by Moris Farhi
‘Why?’
‘He was still wrestler then. His outfit had engagement in Italy. Trieste. His boss make deal with gamblers. Kudret to lose match. But Kudret’s opponent useless. When Kudret touch him, he crumble. So gamblers go for Kudret. With iron bars. Kudret fight them. When he kill one, others run. But not before they shoot Kudret. Luckily police come. Kudret rushed hospital.’
I interjected proudly. ‘He had five wounds. Mama Meryem saved him. She was his nurse.’
Mama Meryem chuckled. ‘I to be nun. Nurse to serve God. But when I see Kudret I forget religion. When he recover, I decide I be Kudret’s, not Jesus’ bride. No Sister Maria. Mama Meryem.’
‘But didn’t they charge him with murder?’
‘Sure. But obvious self-defence. Get two years.’
‘That was lucky.’
I interrupted again. ‘It still took them six years to get married.’
‘Why?’
Mama Meryem sighed. ‘Because suddenly war. Kudret to labour camp. I to field hospital. Then Americans capture me. I nurse for them. When war end Kudret and I have no contact.’
‘But Babacιk found her.’
Babacιk shook his head. ‘No, the Gypsy clairvoyant, Fatma, found her. They had sent me back to Turkey. I’d found work in a circus. I consulted Fatma at a fair. She told me Meryem was working in a hospital in Genoa. I went to a scribe – got him to write her a letter ...’
I concluded proudly. ‘She was here within the month.’
Mama Meryem nodded sentimentally. ‘Twenty-one days, four hours, eight minutes.’
Adem was moved. His voice became sad and wistful. ‘And you’ve lived happily ever after ...’
Babacιk scrutinized the chess piece he had just carved. ‘Yes. And no.’
‘Why “no”?’
‘Because I’ve lived with the fear I might kill again.’
‘Why should you?’
‘If someone hurt Girl or my Meryem ...’
Mama Meryem muttered in trepidation. ‘And I – that someone might kill Baba ...’
‘Who would? Everybody loves him!’
‘But will they protect him?’
‘From whom?’
Mama Meryem faced Adem. ‘From himself – mostly.’
Adem averted his gaze and turned to me. ‘What do you fear?’
I laughed. ‘Nothing. I fear nothing.’ I pointed at the food. ‘Lunch!’
One day, Babacιk was going through his wrestling exercises in the meadow. He still did them every day. I always went with him. That’s when I practised my juggling.
As he formed the defensive move where the wrestler anchors himself with his head and legs – like an upside-down ‘U’ – in order to keep his shoulders from touching the ground, Adem appeared.
(I should confess: since Adem’s arrival, I often imagined that I was using him as my juggling prop, throwing him up in the air, then catching him as he flew into my hands!)
‘That looks difficult, Grandad. Where do you go from there?’
‘It’s a bridge. Defensive move. To stop your opponent pinning down your shoulders.’
‘Looks pretty indestructible.’
‘I’ve seen better.’
Babacιk was being humble. We know from Hacι Turgut that no one has ever broken Babacιk’s bridge. I also remember that, when I was younger, all the children in the troupe used to climb on him and his bridge wouldn’t even shake.
‘I hear you were the best, Grandad.’
Babacιk straightened up. ‘I was all right.’
‘Glad to have retired?’
‘Who likes retirement?’
‘I do.’
‘You expect me to believe that?’
‘Well ...’
‘Have you ever wrestled, Adem?’
‘No.’
Babacιk offered his hand. ‘Try it. Work the muscles we’ve been given. Understand what it means ...’
Adem shunned Babacιk’s hand. ‘What what means?’
‘Wrestling.’
‘Wrestling is wrestling ...’
‘It’s much more than that. It’s love – to put it simply. We wrestle because we love. We look at a man and see he’s beautiful, inside and out. This creates respect, admiration. We want to touch him – love him. So we wrestle.’
Adem cast an embarrassed look at me. ‘Sounds great, Grandad. But surely, when all’s said and done, it’s just a contest. Win or lose.’
