Istanbul Noir - Mustafa Ziyalan [20]
Finding the coffeehouse that the imam had told him about proved quite a task. In the narrow streets crammed full of jostling pedestrians, salesmen screaming out their pitches, store on top of store on top of store, heaps of merchandise piled high upon tables, and dark office buildings, he was looking for a coffeehouse with a certain name but an uncertain address. “Walk straight ahead, turn right, then go uphill …” “You’re at the wrong place, brother. You gotta go down this street until you see a kiosk on the corner, then you turn left there, and then …”
The cigarette smoke stung his eyes and seared his nose the moment he stepped into the coffeehouse. He scanned the room, searching for his stepfather. There were men yelling, playing cards, rolling dice in a game of backgammon, watching television. He looked at each face. When the apprentice carrying tea on a suspended tray asked him who he was looking for, he told him. But why was he looking for him? “I know him from back home,” the young man said, and gave him the name of the town. That loosened the apprentice’s tongue up a bit. He told the young man that the latter’s stepfather wasn’t there at the moment, and that he only stopped by every once in a while. There was a hotel where he hung out sometimes though. He could tell him the name of the hotel, if the young man wanted to try there.
It was nearby. It wasn’t nearly as difficult to find as the coffeehouse had been. He passed through a number of dark, narrow, muddy, potholed, lookalike streets before arriving at the hotel. It had single and double rooms, as well as twelve-person rooms with bunk beds, what the receptionist referred to as “bachelors’ rooms.” He asked about his stepfather. Perhaps he was staying there? “What you want with him, huh, boy?” the receptionist snarled in response. He repeated what he had said to the coffeehouse apprentice. He wasn’t up to no good; he was just hoping to find his friend from back home. The receptionist told him that his stepfather did stay there, but that he didn’t show up every night. Now, did he want a room or not? He whipped out the money for a bed in one of the bachelors’ rooms.
Toward morning the door opened, startling him so much that he nearly bumped his head on the iron bars of the bed above. It took him a few moments to recall where he was. He wasn’t in the army ward, or in the infirmary at the barracks—then he finally remembered. He had to keep watch. Shivering, he got out of bed and with slow, silent steps made his way to the toilet. The odor was suffocating, and so he held his breath as he peed, for what seemed an interminably long time. He washed his hands and face; there was no soap; he took a piece of tissue paper from the nail in the wall and dried his hands. Quietly, he descended the stairs.
He exited the hotel and walked across the street; there, he knelt behind a large garbage can. His empty stomach was raising hell and his eyes burned, desperate for sleep. He saw a crumpled newspaper on the ground and reached out and opened it. Maybe some reading would wake him up; besides, it was a decent way to pass the time.
RUMORS END IN MURDER
A woman in Bayrampaa shot and killed a man whom she claimed had spread rumors about her … Another transvestite murdered. The transvestite, who was staying at a hotel in zmir’s Konak district, was found dead, having been stabbed in the heart with a knife … When his neighbor