10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World

by Elif Shafak

  Each term when they enacted patriotic plays, the popular students jostled for the roles of Turkish war heroes, while the rest of the class had to be the Greek army. Osman didn’t mind being a Greek soldier though – all you had to do was die quickly and lie still on the floor for the rest of the play. But he did mind the constant teasing and bullying that he received every day. It had all started when one of the boys, catching him barefoot, noticed he had painted his toenails. Osman is a sissy pants! Once you had earned that label you might as well have walked into the classroom each morning with a bull’s eye painted on your forehead.

  Moneyed and propertied, his parents could have afforded to send their children to better schools, but his father, distrustful of the city and its people, preferred them to learn to work the land. Osman knew the names of plants and herbs the way his peers in the city knew the names of pop singers and film stars. Life was predictable and steady, a reliable chain of cause and effect: people’s temper depended on the amount of cash earned, cash depended on the harvests, harvests depended on the seasons, and the seasons were in the hands of Allah, and Allah was in need of no one. The only time Osman stepped out of this cycle was when he went away to do his compulsory military service. In the army, he learned how to clean a rifle, how to load a gun, how to dig a trench, how to throw a grenade from a rooftop – skills he hoped he would never need again. Every night in the dormitory he shared with forty-three other soldiers, he longed to revive his old shadow plays, but there was neither an empty wall nor a charming oil lamp.

  Upon his return he found his family exactly as he had left them. Yet he was not the same. He had always known he was a female inside, but the ordeal of the army had flattened his soul to such a degree that, strangely, he felt emboldened to live his own truth. By a fluke of fate, around that time his mother came up with the idea that he should now get married, and give her grandchildren, even though she had loads of them already. Despite his objections, she threw herself into finding him a suitable wife.

  On the night of the wedding, while the guests clapped to the beat of the musicians’ drums and the young bride waited in a room upstairs, her robe loosely belted, Osman sneaked out. Overhead he could hear the hoot of an eagle owl and the wailing of a stone-curlew, sounds as familiar to him as his own breathing. He trudged the twelve miles to the nearest station and jumped on the first train to Istanbul, never to return. At first he slept rough, working as a masseur in a hammam with poor hygiene and a worse reputation. Shortly after, he started cleaning the toilets in Haydarpaşa train station. It was in this last job that Osman formed most of his convictions about his fellow human beings. No one should try to philosophize on the nature of humanity until they had worked in a public toilet for a couple of weeks and seen the things that people did, simply because they could – destroying the water hose on the wall, breaking the door handle, drawing nasty graffiti everywhere, peeing on the hand towels, depositing every kind of filth and muck all over the place, knowing that someone else would have to clean it up.

  This was not the city he had imagined, and surely these were not the people he wished to share the highways and byways with. But it was only here in Istanbul that he could outwardly transform himself into the person he really was inside, and so he stayed, and persevered.

  Osman was no more. There was only Nalan, and no going back.

  Four Minutes

  Four minutes after her heart had stopped beating, a fleeting memory surfaced in Leila’s mind, bringing with it the smell and taste of watermelon.

  August 1953. The hottest summer in decades, that’s what Mother had said. Leila mused on the idea of a decade: how long was it? Her grasp of time slipped through her fingers like silken ribbons. The month before, the Korean War had ended and Auntie’s brother had safely returned to his village. Now Auntie had other things to worry about. Unlike the last, this pregnancy seemed to be progressing well, except she was feeling sick day and night. Seized by terrible bouts of nausea, she was having difficulty keeping down her food. The heat wasn’t helping either. Baba suggested they all go on a holiday. Somewhere by the Mediterranean Sea; a change of air. He also invited his brother and his sister, along with their families.

  Cramming into a minibus, they travelled to a fishing town on the south-east coast. There were twelve of them in all. Uncle, sitting next to the driver, sunlight flickering gaily across his face, told them funny stories about his student days, and when he ran out of stories he started singing patriotic anthems, urging everyone to join along. Even Baba did.

