The Kiss Murder

by Mehmet Murat Somer

  I tried to remember which of the girls Buse had been close to. Due to her advanced age, most of them had kept their distance. Not to mention that she was under the impression that she was made of finer stuff. As a transvestite, she was an odd duck. While most of the girls dressed in evening gowns or sexy outfits, Buse/Fevzi went in for more ladylike costumes. Once she had even arrived at the club in a tailor-made, pale pink, classic Chanel suit. If her alter ego wasn’t Catherine Deneuve, it was at least Sabine Azéma. I’d seen the latter more than a few times in outfits like that, sipping tea on the terrace of the Etap Marmara Hotel. While wearing a tad too much makeup, and something of a coquette, she did manage to stand out as her own woman.

  I called Hasan at the club. If nothing else, we had Buse’s body to think about. If we didn’t claim it and the family refused to do so—as is so often the case—Buse would end up as a cadaver at some medical college. What, exactly, aspiring surgeons would do with it was another question. Anatomy lessons from the dissection of a decidedly male body, complete with pert breasts and loads of silicone in its cheekbones and lips? The times, they are a-changing indeed.

  Hasan had seen the news, but couldn’t remember Buse’s surname, either. “Who would she hang out with?” I asked. He thought for awhile, running through a list of the names of all the girls he knew, then returning to the top of the list. He finally settled on one of the older girls, Sofya.

  “You mean the Sofya I know?” I asked. “Didn’t she retire ages ago?”

  “That’s right,” he confirmed. “She doesn’t get out much anymore. She leads a quiet life.” He paused. “At least I think she does.”

  “How am I supposed to find her?”

  “She still lives in Çatalçeşme.”

  “Hasan, get to the point. Do you know exactly where she lives or not?”

  “I’ve been there once. I’m not sure I can remember.”

  “A simple yes or no will do.”

  I do not, and cannot under any circumstances, tolerate shilly-shallying.

  He thought for a moment. The seriousness of my tone apparently forced him to answer with a gulped “Yes.” Congratulations, Hasan. Then he added:

  “But you know she can’t stand you. She’d tear me to pieces if I brought you to her house.”

  “I know,” was my crisp reply.

  It was all such a bore. Yes, I must admit that we were divided into various factions. Not every girl is overflowing with humanist tendencies and the capacity for fast friendships. Enmity is not unknown. It is, in fact, common.

  “She absolutely hates you. She’s never forgiven you for coming between her and her friend Sinan. There’s no way she’ll ever help you, you of all people.”

  While I expect Hasan to be frank with me, siding with Sofya was really going too far. My employee, supporting Sofya! This was absurd.

  “Look here, Hasan, don’t push me. She won’t be helping me. This is serious. I’ve got to reach Buse’s mother. It’s a matter of life or death.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  I paused, then decided he had every reason to ask me that question. Buse/Fevzi had never been a favorite of mine, was not someone with whom I’d spent any time. The interest I was now showing far exceeded that demanded by my role of employer.

  I briefly summarized the situation. He listened, breathless.

  “So, it’s in her mother’s house?” he asked incredulously.

  His question was normal enough. Possessions of such a highly personal nature are not usually left with one’s parents.

  “Buse’s mother is blind,” I added.

  “Ah, now I understand,” he said.

  “Now go call that desiccated hag Sofya and get the address of Buse’s mother, if she knows it. Also, be sure to find out her last name. Then call me the minute you’re done.”

  “But I don’t know her phone number,” Hasan said. “Only where her house is.”

  Another fly in the ointment. I tried to put my thoughts in order.

  “Look,” I suggested, “put Şükrü in charge of the club. I’ll pick you up and we’ll go to Sofya’s together. You talk to her while I wait in the car.”

  I hung up before he had a chance to answer.

  Next, I called for a taxi. Naturally, Hüseyin showed up.

  “You can’t be going to the club at this time. Where to?”

  “To the club,” I replied sharply.

  His fleeting look of bewilderment pleased me to no end. His self-confidence was badly shaken, the insolent expression replaced with one of surprise. Then, of course, I had to tell him where we were actually going. I thought I detected a sudden gleam of excitement in his eyes. But images seen in rearview mirrors can be misleading, so I paid it no mind.

  After picking up Hasan, then crisscrossing for some twenty minutes through the one-way streets of Suadiye and Çatalçeşme, above and below the railway tracks, and along the coast, we stopped in front of a tall apartment building. “This is it,” said Hasan. We parked. Hasan got out. Hüseyin and I waited in the taxi. You could cut the tension with a knife. Hüseyin appeared to be working up the courage to say something, but would then change his mind. I avoided his glance in the mirror. It was your standard French film: a man, a woman, and a quandary. Well, not exactly, but somewhere along those lines. He finally cracked.

  “Do you want me turn on some music?”

  “Whatever you like,” was my brief reply.

