Istanbul Was a Fairy Tale (43 page)

The sea was another road

To fail to take the turn at the right moment or to choose not to take it at all because of one’s apprehensions and the things that one, in full knowledge of the enslavement involved, would prefer not to lose . . . Although Aunt Tilda was ‘his old’ aunt, the fact that she had not been invited to the wedding of Rosy, the introverted, kind, affectionate and unlucky stepchild of Monsieur Jacques, sufficed to show the extent of the preference involved. Rosy had come upon this fact only on the wedding night and had retorted reproachfully to Juliet, saying: “How very treacherous of you! You should at least respect my beloved grandmother’s memory!” This voice contained a wrath that seemed to conceal other revolts she dared not put into words. This voice was the voice of an extremely sensitive, tender heart, according to the judgment of her friends. Tears rose to her eyes. Berti had let his head sink to his chest; he had a faint smile on his face. He felt he was in an intermediate state between confusion and pride. He was the best person there to understand this touch . . . Juliet was staring at me. I could not exactly tell what she was trying to bring to the fore, but I noticed that she also looked somewhat confused . . . Monsieur Jacques was not there; he hadn’t heard the words exchanged; he looked to have gone off reminiscing to a far spot, somewhere in the distance. When one considers what had been left for other people in other stories and what had to be recollected, this was only too natural. We happened to be at the seaside. Another person in another story had desired to speak of the streets of Istanbul that led up to the sea. The sea they mentioned might well imply a larger road, into which innumerable roads flowed, a road that reached different boundaries in different stories with differing yearnings, capable of propagating different songs. Rosy and I, we had failed to knit together a friendship over the entire course of our lives. She seemed to prefer to keep aloof from her acquaintances. But the fact was that to be able to understand that distance, to have a proper insight into it, was not possible despite what other separations had intimated to us. It seemed as though she was fated to remain distant. Now that I can think more clearly, with a lucid mind, I’ll try to have a fresh insight into my own remoteness. I’m convinced that I’ll be able to think of a more logical explanation, at least on my account. It looked as though Rosy had appeared to others as being unfeminine in character, despite her impeccably clear and ivory skin, blue eyes, fair and thick wavy hair, and full breasts that were likely to engage the attention of men. Was this one of the reasons for our failure in closing up the gap between us? I distinctly remember that I had felt a pang of guilt for not having established a proper connection with her, when I reflected on this incident. Whenever I visualize what we had experienced there, I can’t help thinking that I won’t be able to dispose of this crisis of conscience. At such times I think of the helplessness of people who are the victims of delayed reaction, while a voice from the past, from a past long ago, starts narrating to me the story of people who have failed to convey their dreams to others. I lapse into silence and reconsider the hopes associated with certain songs. I hold my tongue and take refuge in another lie to avoid encountering myself lurking around the corner. I make a quick getaway for the sake of that line of verse I did not touch and whose hideaway was a mystery for me, but, resolved as I am, I have pledged my word that I will some day find that hero I had lost in one of those streets. There was nothing original about Rosy’s marriage. She had married one day like all the others in her class. She would one day bring a child into the world that in no stage of her life would she be able to attune herself to. Furthermore, she would, some day, do something she shouldn’t; take a step she should not take; a step that would cost her a high price; a step that was to continue to rise in value, greater than what was originally paid. It was a special step, a step exclusive to her, a step
sui generis
. . . This might be a surmise on my part, however. Nonetheless, it was a fact that it had been my wish to consider it in this guise, to believe it as such, in order to understand certain steps better and fit them into their proper places. However, it would take some time before the accomplishment of all these things would be within my reach. From its commencement, the marriage was an ordinary affair. İzzet, who had been formally introduced to her, had been the first, and the last man of Rosy’s life, who, more than likely, had but a marginal interest in her. Rumors were flying about; rumors open to finding solid ground in people’s minds, to be imprinted on the brain as an image or an inflexible idea, likely to acquire the aftertaste of a fiction. İzzet had had an affair fraught with danger with the wife of a high official in the Japanese embassy. He had cultivated his friendship with her after he had most probably been introduced to her at one of the receptions at the Japanese embassy; as a matter of fact, he had been operating a business that imported goods from Japan. When information about their affair seemed to leak out, the woman, to avoid scandal, had persuaded her husband to get an appointment in another country. However, the talk of the town also implicated certain dark dealings by the said tripartite camarilla. There were allegations that this dealing was a part of a wider shady scheme. Naturally, no definite proof could be produced. It was obvious that the outward aspect of things and the audible chicanery did not reflect the true state of affairs. Nonetheless, those who claimed to be an authority on the hush-hush subject said that the woman had absconded right after the first hint of a rumor, never to return. To be frank, this was the best thing for everybody. Anyway, İzzet had escaped unscathed from this misfortune as sooner or later all problems brought along their own specific remedies. The yackety-yak died down, with all the pending probabilities and intractable problems involved, as is the result of immoderate indulgence in objects of rumor. He could repair to a sanctuary that nobody would have any inkling of; there would surely be places waiting to receive individuals like himself. Yet, he remained where he was; he seemed to have no prospects in mind. Could the reason simply have been fear, ineptitude, or the indifference that had manifested itself in a good many of his affairs to this day? The answer to these questions was bound to remain a mystery and the data related to this affair, the clues, had become inaccessible by now. As far as we could learn, nobody had dared ask İzzet about the plausibility of the right answer he would be proffering. This gap was to remain unbridgeable even after the terrible incident that was to occur a couple of years down the line. İzzet had been able to keep his family at arm’s length and felt rather secure in himself. Could this be another stage play, in which everybody had resumed his or her role? Or a stage play in which the participants failed to give their respective parts their due as they had already been cast in other roles? Rosy and İzzet had become acquainted at a New Year’s party lacking in fun. Both had attended the party reluctantly, upon the insistence of certain people. Rosy had been expecting more than what İzzet could willingly afford. The reaction he had to the omission of Aunt Tilda’s name on the list of invitees to his wedding had caused great surprise in us. This, for him, was a most unforgettable moment. The said experience held true also for Monsieur Jacques, who had come by this knowledge only later, as far as I’m aware. Rosy bore the name of her mother for whom he still felt a great yearning. Just like her grandmother, she had resolutely taken up this affair that she deemed to be an injustice and tried to lend a helping hand to an individual abandoned to her destiny. This had taught a lesson to everybody, who should be ashamed of the behavior they exhibited in the face of injustice.

