Bliss: A Novel

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Acknowledgments

  Meryem’s Flight

  The Professor in Crisis

  Innocent Bride, Beautiful Bride

  Ill-Starred Girls Suffer

  Life Is a Joke

  Cemal’s Secret

  Why Don’t the Cocks Crow?

  At Night Don Quixote, Sancho Panza in the Morning

  Ambush and Laughter

  The Family Home

  The Hero in Town

  Last Farewells

  A Sailboat on the Open Sea

  The Black Train

  Noah’s Ark

  The Island Suspended in Air

  Have You Ever Seen a Miracle?

  New Passengers

  New Gods and Goddesses

  The Magical City

  God Alone Exists in Solitude

  Is This What Death Is Like?

  Questions and Answers

  Only People and Fish Get Depressed

  A Call of Young Bodies

  It Takes One Human to Heal Another

  An Incompetent Chameleon

  Everyone Has a Secret

  The House That Smelled of Orange Blossoms

  What Did the Donkey Say?

  A Wild Night

  God Loves Meryem Now

  Copyright

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  When this novel was published in various languages, I received many questions from readers around the world. I was not surprised when I received similar questions from Turkish readers, too. The diverse styles of culture in Turkey—a country that shelters acute conflicts to the point that it might seem there are, in fact, two or three different countries within the same country—evoked such questions. Even some Turkish readers were unaware of the details of these varied cultures and lifestyles.

  My valuable editor, Diane Reverand, who interpreted the novel like a virtuoso, provided superb guidance during the preparation of the American edition, enabling me to make necessary changes and incorporate answers to many possible questions. I am indebted to St. Martin’s Press and Diane Reverand for this special English edition.

  Words are insufficient to express my gratitude to my dear friends Leyla Topal and Jim Ottaway, who helped bring the novel to New York and to St. Martin’s Press all the way from the shores of the Aegean Sea, ensuring that it landed at its destination safely. My thanks also go to Robert and Peter Bernstein, who represented the book excellently.

  In addition, I extend my thanks to Çiğdem Aksoy Fromm, who translated the novel from Turkish to English; to Brian Johnson, who proofread and edited it; and to Angela Roome, who re-edited it. Finally, I must express my deep gratitude to my dear wife, Ülker, and my daughter, Aylin, who were by my side during the process of writing the novel and supported me with their ideas and valuable criticism.

  In Turkish, there is a saying that “one hand has nothing, two hands have sound,” meaning that two hands are better than one and that many hands make the work lighter. This novel was brought to you through the hands of many people. The art of literature in the world continues to stand erect thanks to numerous honorable hands.

  MERYEM’S FLIGHT

  In a dream as deep as the waters of lake van, fifteen-year-old Meryem was flying through the air, her pale naked body pressed against the neck of the phoenix. The phoenix was as white in color as Meryem’s own slender form, and it flew as lightly as a feather, carrying her smoothly and safely through the clouds.

  Clasping the bird’s neck, Meryem felt full of bliss. The cool breeze gently caressing her bare neck, shoulders, and legs made her shiver with happiness.

  “O bird!” she whispered to herself. “O holy bird! O blessed bird!”

  This was the bird of her grandmother’s stories; the bird praised nightly by that tall, thin woman, whose looks terrified everyone. The bird had come at last, gliding through the vast infinity of the sky, to land right in front of their house. Picking out Meryem from among everyone else there, the phoenix had risen into the sky, carrying her on its back.

  Meryem knew from her grandmother’s tales that the phoenix must be given milk when it squawked and meat when it sang. If these conditions were fulfilled, it would carry you from one land to another without stopping, but if it did not get what it wanted, the sacred bird would become enraged and fling you from its back. Meryem had often heard this and knew it must be true.

  Far below glittered the blue waters of Lake Van. On its shores there rose a great city, resembling, by all accounts, the city of Istanbul, about which Meryem had heard so much. She could hardly take her eyes off it.

