Yasemın Aydinoğlu - Istanbul Noir

“Besides, hard for anything to happen with it being this crowded,” I said. “Barely room to move as it is.”

“Perfect scene for the crime,” he replied. “Can’t tell who’s got whose throat in a crowd like this.”

There were men who’d been killed in here by having hot olive oil poured down their ears, or stabbed to death with a shiv. At least, that’s what we were told, but neither Sinan nor I had ever witnessed anything of the kind here in the ward. So why did I keep dreaming about killing this guy? I looked in his face like we were two good pals. He noticed, and glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. He was scared shitless, as usual, thinking it was all downhill from here. I should just take care of it for him, I thought to myself. Show him what it’s like to be pushed and pulled around at somebody else’s whim. Nobody calling after him anyway. Nobody even writes him letters, except for that bitch Funda. How that chick got this loser to clean the crap off her honor, who knows. Ahmet, my boy, you’d be snuffing the life of a whore-mongering motherfucker; you’d rise above the rank of mere mugger and be a whole class above those pickpockets and ass-fuckers — not so bad, huh? And with the ward ağa watching over you, nobody’d make a peep. It’d be an open-and-shut case. The asshole can find out what it means to suck it up while he rots in his grave.

For a moment I thought he sensed what was going through my mind. He was alert like some nocturnal animal, his nostrils flaring wider and wider. I pretended to not give a shit about him, stabbed some meat on the metal plate. Besides, he couldn’t actually care less about what I was eating, or how.

It was calm in the ward that evening. I ate alone, sat at one of the tables in the corner next to the dormitory. The doors were long locked. The huge, curtainless window looking onto the courtyard with its pile of snow was nothing but a black wall now. They quickly counted us. The sixty-watt bulb bathed its surroundings in yellow. Beneath its light, the faces of the men sitting at the tables looked more anemic than ever. It wasn’t long before the cigarette smoke made it almost impossible to see five feet in front of you. I caught a whiff of another familiar scent there in that smoke. A joint. It was coming from one of the tables by the window. Three men were sitting there sucking it in. They were always together, those three, in the courtyard, in the ward, evenings at the ward coffeehouse. I’d never spoken with them, not once. Sinan, the master, they’d never messed with those guys either. The tall one was shaped like a padlock; huge head, flat body, and virtually no neck. White skin, a little oily. He’d become the leader of the pack, even though he was new to the ward. He always wore a large, checkered dress shirt and a vest. The middle one had small, dark eyes that were pinched together, giving him these broad, open temples. The third one, the tiniest of them, had white skin and gray-blue eyes. I’d heard the big one grew up in Vefa. The other two were from Anatolia.

“In Diyarbakır, they water this stuff with chicken blood to make it sweeter,” said the middle one.

It was like each of them was talking to himself. Once the joint had made several rounds, they drank a few cups of tea, which was like tar by then, having steeped in the samovar for hours. It’d gotten pretty crowded around the tables. Like we were all curious to see what would happen next.

Sinan seemed almost oblivious to what was going on as he approached me. He was trying to hide his anxiety, as usual. But then he never was one to get mixed up in crowds. Especially during the day, he never ever walked about. He was in a rush, looking for something to busy himself with. He sat down on his bed, two bunks down from mine, and started writing something in half cursive, half printed letters, and unconsciously flipping through old letters. Probably from that bitch Funda. God only knows. As if that cunt’s really yearning for her lover’s return, like she claims in her letters. You’ve nailed her right between the legs the moment she gets a whiff of the dough, there’s not a fool who doesn’t know that much. At times like this, I wished he’d talk to me instead of taking refuge in Funda’s bullshit letters. But just the opposite, he grew even more distant. For a moment I thought of Funda riding him. The smell of her cheap perfume, her cheap panties, cheap lace; the chalky taste of cocaine leaving a tingly numbness in her nose, on her gums; the shadow of Funda’s breasts on her stomach under the direct light of the bulb overhead. It really pissed me off. And I was getting more and more pissed off since he’d stopped giving a fuck about me. The place was too narrow to stare into the distance, like a pharaoh’s grave. Not like they were going to allot us a fucking chateau, but that’s another matter.

Just as these thoughts were running through my mind, he spoke up: “Those are the guys Müfit sent after me.”

“How do you know?” I asked.

“That Müfit guy’s in the dope business. Sells hash and shit. Can’t you see, those guys would sell their own mothers. They’re just waiting for someone to give the go-ahead, just look at them.” He was talking nonstop, not even pausing to take a breath. There he goes again, thinking every dude who walks in here is his assassin. The idiot, like he’s seeing hash and heroin for the first time in his life. Now was the perfect time to play a few tricks, but...

“You know them from before?” I asked. “Nah,” he said.

“It’s just, it seems to me like they know you.”

“No way, this is the first time I’ve ever seen them,” he said. Then he paused. He’d taken the bait. “What makes you think they know me?”

“No, I mean, what do I know?” I said. It was on the tip of my tongue, I’d drop the sinker and walk away. At that moment, I really wanted him to feel the fear, and feel it good. I headed for my bunk.

“I asked you a question!” he barked.

“It’s just, I went to see the ward ağa the other day,” I said.

“And?” He was drawing closer. I’d snagged him by the roof of his mouth, just like that. Otherwise, I’d have lost him.

“I heard those guys talking with him,” I said.

“So what the fuck were they talking about?”

The hook ripped through his palate, shaack .

“Don’t remember, swear to God. It’s been awhile, and you know me, I don’t remember shit,” I said.

He was at a loss for words.

“I think...” I began.

“You think?”

“One of them asked the ward ağa if there was anyone else here besides our Sinan. Since he was saying ‘our Sinan,’ I figured they knew you,” I said.

“What fucking ‘our Sinan,’ you idiot?”

“I don’t know, I just figured they knew you from Istanbul or something.”

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me this before? Like these guys have been here fucking forever — and you ‘forgot.’”

“I swear to God, just figured you knew them. And besides, that thug’s not on good terms with the ward ağa anyway, you know?”

He seemed convinced of my sincerity. He’d literally swallowed it, hook, line, and sinker. He exhaled and said something. I couldn’t tell if he was just cursing or what, with his teeth pressed together like that. His jawbones, his temples were all fidgety. Thanks to me, he was now absolutely certain that the men after him numbered three, and that they were hot on his tail.

The three guys were completely fucked up by that point. It took less than half an hour before the big one had a cheek against the steamed-up window, his arms spread wide like a frozen image of Jesus, crucified on some invisible cross. Another one they found under his bunk. And the third one they found lying on the floor in the bathroom.