Hasan Toptas - Reckless

Be sent crawling far away .

The bride and groom moved again towards the door, as the crowd applauded. Then someone else in the crowd called out: ‘Shall we fall in love?’ Some spoke of dipping their thumbs in henna, and the first night, and heads resting on bosoms; others spoke of fresh lambs, and embroidered pillows, and prosperity; yet others spoke of water flowing like ribbons, and cypress trees, and plenty, but Ziya could no longer bear this much happiness and jubilation, and for a moment he thought he might cry. After that, he climbed over the wall, taking with him the thoughts still in his mind; the applause grew softer as he walked along the cobblestone streets towards the edge of town. In actual fact, he wasn’t walking at that point. It felt more as if the town was slipping beneath his feet like a carpet, a bright embroidered carpet scattering warmth and noise in its wake, and suddenly Ziya found himself back where he had conjured up his dream. Back on the edge of that bed. He was still sitting there, leaning into the night. And now, very slowly, he stood up, and for the next few moments he walked just the same way he had walked in his dream, feeling his way across the room towards the window. Falling on to the sofa, he looked outside.

It was still pitch dark; all that could be seen was a gauzy patch of white, fluttering in the distance. And because nothing else could be seen, it was the patch of white that brought that distance into being, and once it came into being, it mixed in with the darkness and the silence that reigned over it, and once it had done so, it lost all shape, and the more it dissipated, the more strangely and heavily it loomed over the horizon. Which he could not quite see. Which he could only imagine. But it seemed to him as if it was pressing down and down on that patch of white and slowly crushing it. It grew thinner, and thinner still, until suddenly it vanished, and at that exact moment, the night began to fade. Little by little, the sky grew lighter. When he looked out at the hills in the distance, he could just about see the rocks, and the ledges, peeping through the mist. And here and there he could almost see a tree rising above the skyline. When the sky got a little brighter, he could see the plain at the foot of the hills, and the dirt road winding through it, the sheep pens to the right, the line of poplars, a few houses facing in the opposite direction, and the trees in these houses’ gardens. A giant postcard, Ziya thought. A giant postcard, seen through frosted glass. To view it more closely, Ziya leaned over the sofa, and craned his neck. With reverence, he saw how gently the dirt road cast off the night. He saw how the cliffs shimmered with a serenity that seemed, as it echoed, to caress every hill and field, as the land itself became some sort of giant creature, slowly rising. He saw how the frosted undergrowth began to rustle with whispers, and how each rock, each blackberry bush, each heartless thorn came back into being, and each tree back into light. He saw how the air was thick with hisses and pops that blinked like little lanterns, jingled like little bells. And as he saw all this, he thought, what a beautiful place this is. Just imagine, a place where you can hear sound and silence, all at the same time.

With this, he stood up. Curious to see more of the place where he’d been living, he ambled slowly through the house. The walls were painted white, and there was one medium-sized room, and a narrow kitchen looking out over the side yard. Beyond it was a small, dark section with a concrete floor that could, he thought, be either a bathroom or a pantry. How different from the view he had just seen. How disappointing. For a time Ziya just stood there, staring, and asking himself if he could ever get used to such a place. But then he thought: is there anything on earth that a person can’t get used to? He threw on his clothes, as quickly as he could, and stepped out of the house to do a bit of exploring, get a bit of fresh air. Once outside, he spied a wooden bench just to the left of the door. It had cushions. He settled himself down on one of them.

The sun was just rising over the hills, and there, on the dirt road, he could see Kenan walking towards him. Walking towards him, bringing with him the sparkle of every moment he had passed through to get this far, and the strange green quiver of every leaf in the vineyard.

‘Good morning,’ he said, still catching his breath. ‘You’ve woken up early. Maşallah! I thought you would sleep until noon, at least.’

‘Good morning,’ said Ziya, rising to his feet. ‘But why did you think I’d sleep so late?’

‘Don’t you remember? You were in pretty bad shape when you got here last night. You were drunk out of your mind. It was pitch dark when you got here. Your friend Ethem and I — we only just managed to get you from the car to the house. It was so hard to hold you up that the three of us went zigzagging through the vineyard.’

‘I remember that, but only vaguely,’ said Ziya, examining his forehead with his fingertips, as if he were trying to read the lines the night might have left there. ‘I’m sorry — before leaving the city, I had too much to drink.’

They sat down together on the cushions.

‘Or was it that your city friends threw you a goodbye party?’

‘No,’ said Ziya, smiling faintly. ‘There wasn’t any party. Just two friends, having a drink. The same friend who brought me here. I don’t remember, but I probably introduced you to him last night.’

‘Yes, you did,’ said Kenan, and then he added, ‘I wanted him to stay over but sadly he refused. As soon as we had brought you in, he left.’

‘Don’t worry. He loves driving at night. He’ll have made it back to the city, no problem.’

‘I hope you’re right,’ said Kenan.

There followed a short silence, while they both watched the hills beyond rising above the plain, the cliffs behind them sparkling in the sun and the pine forests shivering in the mist, sending up little white clouds that looked like smoke signals.

‘So this is how I made my entrance?’ Ziya asked drowsily. ‘I arrived in Kenan Eli, drunk out of my mind?’

Kenan smiled faintly.

‘Do you know what, though?’ Ziya said, still sounding very drowsy. ‘Even if you set out for Kenan Eli sober, you’d be drunk by the time you got here.’

‘Except that Kenan Eli is not the name of this village,’ said Kenan. ‘This is Yazıköy. As you know.’

‘Of course I know,’ said Ziya.

Again they fell silent. Every time they paused, after all, the view swept in to capture their attention, and take it as far as the eye could see, and deeper, ever deeper, until, for just a moment, it became a shimmering veil of shadow, light and rainbow, only to return to itself with the speed of light. But for that same moment, Ziya’s face would brighten, as if caught by a distant torch. Not just his face. It was his entire being. It was his soul.

So it was after the view had swept in and out again like this that Ziya turned slowly to look Kenan in the eyes.

‘What a beautiful place this is. I can never thank you enough.’

Kenan smiled sweetly and opened his arms. ‘There’s no need to thank me,’ he said.

There was another short silence.

Then Kenan asked, ‘Why did you wake up so early? You must have been so tired, after that trip. I wish you’d managed to sleep until noon. Did you wake up because you didn’t know where you were?’

‘Don’t even ask,’ said Ziya, and he made such a grimace, you would have thought he’d just been stabbed in the stomach. ‘I had the most bizarre dream. That’s why I woke up so early. And this dream of mine, it wasn’t just normally bizarre. It was off the scale. I still haven’t managed to shake it off. Certain parts have stayed with me.’