‘Not for the wrestler. Never a contest. More a celebration. You wrestle to the best of your ability. You honour Creation. Who wins when you make love? Both partners. And by their example – everybody else.’
‘That’s the strangest rule I’ve ever heard!’
‘Rules, you learn in five minutes. I’m talking about classic wrestling. About what makes a man fight fair, what makes him see his opponent as his equal.’
‘What about hate? What happens when you hate your partner – I mean, opponent?’
‘No room for hate. That belongs to fist-men, pretenders, cheats. Not for us.’
‘Us?’
‘When you and Yorgo performed magic in the air – what was it like?’
‘I don’t know, Grandad ...’
‘I do. I saw you. Union. Simple. Natural. Perfect union.’
‘Maybe ... I mean yes, often it was as if we breathed at the same time ... Like when we did the triple ... When he let go of his trapeze on the last swing – so high he could have touched the cone – I felt him stop breathing, same time as I did. And as he performed the somersaults, as I swung to meet him, we held that breath. And he fell into my hands like a feather. And you heard our hands lock – clack! Perfect grip. Clean as anything you’ll ever see. And we breathed out – same time, as if we had the same lungs ...’
‘That’s what I’m trying to say, Adem. When flesh touches flesh lovingly, there is beauty. There is union.’
Adem smiled.
Babacιk stretched out his hand again. ‘Come. Let’s wrestle ...’
Again Adem shrunk away. ‘Another time, Grandad ...’
And he walked off.
Some weeks later, Adem finally dared enter the Big Top.
Babacιk took that as a sign that Adem was feeling better in himself. He went into the Big Top, too.
Mama Meryem and I followed.
We found Adem watching Osman on the trapeze.
Osman, obviously inspired by our presence, performed magnificently.
Hatice, I noted, kept looking uneasily at Adem. Like Mama Meryem who worried that Adem was bewitching me, Hatice feared that Osman, too, was falling under Adem’s spell. Perhaps Mama Meryem should have told Hatice, as she told every woman who asked her advice, that providing she had made a home for Osman between her legs, she would have nothing to worry about.
Osman finished his exercises and jumped off the bar. He ran straight to Adem. ‘Was I good?’
Adem nodded graciously. ‘Yes.’
‘Might we try ...?’
Adem shook his head curtly. ‘No.’ Then he softened his tone. ‘Sorry ...’
Osman tried to hide his disappointment. ‘Another time ...’
Hatice, who had been towelling off Osman’s sweat, dragged him away. ‘Come, you mustn’t catch cold ...’
Mama Meryem, taking advantage of their departure, pushed me forward. ‘Let’s go. Nothing will happen today.’
I followed her out, then telling her that I had promised to help out in the menagerie, slipped back in.
Babacιk and Adem were squatting in the ring and talking. I stayed in the shadows and listened.
Babacιk asked, man to man, ‘Is he good – Osman?’
Adem nodded grudgingly. ‘Yes.’
‘As good as Yorgo?’
‘No!’
‘Could he be?’
Again Adem nodded dismissively. ‘Maybe ...’
‘Let’s hope he doesn’t get a liking for opium ...’
Adem’s anger rose. ‘What’s that supposed to mean ...?’
‘Not
what a flyer needs – opium ...’
‘Is that what they’ve been saying? That Yorgo was an addict?’
‘Was he?’
‘He smoked the odd one. We all indulge now and again!’
‘I don’t. Meryem and Girl don’t. I’ve never seen you use it ...’
‘So what? No harm if it’s the occasional one ...’
‘Why?’
‘Why what?’
‘Why did he smoke – the occasional one?’
‘To relax. To get out of his skin.’
‘Wasn’t he happy in his skin?’
‘Sure, he was. Like everybody else.’
‘Most people are not.’
Adem laughed nervously. ‘So sometimes he got depressed. It’s natural.’
‘What about?’
‘How should I know? People get depressed! Something – out of the blue – upsets them!’
‘He never told you about the things that upset him?’
‘No.’
‘The night he fell – had he been smoking?’
Adem sneered. ‘You can’t smoke when you’re on the trapeze!’
‘What about before the performance?’
