Orhan Pamuk - A Strangeness in My Mind

Once I got to their house, I handed the doll I’d brought for the baby to Rayiha. The single room they lived in was a dizzying mess: diapers, plates, chairs, piles of laundry, sacks of chickpeas, bags of sugar, the butane stove, boxes of baby food, cartons of detergent, pots and pans, milk bottles, plastic cans, mattresses, and duvets had all merged into one big monochrome blur, like clothes spinning inside a washing machine.

“Mevlut, I never believed Vediha Yenge when she told me, but now that I’ve seen it with my own eyes…You know this beautiful, happy family life you’ve got here with Rayiha Yenge and the girls? It makes me so happy for you that I can’t think of anything I’d rather see.”

“Why didn’t you believe Vediha when she told you?”

“Seeing what you’ve got here, this blissful family life, it makes me want to get married right away.”

“Why didn’t you believe her, Süleyman?”

Rayiha served them tea. “No girl seems to be good enough for you, Süleyman,” she teased. “Go on, have a seat.”

“It’s the girls who don’t think I’m good enough,” I said. I didn’t sit.

“My sister tells me, ‘All these pretty girls are in love with Süleyman, but Süleyman doesn’t like any of them.’ ”

“Oh, sure, Vediha is so helpful. Does she always come and tell you everything afterward? Who is this pretty girl who’s supposed to be in love with me?”

“Vediha means well.”

“I know, but seriously, that girl wasn’t right for me. She supported the wrong team, Fenerbahçe,” I quipped, laughing along with them, and surprised at my own quick wit.

“What about the tall one?”

“Good God, is there anything you don’t know? She was too modern, Rayiha, she wasn’t right for me.”

“Süleyman, if you were to meet a girl you liked who was beautiful and respectable but didn’t wear a headscarf, would that be reason enough for you not to marry her?”

“Where on earth are you getting all these ideas from, Rayiha?” Mevlut called from the other side of the room, where he was busy checking the consistency of the boza. “Is it the television?”

“You make me sound like I’m really stuck up and I think no one’s good enough for me. But you should know that I almost agreed to marry a maid, the daughter of Kasım from Kastamonu.”

Rayiha frowned. “I could be a maid,” she said proudly. “What’s wrong with that, as long as you’ve got your dignity?”

“Do you think I’d give you permission for something like that?” said Mevlut.

Rayiha smiled. “At home I’m already the cleaning lady, the maid, the head chef of a three-wheeled restaurant, and the cook in a boza shop.” She turned to Mevlut. “Now give me an employment contract and make sure it’s notarized, or else I’ll go on strike. The law says I can.”

“Who cares what the law says or doesn’t say? The government can’t interfere in our home!” said a defiant Mevlut.

“Rayiha, if you know about all these things, then you must also know that other thing I really want to know,” I ventured.

“We have no idea where Samiha went or whom she went with, Süleyman. Don’t waste your breath trying to get us to tell you. I heard Korkut was really horrible to my poor dad just because he thought he knew something…”

—

“Mevlut, let’s go to the Canopy Restaurant around the corner and talk for a bit,” said Süleyman.

“Don’t let Mevlut drink too much, all right? He’ll say anything after he’s had a glass. He’s not like me.”

“I know how much to drink!” said Mevlut. He was getting annoyed at the indulgent and overfamiliar tone his wife was using with Süleyman, and she hadn’t even covered her head properly. Clearly Rayiha was spending a lot more time than she let on at the house in Duttepe, basking in the comforts over there. “Don’t soak any more chickpeas tonight,” Mevlut commanded as he was walking out.

“You’ve brought back all the rice I gave you this morning anyway,” Rayiha shot back.

At first Süleyman couldn’t remember where he’d parked his van. His face lit up when they found it just a few steps farther on.

“You shouldn’t park here, the neighborhood kids will steal the side-view mirrors,” said Mevlut. “They’ll even take the Ford logo…They sell them to the spare-parts dealers up the hill or wear them as necklaces. If it had been a Mercedes, they would have ripped the sign out long ago.”

“I doubt this neighborhood has ever seen a Mercedes.”

“I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss it, if I were you. All the brightest, most creative Greeks and Assyrians used to live here. Craftsmen are the lifeblood of Istanbul.”

The Canopy Restaurant was an old Greek place situated just three streets up toward Beyoğlu, but Mevlut and Rayiha had never been there. It was still early, so the restaurant was empty. They sat down, and Süleyman ordered two rakı doubles (without even bothering to ask Mevlut) and some starters (white cheese, fried mussels) and got straight to the point.

“It’s time to put our fathers’ property dispute behind us. My brother sends his regards…We have a serious job opportunity we want to talk to you about.”

“What’s the job?”

Süleyman responded by raising his glass of rakı for a toast. Mevlut reciprocated, but he only had a small sip before putting his glass back down on the table.

“What, you’re not drinking?”

“I can’t let my boza customers see me drunk. They’ll be expecting me soon.”

“Not to mention that you have no faith in me, you think if you get drunk I’ll make you tell me things, right?” said Süleyman. “And yet, have I ever told anyone your big secret?”

Mevlut’s heart thumped in his chest. “What’s my big secret supposed to be?”

“My dear Mevlut, it seems you trust me so blindly that you’re forgetting things. Believe me, I’ve forgotten, too, and I haven’t told anyone either. But let me refresh your memory so you’ll remember that I’m on your side: when you fell in love at Korkut’s wedding, did I or did I not offer you my guidance and help?”

“Of course you did…”

“I went all the way from Istanbul to Akşehir in my van just so you could elope with the girl, didn’t I?”

“I’m grateful, Süleyman…I’m so happy now, and it’s all because of you.”

“Are you actually happy, though?…Sometimes our heart wants one thing, but we end up with another instead…Yet we still claim that we’re happy.”

“Why would anyone say they’re happy unless they really were?”

“Out of shame…and because accepting the truth would make them even more miserable. But none of this applies to you. You’re more than happy with Rayiha…Now it’s your turn to help me find happiness.”

“I’ll help you the way you helped me.”

“Where is Samiha?…Do you think she’ll come back to me?…Tell me the truth, Mevlut.”

“Get that girl out of your head,” said Mevlut after a brief silence.

“Do things ever get out of our heads just because we tell them to? No, they get stuck even deeper. You and my brother married her sis ters, so you’re fine. But I failed to get the third sister. Now the more I tell myself I should forget Samiha, the more I think about her. I can’t stop thinking about her eyes, the way she walks and talks, how beautiful she is. What can I do? The only other thing I think about is the person who has brought this humiliation upon me.”

“Who is that?”

“The son of a bitch who took my Samiha away from me in broad daylight. Who was it? Tell me the truth, Mevlut. I’ll have my revenge on that bastard.” Süleyman raised his glass as a sort of peace offering, and Mevlut reluctantly downed his own rakı, too.