  “What would you like?”

  The question was a loaded one. I toyed with, Anything but you. But now was not the time.

  Instead, I settled for, “Something light. I need to think.”

  “You mean slow, or classical?”

  I raised an eyebrow. Our taxi stand drivers invariably play either arabesque or Turkish pop.

  “It doesn’t matter, just make it something light.”

  “I know you listen to classical music. I saw the CDs at your house,” Hüseyin revealed.

  He had once again resorted to the familiar sen, and I started to correct him, then held my tongue. Just as I began to wonder what was taking Hasan so long, the door opened and he got in.

  “So?”

  “I guess she’s not at home,” Hasan replied.

  He sat there without a word.

  Thanks to Hasan, we’d wasted a whole hour. And time was, as they say, of the essence. At this rate, someone was likely to get hold of Buse’s mother, and the photos and the letters, before I did. We’d traveled all the way to the Asian shore for nothing.

  I had no time to sort through alternative courses of action. “To the coroner’s,” I ordered Hüseyin. “We’ll drop you off,” I told Hasan.

  Hüseyin began forming his own interpretation of events, based on what he’d overheard.

  “We’re looking for the mother of the friend I brought to your house this morning, aren’t we?” he asked.

  “No,” I said. “We’re going to the coroner’s office to learn any details we can about Fevzi’s—that is, Buse’s—death.”

  The three of us fell silent for the rest of the trip. When Hasan stepped out of the taxi, I said to him, “Let’s do whatever is needed for the funeral.”

  “Don’t worry,” he said, slamming the door, doing his best to look responsible and mature.

  We proceeded to Çapa.

  Hüseyin broke the silence: “Well, he calls you sen,” followed by a glance over his shoulder.

  He had apparently comprehended my sensitivity over the use of sen, and had taken it to heart. That was good.

  “Yes, but we’ve known each other for five years.”

  Silence.

  “But why do you get so cross when I say sen? You call me sen. I don’t have a problem with it.”

  I considered whether or not to embark on a long monologue. Were I to let it slide, he’d misunderstand. Were I to try to explain, he’d misunderstand.

  “Whatever. Don’t worry about it.”

  We arrived at Çapa.

  The entrance to the morg
ue was an unusually colorful sight, thanks to our girls. They were as loud as they were vibrant. Some were decked out in costumes, others were in civilian clothes. News, particularly bad news, travels swiftly in our circle. I’ve always believed that the system of communications goes beyond mere telephones. It could even be a form of telepathy, but I have yet to fully comprehend what exactly it is and how it works. Nor did I have any intention of dwelling on it. It was enough to see that, whatever it was, it was running smoothly.

  I looked for Gönül, who regularly haunts the morgue. She’s a large girl, badly dressed and quite ugly, but with a saucy tongue and bold manners. More important, though, I had heard that she was somehow related to Buse.

  Most of the girls were here in the name of solidarity. There was an unbelievably united front against all enemies of transvestites and the police who failed to be of assistance to girls like us. I wondered how many of them had known Buse personally. Most of the girls were from a world unfamiliar to me—that is to say, they were the girls of Aksaray, Laleli, and the motorway. I pressed my way through to the middle of the crowd. Intent on extracting any shred of possibly useful information, I began questioning one and all.

  Fury boiled in the eyes of some. They were prepared to take any form of action in order to demonstrate their rage. I quickly realized that most not only didn’t know Fevzi/Buse, they weren’t even aware of what exactly had happened. All they knew was that a transvestite had been murdered. One of them! This meant action was required. I had growing doubts about their reliability as sources of hard information.

  I approached one of them.

  “My condolences. Did you know her?” I asked.

  She sniffed, eyes running with mascara. An unmistakably baritone voice, altered through habit into a falsetto, demanded to know, in a thick Eastern accent, why I was asking. “She’s dead. They killed her. Isn’t that enough?”

  “I knew her well,” I said. “We hung out at the same club.” There was no need to mention that I owned a stake in the club, or that the girls looked up to me as their boss.

  “Hmm . . .” was her reaction. She sniffed again. I waited, sensing a possible breakthrough. She knew something.

  In my most affected voice, I continued, “I adored Buse. We were such good friends.”

  She stopped sniffing and looked me up and down. All she saw was someone dressed as a man, and lacking even a single piece of jewelry. I looked far too masculine to have been a bosom buddy of Buse’s.

  Determined to put her right, I mincingly added, “Don’t pay any mind to my clothes right now. I’m one of you. Like Buse.”

  She continued scrutinizing me. Cutting me off, she demanded to know, “Are you one of the girls, or just a fag?”

  Well, I never!

  “Oh, I’m completely different by night. I dressed like this for the funeral.”

  Suddenly the graceless Gönül materialized, spouting unintelligible cries.

  “Ay, ablam,” she said as she embraced me. “There’s nothing in the world like a loyal friend.”

