Helen Oyeyemi - What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours

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NOOR’S EX-WIFE came over for coffee and spoke of seeking psychiatric assistance for Aisha, particularly in the light of Day’s discovery that Aisha had made a purchase from her laptop: a liter of almost pure sulfuric acid—96 percent. The three of us sat silently with our coffee cups, picturing Aisha and Füst alone in some garland-bedecked bower, Füst singing his heart out, maybe even singing his latest hit, “Dress Made of Needles” … then as the last notes of the song died out, Aisha uncapped the bottle of acid hidden beneath her dress and let fly. For about a week Noor couldn’t look at Aisha without shouting: “What are you?”

All we’d hear from Aisha was the bitter laugh, and I tried to soothe her by saying, “He’s been forgiven, Aish. Everyone else has forgiven him,” but I stopped that because there was a look that replaced her laughter, and that look haunted me.

It was Ched’s opinion that it might have been all right if the apology had been something that Aisha could consider real, but now this thing wouldn’t end unless she was able to take or witness vengeance upon Matyas Füst. Tyche agreed, but with a slight modification: Aisha would be able to move on if Matyas Füst was able to deliver a sincere apology for what he’d done. “At least… that’s how it would be for me,” Tyche added, twirling her wedding ring around her finger. “I mean, the galling thing about ‘Dress Made of Needles’ is that as a piece of music it’s fine, but as an apology it takes the piss. But you know what, at least we got a meaningful song out of it, at least he wrote this good song because of her…”

The constellation on Tyche’s wrist was definitely a tattoo that day and her breeziness was macabre. I thought for a long time, or what felt like a long time, anyway, before I asked her if there was anything she could do for Aisha.

“Let me talk to her,” Tyche said.

I wasn’t allowed to listen to their conversation, but I know that it concerned the invocation of a goddess and Tyche was very well prepared for it, arrived at our house wearing an elegant black suit and carrying a portfolio full of images and diagrams that she and Aisha pored over at length.

“Just FYI, we decided on Hecate,” Tyche said on her way out.

“Yeah? Who she?”

“Oh, nobody you need to worry about…”

“Come on, let me have the basics.”

“Well… she keeps an eye on big journeys from the interior to the exterior, or vice versa. She’s there for the step that takes you from one state to another. She’s someone you see at crossroads, for instance. Well, you sort of see her but don’t register what you’ve seen until it’s too late to go back. She holds three keys… some say they’re keys to the underworld, others that they’re access to the past, present, and future. And — ah, you’re zoning out on me…”

Tyche struck and held a warlike pose in the doorway.

“Picture the image of me fixed in this doorway, and also in every other doorway you pass, sometimes three-dimensional and sometimes vaporous, whatever I feel like being at the moment you try to get past me,” she said. “Imagine not being able to stop me from coming in, imagine not being able to cast me out because I own all thresholds. As an additional bonus, imagine me with three faces. That’s who we’re sending to have a little chat with Matyas Füst.”

“Oh! Why didn’t you just lead with that instead of the benevolent stuff? But listen, hang on, Tyche, is that not a bit much—”

She was already gone.

—

SUMMER HAS COME BACK around, and with only a week until Ched returns from military service, I write this from a bench beside Ched’s water fountain at the House of Locks. The woman with the voice he likes came in while I was feeding Boudicca, so I left.

Anyway, events of recent months, presented without comment, for who am I to comment after all?

The day after Tyche and Aisha had their meeting, a black-bordered notice appeared in one of the national newspapers:

R.I.P. MATYAS FÜST,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MATYAS FÜST AND GOOD LUCK.

YOUR REBIRTH WILL BE A DIFFICULT ONE.

Naturally a lot of questions were asked, since Matyas Füst was alive and, at that time, well. It proved impossible to discover who was responsible for the notice.

The day after the notice appeared Matyas Füst phoned into a five p.m. radio show that was popular with commuters all over the country and announced that he’d like to apologize for his apology, which had come more from his head than his heart. He also asked that his fans cease their verbal abuse of the victim of his attack, since she had “been through a lot” and hadn’t asked for a penny in compensation beyond their original transaction. The hosts of the radio show had to ask him to repeat his declarations of remorse several times because his weeping made them unintelligible.

About a week after that, Füst interrupted his performance on the live taping of a variety show to state that he was being “hounded” and that he feared for his life, that “they” pricked him with needles and slammed his hands in doors. When members of the audience pointed out that he was uninjured he appeared confused and said that it had only happened “inside where no one could see.” Before the broadcast was halted he also managed to say that he believed that in attacking the woman he’d met on the street he’d been following a bad example set by his father, who had frequently beaten his mother in front of him. His parents issued a joint denial that basically boiled down to: We have no idea why he’s saying these things but it’s making us sad. Füst’s fiancée moved out of his house again with talk of plans to “focus on her career”… that was funny, and rather sweet… if there was ever anybody born focused on her career it was this prima ballerina, but her statement suggested she thought it didn’t show. As for her ex-fiancé, a few close members of his family moved into his home, “to look after him.” The close family members were unable to prevent him from phoning into radio shows and appearing on breakfast TV to apologize for his previous apologies and make further apologies. He ended his most recent TV appearance with the reflection that quality was probably better than quantity and that he’d take his time to find a genuine expression of his thoughts. He’d been told that the key to a real apology was the identification of one’s real mistake. He hoped to be able to do that soon.

Health-care professionals were reported to have joined the close family members surrounding Füst at his home, but he escaped them all and was reported missing for six months.

Füst was found to have been sleeping rough all winter — a very hard winter, so much surprise was expressed that he’d lived through it. He gave one interview, to a reputable chronicle of paranormal phenomena. I think he intended for the interview to dispel the rumors of his insanity but it had the opposite effect. Especially when he spoke about “them.” “They” demanded that he apologize and then called his apologies glib. He said that “they” were three women and yet “they” were one, and that one of them took his pain away so that the others could return it to him and so it went on. He said he should have died during the winter but it pleased “them” to keep him alive in order for him to learn what he could say or do to keep them off. If there was anybody who knew how to convince this woman that he was sorry, Matyas Füst begged to know that secret at any price.

Aisha may have abandoned tails for good, but allheal plants are flowering in her window box, she’s working on reducing the aphrodisiac effect of an otherwise very convenient headache cure, and she’s looking forward to Matyas Füst’s forthcoming book, An Outcast’s Apology. She reckons Füst is getting closer to identifying his mistake, and says he should keep trying.