  Suddenly, the phoenix squawked, a sound that reverberated stridently in her ears.

  “Where can I find milk for you, blessed bird?” Meryem wondered. “What can I find to milk in the sky, supported by a thousand pillars?”

  The bird squawked again.

  “Where in heaven’s name am I going to find milk?” she asked again. “The sorrel cow whose full udders I milk each morning isn’t here.”

  The giant bird squawked even louder, frightening Meryem, for the bird shook itself angrily, as if it wanted to hurl her from its neck.

  “Please!” she begged. “Can’t I give you milk when we get back to earth? I’ll milk the sorrel cow and give you as much of its sweet milk as you wish.”

  At that moment, it occurred to Meryem that if the cow had huge udders, she had her own small breasts. Squeezing one of them, she saw that drops of milk trickled from the rosebud nipple. She bent forward, wetting the bird’s head with her warm milk. Suddenly the flow increased; the first few drops became a stream, then poured out in a copious fountain.

  The sacred bird drank the warm milk that dripped down its neck and was appeased.

  As the cool breeze caressed her body, Meryem floated on without a care. She felt weightless, as if she were one of the pure, white clouds drifting along beside her.

  After a time, she heard the voice of the phoenix again. It was now singing sweetly.

  “Ah, my dear bird, where in the seven circles of the universe am I going to find meat for you?”

  The bird repeated its song, and once more she began to plead with it—this time she really had nothing to turn to. The phoenix then screeched so hideously that Meryem felt the end of the world had come.

  “O glorious bird! Holy, blessed bird!” she cried. “I beg you, please don’t throw me down!”

  Her fears were not realized. The phoenix did not fling her from its neck.

  Meryem saw that they were approaching a mountain piercing the sky with its towering summit. The mountain was so high that the clouds hung below the serrated cone cutting through the white mist. The bird placed Meryem on the sharpest rock of this lofty peak, which seemed to stab into her back. Her slim, naked body shook violently, shuddering with cold and fear.

  Without warning, the phoenix began to change. Sprouting coal-black feathers, its white head turned to darkest ebony, and its beak lengthened into a pair of bloody pincers. The phoenix screeched, jarring heaven and earth, and all the other birds fled away in fear.

  Meryem was terrified. “I know it wants meat,” she thought. “It must have meat, so it must want to eat my flesh. First it drank my milk, now it’s my flesh it wants to devour.”

  The giant bird plunged its bloody beak between her thighs—into that disgusting and accursed place of sin. “I’m just imagining it,” Meryem reassured
herself. “It’s just a nightmare, that’s all. It can’t be real.” But this thought brought her no comfort.

  Meryem struggled to push the bird’s coal black head away from her thighs, but the phoenix was too strong for her. It took no notice of her tiny hands, but kept digging into her, ripping out pieces of her flesh.

  Suddenly, in a flash, the bird’s head became human, and she saw a man’s face covered with a dark growth. Meryem recognized her uncle with his black beard.

  “Uncle, please give me back what you’ve torn out,” she begged.

  The bird with the human head and bearded face gave her the mangled pieces of flesh and flew off into the heavens.

  Meryem was left alone on top of the mountain. She gathered the pieces one by one and put them back where they belonged. Each piece adhered to its place and healed immediately.

  With a start, Meryem suddenly awoke.

  “I don’t want to wake up,” she thought. “I don’t ever want to wake up!” Her dream had frightened her, but the reality was more horrifying.

  She opened her eyes—the eyes that everybody in the village talked about. Large, unusual eyes, where a thousand and one different shades of green and hazel blended, those unseeing eyes, which had inspired admiration in some and in others enmity. Her grandmother, before she died, had often embraced her, saying, “This girl’s eyes outshine the sun.”

  Meryem realized she had been clasping the place between her thighs so tightly with both hands that it hurt.