  I was enfolded in a stifling bear hug. She reeked of fake Joop.

  “Gönül, abla, do you know this person?”

  “Ay, of course I do,” said Gönül, introducing us.

  I took Gönül by the arm and led her off.

  “Did you know her?” I asked.

  “Her real name was Fevzi.”

  “I know,” I said. “And she had a mother . . . I wonder if anyone’s informed her.”

  “You mean Sabiha Teyze?” That was it! The name of the blind lady. “How do I know?”

  “There’s no point in waiting around here. Let’s go check on her. She may need us. She can’t see, after all. At least, that’s what Fevzi said.”

  “What’s with calling her Fevzi? Her name was Buse,” scolded Gönül.

  Moments ago, it had been Gönül who for no reason had introduced the name Fevzi into the conversation. There’s no predicting what our girls will do or say, and Gönül is the most erratic of them all. She was glaring at me.

  “Of course I know she was called Buse. I only said Fevzi because you had,” I explained.

  “Well, don’t. It’s disrespect toward the deceased.”

  I had grown used to Gönül’s attempt to sound refined, which she tried to achieve by replacing all her a’s with e’s. But it still took a brief moment to figure out what she was saying.

  The final syllable of each word was drawn out, singsong. The end of each sentence was marked by the lifting of a single shoulder, toward which she would rotate her head. The head toss was accompanied by what she believed to be a highly significant stare, delivered through narrowed eyes toward the raised shoulder. Upon hearing my voice, she would once again look directly at me, and the shoulder would sink back down. Undoubtedly, the move had been rehearsed repeatedly in front of the mirror for an appreciative audience of one. There is also no doubt that it worked its magic among the louts at less sophisticated beer houses.

  “Fine, then,” I said. “Now let’s go to Sabiha Hanım’s house. I just can’t remember where it is . . .”

  “What does everyone want with that poor blind woman? Just a few minutes ago there were a bunch of ruffians here asking where she lived.” Alarm. Alarm! Red alert! So I wasn’t the only person who’d come here to extract information.

  “What did you tell them?”

  “They didn’t ask me,” she said. “I suppose I wasn’t their type. They talked to everyone but me. It wasn’t so crowded then. Just look around now though, this place is crawling with trannies. It’s wonderful, isn’t it?”

  I feigned interest and had a look around. She was right. The crowd was swelling. The news had spread from ear to ear, from cell phone to cell phone. And all who heard had come.

  “It’s still early, you know.” Gönül continued. “That means no customers, empty bars, families still in command of the streets. The girls had nothing better to do. Now look at them! They’re about to break into the morgue. You’d think the undertaker had killed Buse!” she said with a rueful grin.

  “But who were those men, and why were they looking for Sabiha Hanım Teyze?”

  Gönül let loose a luxurious, low laugh, her head turned toward the raised shoulder.

  I smiled sweetly. She observed me out of the corner of her eye. Then she tossed her mane of hair and focused her attention on me once again.

  “They must have been cops or something. Why else would those thugs want to see Sabiha?”

  “So where did they go?” I asked.

  “How am I supposed to know, ayol! And what’s with all the questions? What’s your problem anyway? You’re not some kind of spy, are you? All I get is a whole load of questions every time I see you.”

  “Ayol, the things you come up with,” I said. “And we’ve known each other all this time.”

  “For as long as I’ve known you, you’ve been pestering me with questions. ‘What do you know? What have you heard?’ It’s like some kind of Judgment Day examination.”

  “Don’t be such a child,” I reprimanded her. “If I can’t even count on you, what will the others be like? You know me, I’ve always had an inquiring mind.”

  “I can’t say I think much of know-it-alls or busybodies. They rub me the wrong way.”

  “Ayol, here I am trying to help this poor lady. Buse’s mother, Sabiha Teyze, could be in terrible danger. Whoever killed the daughter could go after the mother next. I can’t tell you all my suspicions right now. Buse came to my house last night—well, this morning. She said her house had been broken into. She was terrified.”

  Gönül’s eyes widened with fear and curiosity. She nearly pierced my eardrum with a shriek that echoed through the entire district.

  “Who broke into Buse’s house?”

  All heads turned in our direction. The low murmuring suddenly stopped. Ears pricked, the crowd gave us their full attention. Gönül lowered her voice to a whisper.

  “Who were they?” she repeated.


  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “I’m trying to find out. I need help. I don’t know what to do. And all you do is tell me I give you the creeps.”

  “Well, it’s true. I got all funny,” she said. “Once I get that way, that’s it. The end. Finito. Even if I were in the sack—with Kadir İnanır, no less—that’s it. Off I go. Speaking of Kadir, I’m just wild about him. I think he gets better with age. If he gave me a sign I’d be his on the spot. I’d put on a head scarf and nestle at his feet. I mean, I’d be his love slave for life, ayol.”