Istanbul Was a Fairy Tale (18 page)

l him Mimico . . . It’s a long story.” She had been one of the avid listeners to the stories I told, the stories I always wanted to tell. In this, her stage experience in the past had certainly had its part to play. However, what had particularly impressed me was that power of intuition that had made her a different woman in my view. In the course of time I was to get acquainted with many women who would impress me with their intuitive power for the sake of different relationships in different ways. What made Juliet different were the efforts she made to defend herself solely by her intuitions, although she had been fully equipped with all the necessary prerequisites. This seemed to be her distinguishing feature which could be considered both developed and underdeveloped, in a certain sense. As for her wide hips and full breasts, they tended to arouse sexual desire, especially for the latent dreams of an adolescent boy, avid to touch a woman’s body . . . I remember well, as we had been speaking of stories, she had cast meaningful attractive glances my way. This was one of the key moments of a storied relationship. I felt as though a closely guarded secret had been revealed. I had felt myself stark naked in front of her. As we had been sitting next to each other on the sofa, I had suddenly been conscious of that moment when her leg touched mine. This was of such a nature that it could never be experienced again, a moment intensely felt and reproduced to infinity. From the slit of her skirt one could see the entirety of her leg, a real treat . . . She leaned forward to shake out the ash of her cigarette, and trying to cover up the trembling in her voice, she had continued her story from where she had left off in order to redirect my attention to the photograph, and went on to tell the story in question that had introduced Mimico to me as a person who would always abide in me, as though I felt guilty about him. “Do not let those looks deceive you. Those were actually her happiest days. Her happiest days despite all the lies, deceptions and deceits . . . ” she began as a preamble. I had asked myself once again whether you needed key witnesses in order to be able to understand certain sentiments that had been experienced in a place very distant from you. I knew the story of the people who had hidden themselves behind those appearances. I was beginning to acknowledge that I belonged to the family that those people formed, and that I would be bound to acknowledge it, years later, when I came to realize that I had learned not to feel ashamed of those shortcomings. She had continued to speak: “You should ask Berti about Mimico’s youth. They had grown up together in the same district. He was a strange sort of a fellow. He was the laughingstock of the district, a timid boy,” she added. And I’d said in return that laughing at people was a sort of self-defense for the weak. “It expresses the restlessness one feels at the existence of a creature different from them, the easiest way to compensate for their own shortcomings.” She had smiled at my remark. She seemed to be approving of my observations. Nevertheless, it seemed that for her to speak about Mimico, to shift back to that time in the past was of greater importance. I believe this was the attempt of a person abandoned in some undesired place to free herself from her own shadow . . . To endeavor to free oneself from one’s past . . . By imparting one’s experiences and sharing them with others, a way of confessing things in a roundabout way . . . All I had to do was to lend an ear. Everything had assumed the air of a ritual enacted for commemorating someone . . . “Berti found the cause of it in his being orphaned. Mimico had lost his father six months after his birth; thus, he had not known paternal affection. Hard times had started for the family, who had until then made a decent living on the income derived from a small brewery and winery. Madame Victoria had to shoulder the burden of the family, acting both as mother and father to her children. The family was not that large, there were only the three of them, yet they formed a unit. She had to do something about them. A newborn infant of six months, an old mother in need of care, a new business, just like in the trash we occasionally take delight in reading in order to kill time . . . or in those cheap movies . . . these were Berti’s memories from childhood days, from the days when blocks of apartments were given female names . . . When I think of Mimico I cannot help asking myself the reason why certain stories are so tragic. After all, it was not so easy to imagine oneself living a detestable life you would never have dreamt of . . . with all the responsibilities and penury . . . Madame Victoria had immediately started to work at the brewery thanks to the practical knowledge she had acquired from her husband. Scratching a living, maintaining a family . . . Monsieur Dimitro, her husband’s business partner, had been of great assistance in tutoring her in the particulars of the job, just like an elder brother who had spared no effort to train her in the business. But this was at the beginning; for, later on he had harassed her. Madame Victoria, who refused to yield to his amorous inclinations, thinking that she should keep her chastity and not betray the memory of her husband, had to give in, in the end. Perhaps she