  Uncle was trim and tall, with hair shaved close to the scalp and bluish-grey eyes with long lashes that curled at the ends. He was handsome, everyone said so, and one could see how hearing the same compliment all his life had affected his ways. He carried himself with an ease that other members of the family visibly lacked.

  ‘Look at us, the mighty Akarsu family on the road! We could form our own football team,’ Uncle was now saying.

  Leila, sitting in the back with Mother, exclaimed, ‘That’s eleven players, not twelve.’

  ‘Is that so?’ Uncle said, looking at her over his shoulder. ‘Then we’ll be the players and you’ll be the manager. Give us orders, make us do whatever you wish. We are at your service, ma’am.’

  Leila beamed, delighted at the prospect of being the boss for once. During the rest of the journey, Uncle happily played along. At every pit stop, he opened the door for her, brought her drinks and biscuits and, after a little rain in the afternoon, carried her over a puddle in the road so that her shoes wouldn’t get dirty.

  ‘Is she a football manager or the Queen of Sheba?’ said Baba, watching from the side.

  Uncle said, ‘She’s the manager of our football team and the queen of my heart.’

  And that made everyone smile.

  It was a long, slow ride. The driver puffed on hand-rolled cigarettes, a thin smoke swirling around him, softly tracing unread, cursive messages above his head. Outside, the sun was beating down hard. Inside the bus, the air felt musty, stifling. Leila kept her hands under her legs to stop the hot vinyl from burning the backs of her thighs but, after a while, feeling tired, she gave up. She wished she had put on a long dress or a loose shalwar instead of cotton shorts. Thankfully, she had remembered to bring her straw hat with the bright red cherries on one side; they looked extremely appetizing.

  ‘Let’s swap hats,’ said Uncle. He was wearing a narrow-brimmed white fedora that, though worse for wear, suited him well.

  ‘Yes, let’s!’

  After dark, her new hat on her head, Leila stared out of the window at the blur of the motorway, the lights of the passing cars resembling the silvery, slimy trails that she had seen snails leave in the garden. Beyond the motorway glowed the street lamps of small towns, clusters of houses here and there, silhouettes of mosques and minarets. She wondered what kind of families inhabited those homes, and what kind of children, if any, were looking at their bus now, thinking about where they might be going. By the time they reached their destination, late in the evening, she had fallen asleep, hugging the fedora against her chest, her reflection in the window small and pale, floating past buildings.

  Leila was surprised, and slightly disappointed, when she saw where they would be staying. Old, torn mosquito screens covered every window, splotches of mould crept up the walls, nettles and thorny weeds pushed their way through the stepping stones in the garden. But to her delight there was a wooden washtub in the yard, into which they could pump water. Up the road, a giant mulberry tree towered in the fields. When the wind came whirling down the mountain and slammed against the tree, it rained purple mulberries, staining their clothes and hands. It wasn’t a comfortable house but it felt different, adventurous.

  Her older cousins, all of them teenagers in various fits of the sulks, declared Leila too young to share a room with. Nor could she stay with Mother, who was given a room so small that it could scarcely accommodate her suitcases. So Leila had to sleep with the toddlers, some of whom we
t their beds, and cried or chuckled in their sleep, depending on the content of their dreams.

  Late at night, Leila lay awake, wide-eyed and very still, alert to every creak, every passing shadow. Judging by the droning of the mosquitoes, they must have got through the holes in the wire mesh. They swarmed around her head, buzzed inside her ears. They waited for the darkness to become complete and slipped into the room at the same time – both the mosquitoes and her uncle.

  ‘Are you sleeping?’ he asked the first time he came and sat on the edge of her bed. He kept his voice low, just above a whisper, careful not to wake up the toddlers.

  ‘Yes … no, not really.’

  ‘Hot, isn’t it? I couldn’t sleep either.’

  Leila found it strange that he had not gone to the kitchen, where he could get himself a glass of cold water. There was a bowl of watermelon in the fridge, and it would have made a perfect midnight snack. Refreshing. Leila knew that some watermelons grew so large you could put a baby inside and still have room to spare. But she kept this information to herself.