‘Grandad, I don’t know what you’re getting at, but ...’
‘Was he depressed – before the performance?’
‘Who knows ...?’
‘Can you think what might have depressed him?’
Adem protested. ‘I didn’t say he was depressed!’ He stared at his hands wearily. ‘If he was, I don’t know why! I never knew what was in his mind!’
‘But you were so close ...’
‘Even so ...’
Babacιk shook his head. ‘I think you know what depressed him.’
‘I’m telling you, I don’t!’
‘Your eyes are telling me you do ...’
‘To hell with my eyes!’
‘They’re saying there’s a weight around your neck – and you’re sinking ...’
Adem wailed. ‘Grandad!’
‘Talk about it. Throw off the burden. Free yourself.’
Adem sighed heavily. ‘It was nothing. Stupid, in fact! We – had an argument ...’
‘What about?’
‘Something he did – I didn’t like ... I told you – it was silly ...’
‘Silly enough to want to die?’
‘He didn’t want to die! I dropped him!’
‘On purpose?’
‘No!’ Adem started to shake. ‘Is that what you think? That I killed him?’
‘No. That’s your fear. I know – everybody knows – that he fell because he mistimed his take-off.’
‘No! He was too good for that!
Babacιk nodded pensively. ‘What was it he did – you didn’t like?’
‘I told you – nothing ... He ...’
‘What?’
‘He – kept ... watching me ...’
‘How do you mean?’
‘When I slept ... We lived in the same caravan ...’
‘Sure ...’
‘And he also ...’
‘Yes ...’
‘Stroked me – as if I were a ... child ...’
‘I see ... And you wanted to be stroked like an adult?’
‘Yes! No! I didn’t want to be – touched!’
‘Did you tell him that?’
‘Yes ...’
‘You must have hurt him ... The man who shared his breathing – not wanting to be touched ...’
‘Oh, I hurt him all right ...’ He sprang up. ‘Sorry, Grandad. Too painful to talk ...’
He rushed out.
Adem was going to run away again. We knew – even I did – that we would not be able to find him this time.
But Babacιk was not one to leave a conversation unfinished. He charged out of the Big Top and confronted Adem, who had gathered from our tent the few clothes he had acquired during his stay.
‘Before you go, Adem!’ This was the first time I had heard Babacιk shout. Such was the power of his voice that he must have sounded like one of Mama Meryem’s formidable prophets. ‘I told you about touching! I’ll tell you again!’
Adem stopped as if held by an invisible harness.
All the members of the troupe rushed out, wondering what was happening.
Babacιk raised his hands as if preparing to worship. ‘Look! Our hands! Allah created them to do three things.’ He opened up his hands. ‘One: to be palms – to touch, stroke, create, love.’ Then he clenched them. ‘Two: to be fists – to strike, hurt, destroy, kill!’ Then he put them in his pockets. ‘Three: to hide – to run away, to do nothing.’
Adem pleaded. ‘Let me go, Grandad!’
Babacιk faced him. ‘Everything that’s good in this world comes from touch, when hands are palms. Everything bad happens for lack of touch, when palms turn into fists. We must touch as if we’re mothers giving suck, with smiles and sighs and blessings to Allah for having created touch.’
Adem was becoming agitated. ‘Grandad, please let me go!’
Babacιk moved closer to him. ‘When men and women wrap themselves around each other, they’re in heaven. When people like you and me lock hands, we’re in heaven. All those who hold daughters and sons to their chests, they’re in heaven. Because touch creates love. Makes male and female jump like dolphins. Makes men like us feel the miracle of our bodies, admire the grace of muscles flexing, the honest way we share our strength. Makes us fulfil Allah’s will!’
Adem yelled, ‘And if the touch is not entirely honest?’
Babacιk thundered, ‘If the touch is given with love, it’s always honest!’
Adem bellowed, ‘You don’t understand!’
Babacιk outshouted him. ‘I do!’
Enraged, Adem tried to punch Babacιk.
Babacιk seized Adem’s fist and held it in his palm.
For what seemed an eternity, they stood, eyes locked, gauging each other’s strength.