had also been willing; we can never know. After all, she was a beautiful and attractive young woman. Business life, uncontrollable impulses . . . When I think of it, to be frank, there was nothing out of the ordinary in this relationship. I believe it was Mimico who had resented this and was injured at Monsieur Dimitro’s frequent and long-lasting visits on the pretext of discussing business. In his crankiness, lack of confidence in people and introversion, the influence of those long nights could not be denied. Monsieur Dimitro often invited Mimico to the dinner table prepared fastidiously by Madame Victoria with appetizers, and offered him raki, telling bawdy jokes which he did not understand, wishing him to grow up and be a man. Mimico was eight or nine years of age at the time. According to the account of Berti, he felt terrified in the presence of Monsieur Dimitro during those nights and detested him . . . ” As you try to imagine this scene, you might remember the age-old anecdotes in which virility is displayed in all its dimensions. In the fullness of time, I was to learn that Monsieur Dimitro, far from being an experienced gallant and an extreme dandy who had earned the admiration of women used to living with stereotyped standards, was a puny asthmatic valetudinarian who had had no extramarital affairs. Under these circumstances, Madame Victoria’s choice acquired a different value. However, despite all the hustle and bustle, apocryphal stories abounded in which a web of elaborate lies were worked out for fear of being cast away, and in order to be a member of the great majority in which so many fine feelings were smothered grievously. Juliet’s mindset in her stance toward those recollections had inestimable value for me. For, she happened to be one of those who had shown and taught me one of the many facets of lies . . . We had grown silent. I distinctly remember that that silence was one of those contrapuntal silences. I had thought that we could conjure up these people into whose psychologies we had gained an insight, following different devious paths to different places and possibilities after all these years; doing so in more subtle, diverse ways. To tell the truth, we lived in so many forbidden zones, with so many shadows, our own shadows . . . “Mimico was a sensitive fellow,” said Juliet continuing her narrative. Acting had got her nearer to the voice that her past had given her, identifying her as a narrator. With her left hand she had stroked her hair, and after moving her hand along her neck, she diverted her looks from the photographs, assuming that feminine air I adored, casting a glance at me with a smile. Our legs touched. The timing was excellent. I felt once more as th
ough I was stark naked . . . Then we had returned to the photograph . . . for that time, for our time, for our times . . . “The kid could not possibly understand everything by discourse or reason. Understanding aside, the fact remained that the mere sight of his mother being appropriated by another man would be enough to make him feel estranged. The boy’s hopelessness in the presence of his mother’s situation can easily be understood . . . Those nights must have deeply affected the boy’s future attitude toward women, inflating the risk of him being seen as a cast away. Madame Victoria was reported to have been a kindhearted, loving mother. Mimico had never forgotten this. I believe that he always wanted to remain faithful to her memory. However, this period did not last long, for Monsieur Dimitro died within a few years. The brewery was sold at auction. There remained little afterward. Madame Victoria was a resolute woman; she did not resign herself to her fate stoically. She turned another of her talents to good account and began working as a tailor. She went to houses to do her job; she took Mimico with her on the days there was no school or when he was reluctant to go to school. These days apparently affected not only his own world of imagination, but also that of his friends, of his peers. Such fancies are all the more potent during adolescence. Even more so with innocence . . . perhaps because the young are not left crushed under them . . . I know this not only from the impressions of my old friends, but also from Berti. Men are somehow more innocent in the beginning as regards sexual matters. Mimico used to relate to his friends the lascivious scenes to which he had been a witness at the houses of the clients he went to with his mother, describing the women stripping in his presence—who took little heed of him at the time. Such moments were the rare instances when he enjoyed supremacy among his friends. It occurred to him however, that at times he made himself the laughingstock of his companions through his exaggeration of events. Even so, he reigned supreme during such reports. “O the things I have seen! What hips, what breasts!” He went on describing how a woman had replaced one of her large breasts that had come out from her bra back to its nest; how another woman had adjusted her panties squeezed in between her buttocks, how still another woman tactlessly exposed the tuft of pubic hair that had jutted out from the slit of her slip. Most probably he described his adventures in glowing terms. All these cock-and-bull stories may have been of his own invention, but it was undeniable that they had a powerful effect on his companions. I know this from