  Uncle nodded as if he had read her thoughts. ‘I won’t stay for long, just a little bit – if Your Highness would allow me?’

  She tried to smile but her face felt stiff. ‘Um, okay.’

  He swiftly pulled aside the bedsheet and lay down next to her. She heard his heartbeat – loud and fast.

  ‘Did you come to check on Tolga?’ Leila asked after an awkward moment.

  Tolga was Uncle’s youngest son; he was sleeping in a cot by the window.

  ‘I wanted to make sure everyone was okay. Let’s not talk, though. We don’t want to wake them up.’

  Leila nodded. It made sense.

  A rumbling rose from Uncle’s stomach. He smiled, shyly. ‘Oh, I must have had too much food.’

  ‘Me too,’ Leila said, although she hadn’t.

  ‘Really? Let me see how full your tummy is.’ He pulled up her nightie. ‘Can I put my hand here?’

  Leila didn’t say anything.

  He started drawing circles around her belly button. ‘Hmm. Are you ticklish?’

  Leila shook her head. Most people were ticklish on their feet and their armpits. She was ticklish around her neck, but she was not going to tell him that. It seemed to her that if you told people your weakest spot they would definitely target it. She kept quiet.

  At first the circles were small and light, but they grew larger, reaching her privates. She pulled away, embarrassed. Uncle inched closer. He smelled of things she didn’t like – chewed tobacco, alcohol, fried aubergine.

  ‘You have always been my favourite,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you are aware of that.’

  Was she his favourite? He had made her the manager of the football team, but still. Seeing her confusion, Uncle caressed her cheek with his other hand. ‘Do you want to know why I love you the best?’

  Leila waited, curious to hear the answer.

  ‘Because you are not selfish like the others. A smart, sweet girl. Don’t ever change. Promise me you won’t change.’

  Leila nodded, thinking how annoyed her older cousins would be if they heard him compliment her like that. What a pity they weren’t here.

  ‘Do you trust me?’ His eyes were topaz crystals in the dark.

  And there she was, nodding again. Much later in life, Leila would come to loathe this gesture of hers – an unconditional obedience to age and authority.

  He said, ‘When you are older, I’ll protect you from boys. You don’t know what they’re like. I won’t let them get close to you.’

  He kissed her on her forehead, just like he had done every Eid when they visited them as a family and he gave her boiled sweets and pocket money. He kissed her the same way. And then he left. That first night.

  The next evening, he didn’t show up and Leila was ready to forget the whole incident. Yet the third night he was back. He smiled more broadly this time. A spicy scent lingered in the air; could it be that he had applied aftershave? As soon as she saw him coming, Leila closed her eyes, pretending to be asleep.

  Quietly, he pulled aside the bedsheet, cuddled next to her. Again he put his hand on her belly, and this time the circles were bigger, persistent – searching, demanding what he already believed belonged to him.

  ‘Yesterday I couldn’t make it, your yenge was feeling poorly,’ he said, as though apologizing for a missed appointment.

  Down the corridor Leila could hear her mother snoring. Baba and Auntie had been given a large room upstairs, close to the bathroom. Leila had overheard them say that Auntie kept waking up at odd hours throughout the night, and it would be better if she slept alone. Did that mean she was no longer fighting her demons? Or perhaps it meant that the demons had finally won the war.

  ‘Tolga wets the bed,’ Leila blurted out, opening her eyes.

  She didn’t know why she said that. She had never seen the boy do such a thing.

  If Uncle was taken aback, he didn’t show it. ‘I know, sweetheart. I’ll take care of it, you shouldn’t worry.’

  His breath was warm against her neck. He had grown stubble; it made her skin prickle. Leila recalled the sandpaper Baba used to give a nice finish to the wooden cradle he was making for the baby on the way.

  ‘Uncle –’

  ‘Hush. We shouldn’t disturb the others.’

  We. They were a team.

  ‘Hold it,’ he said, and pushed her hand down the front of his pyjama shorts, towards a place between his legs. The child winced and drew her fingers back. Grabbing her wrist, he shoved her hand down again, sounding frustrated and furious. ‘I said, hold it!’