The venue for the wedding party was one of those candlelit restaurants overlooking the Bosporus. Juliet was very beautiful that evening; she looked like a model who had popped out of a fashion magazine. She had evaded my looks, possibly because she had guessed the impressions that this little betrayal might engender within me. However, it was Monsieur Robert, forced to experience a different solitude in a different country that had regretted this. He had come by this knowledge one way or another and made a phone call to me expressing his disappointment. He gave the impression that he had been injured, hurt, and displaced. He said that families were being disintegrated the world over; that families were grounded on lies, that they were but fabricated structures. Every member, bedecked with little hopes, expectations, and dreams were wasting away, gradually falling into an everlasting sleep. I was perfectly aware that such generalizations were made to cover up the bitterness lying deep within one’s heart. In other words, I thought I was in a position to guess where he was heading for. I was not kept waiting for long. His family had become tantamount to death . . . death which he could no longer share with someone from a family already extinct. He wanted to go back to Istanbul, to lay his feelings bare, and to clasp Tilda in a strong embrace, fully aware of her loneliness . . . Yet, he was in no position to materialize this desire. Life had removed from him a good many of his dreams. Nature had left many of his aspirations unfulfilled. I don’t remember now exactly when these telephone conversations had taken place; how many evenings had gone by in the meantime since he had settled in London? Was it his first or last evening in London? How many solitudes had he tasted? Solitudes he wanted to share from afar with someone? How had he learned of this miles and miles away? Could this be a sign of the ties with Istanbul he could not loosen? What was the meaning of this telephone call after so many years? Who was this call for, considering that there was no one left to share this death that his family had engendered in him? Why had he called someone other than Tilda, the sister he wanted so much to embrace? I could not bring myself to put these questions to him during that conversation because they might have led to unpredictable disputes. I had preferred to remain tuned in to what was being said; for fear of my likely disclosing of things I would have preferred to remain secret. I had merely mentioned that he should thank his god for having failed to set eyes upon Aunt Tilda before the horrid events. He seemed to have understood me; he appeared to have at least. I hadn’t omitted the fact that her health had not been undermined following the incident. The rest was unpredictable, as nature would follow its course, as it is obliged to do.