the way Berti told me years later with great relish. Here, I must draw your attention to something of considerable significance. I doubt if you have noticed it. Mimico was shrewdly taking revenge on his companions who had ostracized him during his narrations and demonstrations. It was unkind of him perhaps, although he may be thought of as justified . . . By tickling their fancies, by arousing their jealousy, and, probably by deceiving them . . . He had at the time been robbed of a valuable story . . . His school records were far from being satisfactory . . . He had studied at the High School of Commerce; his mother could not afford to finance his tuition at colleges where European languages were taught and in which his friends studied . . . They were to learn much later what destitution was. Mimico had been faced with another disadvantage at the High School of Commerce: the inconvenience of being a Jew; he was the only Jew in the school. His companions used to call him “Dirty Jew!” Those were the days when he had been separated from Berti. During his junior years, in his adolescence, the gap widened even more. In summer, while his peers met at the square under the clock tower at Büyükada with their girlfriends and went to Dil or made the tour of the island on bicycles, he, in whom no girl paid any attention, remained with his mother and took sea baths all alone. He had to take cognizance of his alienation and lead the life of a recluse. What happened afterward, you can guess . . . The ever-increasing pain of banishment resulting from seclusion . . . As though this was not enough, he developed a phobia for riding bicycles. This seems obstinate and makes one irate . . . ” She was right. It was a rather important characteristic, a very important one in fact, for a woman. In order to be acquainted with a woman, to be better acquainted with her, one need only exert extra special effort in satisfying her needs and wants. Was this characteristic a female trait? Time would tell. Yet, it was possible to lend meaning to this deception by finding room for it in those circumstances. To be obliged to go swimming all alone, to view those who journey to the beach in the company of others with envy, and, to be frank, with some jealousy, caused storms to rage within one’s soul, and on top of this, to put on an air as though everything was all right . . . The fact that one could ride a bicycle had a poetic meaning difficult to express in words. At such times, one felt that such a painful experience would fail to exude from you, forever leaking inside. Then you began learning certain tricks, mastering them out of necessity. And eventually you became attached to them, up until the moment you found your match. I distinctly remember this had been one of the moments that had drawn me closer to Mimico. “Berti once told me that he had made a mistake by having left Mimico alone and that he had bitterly regretted it afterward . . . But regret does not avail, since nothing can be retrieved . . . ” Juliet said at a time when I had been ruminating on the subject. She seemed to be defending Berti rather than accusing him. Her voice had the warmth of a doting mother keeping watch over her child. Her voice did not change when she spoke about Mimico. She said: “People thought that he was a borderline case, that he was retarded. I was the only one who thought differently,” adding, “What was wrong with him was that he was a person who didn’t know how to turn his intelligence and talent to good account, unlike his acquaintances. With a magic touch, a real woman might change everything for her man enabling him to reconnect to the world and to those who had denied him. On condition that this woman is a virtuous woman who would be willing to take care of him . . . ” She had spoken without taking her eyes off the photograph; after having stared at length at the appearance that had popped up before her at that unexpected moment, returning from a far distant past. That was what one did, what one always did, to imaginatively enter into the time of a photograph, to the time of its shooting; to stare, merely to stare at it; to stare at it in order to hold onto our history more tightly, to stare at it because we cannot entrust ourselves wholly to another person. Was the fact that the continuation of our conversation was carried on, even though on a different plane, with a long interval in between, due to our failure to take cognizance of this reality at the time? Maybe. On the other hand, even though we had known this reality, we had known that we knew it; we could not explain to each other those voices produced by the silences caused by our evasions. It was evident, however, that her last sentence tried to make way for another story. This was an interim period between disclosure and concealment. I believe that this was the reason why I had suggested to her to join me in keeping the story under our hat. Personally, I also had a hand in the matter in regard to the illusion that her feminine touch created. That was why I had asked her: “What about Madame Victoria?” I had felt it. My question had generated a spark in her. She seemed to express that I had touched upon a moot point. I knew her only that much. I still entertain the same opinion. “She cherished the same opinion. She was the one who wanted her son to find a decent job and get married, during the days when his companions had eith