  Under her palm Leila felt his hardness. He squirmed, groaned, clenched his teeth. He moved back and forth, his breath quickening. She lay still, petrified. She wasn’t even touching him any more, but she didn’t think he was aware of that. He groaned one last time and stopped moving. He was panting heavily. There was a sharp smell in the air and the bedsheet was wet.

  ‘Look what you’ve done to me,’ he said when he found his voice.

  Leila felt confused, embarrassed. She sensed instinctively that this was wrong and it should never have happened. It was her fault.

  ‘You are a naughty girl,’ Uncle said. He looked solemn, almost sad. ‘You seem so sweet and innocent, but it is just a mask, isn’t it? Deep underneath, you’re as dirty as all the others. Bad-mannered. How you have fooled me.’

  A stab of guilt went through Leila, so sharp she could hardly move. Tears welled up in her eyes. She tried not to cry, but failed. Now she was sobbing.

  He watched her for a moment. ‘Okay, fine. I can’t bear to see you cry.’

  Almost at once, Leila’s crying slowed, though she felt no better, only worse.

  ‘I still love you.’ His lips pressed on her mouth.

  No one had kissed her on the mouth before. Her entire body went numb.

  ‘Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone,’ he said taking her silence for compliance. ‘But you must prove your trustworthiness.’

  Such a long word. Trustworthiness. She wasn’t even sure what it meant.

  ‘It means you mustn’t tell anyone,’ said Uncle, a step ahead of her thoughts. ‘It means this will be our secret. Only two people can know about it: you and I. No third person allowed. Now tell me, are you good at keeping secrets?’

  But of course she was. She was holding too many secrets in her chest already; this would be yet another one.

  Later on, growing up, Leila would ask herself over and again why he had chosen her. Theirs was a large family. There were others around. She wasn’t the prettiest. She wasn’t the smartest. In truth, she didn’t think she was special in any way. She kept brooding on this, until one day she realized how awful the question was. Asking ‘Why me?’ was another way of saying, ‘Why not someone else?’ and she hated herself for that.

  A holiday house with moss-green shutters and a split-rail fence that ended where the pebble beach began. The women were cooking the meals, sweeping the floors, washing t
he dishes; the men were playing cards, backgammon, dominoes; and the children ran around, unsupervised, throwing burrs at each other that stuck to everything they came into contact with. The ground was strewn with crushed mulberries and there were watermelon stains all over the upholstery.

  A holiday house by the sea.

  Leila was six years old; her uncle was forty-three.

  The day they returned to Van, Leila came down with a fever. She had a metallic taste in her mouth, a knot of pain lodged deep in the pit of her stomach. Her temperature was so high that Binnaz and Suzan scooped her up and carried her between them to the bathroom, where they plunged her into cold water – to no avail. She was kept in bed, a vinegar-soaked towel on her forehead, an onion poultice on her chest, boiled cabbage leaves on her back and slices of potato all over her belly. Every few minutes they rubbed egg whites on the soles of her feet. The whole house stank like the fish market at the end of a summer’s day. Nothing helped. Talking incoherently, grinding her teeth, the child slipped in and out of consciousness, sparkles of light dancing in front of her eyes.

  Haroun called the local barber – a man who, among his many other duties, performed circumcisions, extracted teeth and gave enemas – but it turned out he was away on an emergency. So Haroun sent for the Lady Pharmacist instead – not an easy decision for him to take, since he had no liking for the woman, nor she for him.

  No one knew her real name for sure. She was ‘the Lady Pharmacist’ to all and sundry, a strange woman by all accounts, but one with authority. A stout, bright-eyed widow sporting a bun as tight as her smile, she wore tailored suits and perky little hats and spoke with the confidence of those used to being heard. A champion of secularism, modernity and too many other things that came from the West. A staunch opponent of polygamy, she did not hide her dislike of a man with two wives; even the thought of it made her cringe. In her eyes, Haroun and his whole family, with their superstitions and stubborn refusal to adapt to a scientific age, were the very antithesis of the future she had in mind for this conflicted country.