising than his smile was what he said as he leaned towards me across the table: ‘I’ve read your books.’

I’m ashamed to admit this now but I think I blushed. I could even feel my ears burning. It was so unexpected that even in the depths of my unconscious there was no appropriate response, no right answer. ‘Is that so?’ was all I managed to say. And still smiling, he said, ‘Yes.’ For a moment I thought that he was mocking me.

‘When did you read them?’

‘Over the weekend.’

‘Just recently, then …’

‘Yes, I just read them. It took me a little while to get around to it.’

I stammered out another ‘Is that so?’, feeling like a boxer being pummelled in the ring, staggering to stay up on my feet.

‘I really liked them. For whatever reason I just can’t get into contemporary novels, I like the classics. I like writers who make you think, but I think books that analyse people are something else altogether. I think literature should be more about people than events. But then again what does my opinion matter, you’re the writer. Let’s just say I can personally relate to those kinds of books.’

‘So you enjoy reading,’ I said.

‘Is there anything more important? I think literature is one of man’s most praiseworthy pursuits. Greater than science. Consider Jules Verne. He took us to space before science did.’

He paused for a moment. ‘Would you like something to drink?’

‘I’ll have a rakı,’ I said. Drink was undoubtedly invented for just such times.

The conversation was so unexpected, I felt lost.

He ordered two glasses of rakı.

‘So how do you know Zuhal?’ he asked, politely, but a shadow fell over his face.

‘We met here,’ I said. ‘On the plane. Why does a small town like this even have an airport?’

‘People here are a little bit mad. Mahmut Amca, former president of our Chamber of Commerce, was always coming and going and he got fed up with the bad roads, which you can imagine were a lot worse back then. First he wanted to repave the roads but he found out how expensive that was going to be so he decided to build an airport. People thought he was insane, and they protested, but he insisted, saying that the airport would be cheaper than new roads. So he did it and he bought a little propeller plane. His son, Teoman, bought a new plane, for personal use and commercial flights. Then he bought a crop-duster and in the end it turned out to be a profitable investment. And we were happy to have our own airport. We travel by plane and not by bus.’

Raising his glass, he toasted my health. Then he asked, ‘So have you come to our town to write a new book?’

‘Let’s see. I was looking for somewhere quiet, and there was something about this place.’

‘I wouldn’t call this town quiet,’ he said, looking me in the eye.

‘I’ve heard,’ I said. ‘All the murders.’

‘Oh not so many really, just a couple of cases, but they talk as if someone’s shot every day.’

‘Why the killings?’

‘It’s all about land. Property values are only going to rise. Everyone knows that. So people are racing to get their hands on land. Then it quickly becomes a blood feud. And people here are a little behind the times. Revenge is still a powerful emotion. If you ask me, money is a stronger incentive than revenge.’

‘You have a difficult job,’ I said, beginning to feel the rakı. It was just what I needed; I was pulling myself together.

‘Of course. That’s inevitable but I’m used to it now.’

‘Do they ever threaten you?’

‘Me?’ he said, surprised. The sincerity in his voice was real; clearly he had never considered someone actually threatening him. ‘No, people here would never go so far.’

‘Are they afraid of you?’

‘Oh no, please, it’s not that, it’s just that my family has been here for such a long time, and there are a lot of us, so let’s just say it’s respect for the family.’

He had such a calm and natural confidence and I realised he was condescending to me in the same way he did to everyone else. He had already ruled me out as a potential rival.

He treated me like a valuable but useless antique vase, never offending or threatening me. I was faced with a dilemma. If I were to submit to his courtesy, which was gift-wrapped in pride, he’d place me among the bigwigs and he’d speak to Zuhal about me with a sort of affection; but if I were to counter with the same indifferent air of arrogance, he’d never speak well of me, and prevent me from learning more about the people in town.

I was caught between curiosity and pride.

I decided to take a step back to a place where I was safe from a sudden attack of kindness or his insolent aggression. But it wasn’t really a conscious decision, rather an action seemingly independent of my thoughts.

‘Are you and Zuhal old friends?’ I asked.

I knew that on the subject of Zuhal it was best to feign ignorance. Surely both of us would talk about our meeting with her separately, reshaping the scene in our own way.

I imagined the way she would laugh at us.

‘We’re friends from university,’ he said. ‘We went to the same college in Minnesota. You wouldn’t believe it. Someone from here must have discovered the place because there were a lot of students from around here at the time. Zuhal majored in economics …’

‘And you?’ I asked with a smile. ‘Literature?’

‘No,’ he said, laughing. ‘We own all of these olive groves here, so my dad wanted me to study agricultural engineering.’

‘Why the interest in literature?’

‘My uncle. There’s a black sheep in every family. He loves reading.’

Then he paused: ‘Black sheep in the positive sense. I don’t want you to get the wrong idea.’

He had a polite and cultivated side: and the courtesy was genuine.

‘No offence taken,’ I said. Then I laughed and added: ‘In my books the “black sheep” are almost always portrayed in a positive light.’

‘Then let’s drink to them.’

At that moment I sensed that we might actually become good friends, despite the strange tension between us. One of the strangest friendships is the one between two men pursuing the same woman and we seemed to be heading in that direction. I was both excited and a little nervous. ‘You were telling me about your uncle …’

‘He wasn’t interested in the family business. We have a little house up in the olive groves, which was built so we could spend summers there but no one ever really went. I used to go up there with my uncle. Like I said, he wasn’t interested in working, but he was a really fun guy, always making fun of people – you’d like him. He’d bring me books and the way he’d talk about them inspired me to read them. And I really enjoyed them. Introverts like reading, but you already know that.’

I didn’t take him for an introvert and the look on my face made him laugh.

‘One can be lonely in a crowd,’ he said. ‘It’s a bit of a cliché I’m afraid but, well, sometimes clichés are true.’ So he had some intellectual modesty. His overdone confidence had been undermined by the thought that he’d said something silly. So there were subjects in which he didn’t feel entirely comfortable. I was pleasantly surprised to see that on matters in which he didn’t see himself as the sole authority he was sensitive, even shy.

In my contentment I ignored the clear indications of my own malice. There are times when I can’t see what I’m doing, and this was one of them.

‘Life would be that much harder without clichés,’ I said. ‘Clichés constitute the courtesy that life has taught us. And it’s true that you can be alone in a crowd. Unfortunately crowds are no cure for loneliness. Loneliness is an illness that can only be cured by one person. There’s another cliché for you … But who could deny it?’

‘Some might. But then they probably don’t know anything about loneliness.’

We looked at each other.

Then we both burst out laughing and everyone in the restaurant turned to look at us. It was the last thing I had expected.

I don’t think we really knew why we were laughing but something about our situation and the conversation we were having was suddenly incredibly funny.

He looked at his watch.

‘I should get going. There are things I have to do.’

Standing up, he said, ‘Some friends are coming over this weekend. We’re going to roast a lamb on the spit. You should come over if you have the time. Zuhal’s coming.’

Checkmate.

I was completely thrown. I was chatting with Zuhal every night (we knew the most intimate details about each other) but she’d never told me that she was going to the party.

She had told Mustafa.

So while she was leading me on, she was also speaking to him and even planning to see him.

The blow was devastating. I could hardly control myself.

‘Zuhal’s coming too,’ I said, without concealing my surprise.

He looked at me intently. He’d hit me just where he wanted.

‘That’s right. You should come.’

‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘I’ll try to make it.’

I had another drink after he left. When the other people in the restaurant got up to leave they nodded when our eyes met.

I had been accepted into high society.

But the initiation ceremony would be far more painful.