Istanbul Noir - Mustafa Ziyalan [76]
“Good evening, gentlemen,” he said with a smile. “Enjoying the fare, I hope!”
Three from our table knew him. They introduced us to each other. A smile broadened across his face and his attention focused on me like a beam. “Vasili, you say! You still speak Turkish like your mother tongue!”
The other men at the table were taken by surprise, and I was too. The man was alert, like a fox, and was obviously eager to hear my response. But I was petrified.
“You are that Vasili, aren’t you?” he said. “Son of Yorgo. I knew your father. Do you remember me?”
At that moment, I concentrated upon the calm, serene face of the man, where time, in all its destructiveness, was hiding. His wrinkled face did remind me of something, but it was as if my memory was being swept away by a strong current, a current stronger than life itself, and was struggling to gain a foothold.
“Sorry, can’t seem to place you,” I said.
Perhaps he had more to say, but he remained quiet. He stood up, extended his arms, and hugged me tightly. His eyes were wet when he sat down. Truth be told, what could I say to him at that hour of the night, with that buzz in my head? Yet it was a precious opportunity; this old man was the first acquaintance I had stumbled upon in my neighborhood, which had been so thoroughly appropriated and alienated by time. He didn’t know where to place his huge hands. The heart-breaking zeal of this chance encounter induced a growing sense of disquiet. There was something cruel there in the twilight zone of that dimly lit meyhane. My heart filled with an unidentifiable longing, my mind with myriad possibilities.
The busboys, who were no older than fifteen or sixteen, and the middle-aged, mustached waiters were circling us. We ordered another bottle of rakı. The old man (Cevat, that was his name), who had been born and raised in Fener, was talking about how drinking was the only curative he’d been able to find in this city, which so viciously laid waste to human life. He was a man with nine lives, who had managed to survive so many dangers, so many nights, so many miseries, so many adventures …
“Your father and I first met in front of the Red Church,” he said. “I enjoyed meeting new people when I was young, now I prefer solitude. We remained friends after we met, your father and I. I lived nearby, on Çimen Street, where I still live today. But everything is in the past now. Frankly, that devastating incident did away with it all, all the beautiful memories we had, everything.”
I dredged up the courage: “Do you know something?”
He remained silent for a long moment, staring at his plate, before he finally answered: “No, nothing at all. I want to forget all about it, the whole thing.”
I refrained from exalting my father, praising his goodness and generosity, but I did give in and let myself get carried away by the memories. I shared a few, though names largely escaped me. At first, my words contained nothing too far beyond the conditions that fate required. It was as if I was in two different times, two different places at once, and that made it difficult for me to speak. In spite of this, words began rolling off my tongue of their own accord; I just kept talking and talking. There are moments when one feels hopeless and does what he can to evade that feeling. But that wasn’t my only problem, for it was as if a wall had come tumbling down, and there I was inside the chamber of my childhood. I don’t think there could possibly be anything at once so mysterious and familiar as the eternal texture of childhood.
It wasn’t easy to keep up conversation with the old man, because he kept interrupting me.
“Come to my home and be my guest tonight,” he said, “we have a lot to talk about.”
His proposal surprised me; I turned down his invitation with visible mistrust. I suggested meeting the next day. It was late; we got up and left. I took