I had lied to him for the last time. For, I had sneaked away that night unnoticed.

To describe my situation better, or perhaps to atone for my shortcomings, I had knocked on the door with certain misgivings. She had turned a deaf ear to my rap. She was at home; I heard her footsteps. It was apparent that she wanted to speak to no one . . . no one . . . whoever the visitor may be. I plucked up the courage to return after a few months had elapsed. In the meantime I had received a postcard sending seasons’ greetings from Monsieur Robert. The postcard was quite different from the previous ones he had sent to me; it had on it a superb view of the African forest. “I hope you will have a better future than mine,” was written on it. He added that I should pay a visit to Aunt Tilda as she did not deserve such isolation.

I had visited Aunt Tilda on a spring day. She said she was sorry she could not offer me something. Although she seemed somewhat better, her manner of conversation had changed. In the course of our conversation she fell into long brooding silences, during which she stared into space through the window. “I’ve lost everything, whatever I possessed, including my movies that linked me to my past; the past I fear I’ll forget altogether. Everything . . . So few people have survived . . . Where are we now? Who were those people we loved, where are they now?” Having spoken thus, she had lapsed into silence. Then she had asked me to speak and I had tried to find subjects that might arouse her interest; I had spoken about the films of Claude Sautet; Romy Schneider, Bergman, Buñuel, and Saura . . . I was asking myself what and who had I seen in the
Hour of the Wolf
with Max von Sydow. I wondered what had that adolescent from the Far East shown to Catherine Deneuve in the box, I was curious about the reason why the loneliness of that child had affected me so much. The looks of that child and the tune that he hummed were still in my mind. I distinctly remember Catherine Deneuve stretched on the bed in her underwear through which her pubic hair was visible; Liv Ullmann’s penetrating looks and the scene in which she said that two people who live together over a long period of time end up resembling each other. Then it was the turn of Isabelle Adjani. I had also mentioned
The Tenant
by Polanski. But I had to stop in the end. Everybody lived in a movie of his or her own after all. How could we otherwise explain our momentary silences? I might open and close the brackets and go back to where I had left off. An action was needed, an action or a word . . . I had looked for that world during a stroll. “According to the weather forecast, we’ll have snow in a short while . . . Do you remember? It was years ago . . . We had met at a Chopin recital . . . Berti and Juliet were also there . . . So was Anita, to whom you have not been introduced. I’ll tell you about her some day. Yes, some day . . . when I find enough courage to tell you about my experiences there,” I said. She sat in complete silence. She hadn’t reacted to my words. She was simply staring through the window. There were children playing soccer, peddlers selling yogurt and rolls, and neighbors exchanging witty remarks outside on the streets like everywhere else. However, I don’t think she saw or heard anything. The glow of the setting sun was on her face. She looked very old. “Films have changed, haven’t they?” she said after a while, the words were uttered in a whisper.

Then she had given me a wedding gift for Rosy. A gift clumsily wrapped that gave the impression that it was preserved with care. It was a bedcover of the blue satin of old that seemed to have seen better days. It was a blue that reminded one of a lost sea, a sea that was reminiscent of one seen in an adventure film set on the other side of the world. A dream of infinity . . . “I’m sure Rosy will take delight in this,” I said, “She had grieved so much over your absence at the wedding.” This made her smile for the first time. “I wasn’t that disappointed,” she rejoined, “but I deplored the fact that I’d missed the opportunity of having my hair dyed and putting on my red dress which I’ve not worn for ages. If I had put in an appearance at the reception hall all the stares would have been directed at me. I would’ve looked as beautiful as Merle Oberon. They’ve robbed me of my dreams. It’s deplorable, isn’t it?” To have missed the opportunity of cutting a dashing figure like Merle Oberon’s . . . She grew bitter and resentful . . . That’s the image I still keep of her.