Then Adem unclenched his fist, pulled his hand out of Babacιk’s grip and strode away.
This time Babacιk did not stop him.
Sadly, the troupe made way for him.
Both Osman and I shot forward to stop him.
Babacιk held us back. ‘Let him go. If he’s worthy of you, he’ll come back.’
He came back weeks later, when Osman and I – though not Babacιk – had given up hope.
I had expected him to look weak and haggard from too much drinking and maybe even on opium, like Yorgo. Instead, he looked like a film star, like Errol Flynn who saved England for Richard the Lionheart.
He arrived by taxi. When he got out, he did not salute those members of the troupe who came out to welcome him. Barely nodding, once to Babacιk and Mama Meryem and once to me, he proceeded to the Big Top, dragging a trunk.
Osman, as usual, was training. When he saw Adem, he scrambled down to greet him. He, too, received a cursory nod.
Adem took off his jacket, shirt and trousers. Underneath he was wearing the white vest and tights of a trapezist.
By now the whole troupe had heard of his arrival and had rushed into the Big Top. As they settled around the ring, they made happy sounds like animals coming to feed.
Adem unlocked the trunk and brought out his trapeze gear. He started rigging it in the catcher’s corner.
I gaped at his torso. Not even Babacιk possessed such powerful shoulders.
Babacιk noted my wonderment. ‘He’s been getting into shape.’
‘He looks so strong.’
‘Has to be. When a flyer drops for the catch, he falls like a meteor – at great speed. That makes him much heavier than his weight. If you don’t have the strength to arrest such a fall, you’ll tear off your shoulders or get pulled off your perch.’
His trapeze now secured, Adem sat on the bar. He began swinging, slowly at first, then faster and faster. Had he not been in costume, he would have looked like a giant child in a playground.
Babacιk looked pleased. ‘Wise man ...’
‘Yes?’
‘He’s coming back from the depths – maybe from the edges of life. He’s coming up slowly – trying to keep his mind clear.’
Adem seemed set to swing for hours. Some of the troupe got bored, urged him to show them what he could do.
He ignored them.
Babacιk chased us out. ‘He’s not ready yet! Let him be!’
Thereafter Adem went into the Big Top every day. Week after week, he sat on his trapeze and worked on his swing. Then he practised swinging in the catcher’s position, hanging upside down while he gripped the bar with the insides of his knees.
Babacιk left him to find himself.
Occasionally, Osman offered to exercise together. Adem refused – delicately, in order not to offend him.
But he allowed me to stay and watch.
And I did. I devoured Adem – every part of him – with my eyes and relished the moist warmth in my crotch. I even began to think I might like motherhood.
Adem pretended to ignore me. I knew he was pretending because every time I left the ring – either to have a pee or change my rags during my monthlies or, if there was a commotion outside, go and see what it was about – he would watch me leave. And often, when I returned, I’d find him down from his trapeze, seemingly towelling himself, but actually looking for me.
One such day, Mama Meryem had got there before me. Adem had come down from his trapeze and she was talking to him.
I hid so that I could listen.
Mama Meryem had put on what Babacιk called her Catholic voice. ‘You had women, Adem?’
Adem looked like a cornered animal. ‘A few ...’
‘What happened? You loved and left?’
‘No ... They were ... in brothels ...’
‘Ahh ... Ever love somebody?’
‘Why do you ask ...?’
‘No. You not have. You not loving kind ...’
Adem became defiant. ‘I did – love.’
‘What happened her?’
‘He died.’
Mama Meryem was left temporarily speechless. ‘You telling you don’t like women?’
‘No ...’
‘What then?’
‘I can love.’
‘What about my girl?’
‘I haven’t touched her.’
‘I know. If you had, I see it the way she walks.’
‘Then why do you ask?’
‘Listen, I’m no Muslim. No even Catholic any more. Just mother wants Girl happy. I give camel’s turd about virginity. My girl will break hymen one day. Soon the better, I say. Best life for woman when her legs open. But how Girl break hymen what concern me! Will be bang-bang? Or will be kiss-kiss everywhere?’