  In one respect, at least, it was good to be awake. At least she no longer felt so afraid. She had wiped the thought of her uncle from her mind; now it was the phoenix that replaced him in her memory.

  She no longer remembered the hut by the vineyard at the edge of the village where she had gone to take her uncle his food. She no longer recollected how the man had thrown himself on her and violated her; nor how she had fainted; nor even later, when she had come to her senses, how she had rushed out of the hut and ran madly down the road. It was all buried deep in the shadows of her mind.

  Two young men had found her near the graveyard, her skin scratched by thornbushes, dried blood on her legs. Delirious with fright, she had fluttered like a wounded bird. They carried her through the village marketplace and brought her home—where everyone was stunned into silence. Too afraid to discuss the incident, Meryem’s family had locked her in the damp and dingy outhouse they called the barn.

  Meryem spoke to no one about the rape in the vineyard hut, nor did she reveal the identity of her attacker. In fact, she began to doubt it had ever happened. Perhaps it had just been a dream. Her memory was blurred, and she could not remember what she had done after regaining her senses. It was all so confused, so impossible to think of, though she could not imagine ever saying “uncle” to him again. She thrust the event to the farthest corner of her mind. Yet, even there, out of conscious reach, it still lay lurking—ready to surface again in her dreams.

  The barn, where her thin mattress lay on the ground, was dark. Feeble beams of light from the courtyard flickered through the cracks in the aged wooden door and the tiny hole in the ceiling. In the dimness, the shapes of discarded saddles, saddlebags, halters, harnesses, a pitchfork abandoned in a corner, bundles arranged in rows on the wooden shelves, a bag used to store dried phyllo dough, thin sheets of sun-dried grape pulp, and grain sacks were all indistinguishable, but Meryem knew by heart the place of each and every one of them.

  She had spent her entire life in this place on the shores of Lake Van, this place half town, half village. She knew each house, each tree, each bird there. Every detail of the abandoned Armenian house, two stories high, in which they lived was stamped on her mind: the granary, the simple bathroom, the earthen oven, the stable, the chicken coop, the garden, the poplars, and the courtyard. Even with her eyes closed, she could easily find the smallest thing, as if she had put it there herself. On the wooden door of their house were two knockers—one big, one small. The larger knocker was used by the men and the smaller one by the women who visited the house. The women of the household understood from the sound who was at the door, and when they heard the banging of the bigger knocker they had just enough time to cover themselves for the male visitor.

  Since Meryem had never left the village or even seen the other side of the hill that was always there in front of her, she sometimes thought she knew nothing of the world. But this did not bother her. After all, she could go to the city of Istanbul anytime she liked; whenever people talked about some acquaintance or other, they always seemed to remark, “She went to Istanbul” or “He came from Istanbul.” Meryem was certain that it lay just beyond the distant hill. She had always believed if she climbed to the top, she would see the golden city about whose glories the villagers never tired of telling.

  To go to a city so near might not have been difficult, but now it was quite impossible. Quite apart from going to Istanbul just over the hill, now she could not go even to the fountain, the bakery from which she used to fetch bread, the store full of sweet-smelling, colorful cloth she had been taken to by her elders, or the public bath where once a week they used to spend the whole day. She was now imprisoned in the barn into which her family had thrust her, then locked the door. An outcast, she was in solitary confinement.

  Meryem could not even go to make water with her aunts and female cousins anymore. On summer evenings, after the evening meal, the women used to gather in the far corner of the backyard, squat down, and urinate—gossiping together all the while. She remembered the evening when everyone else had finished but her gentle splashes continued without stopping. “Listen to that.” Her aunt had laughed. “Meryem’s so young, yet she has so much pee!”

  “Oh, Mother!” her daughter Fatma objected. “What’s the connection between being young and peeing?”

  Meryem had no mother. The poor woman had died a few days after giving birth to her. Despite the protests of Gülizar, the village’s elderly midwife, who knew how little strength her mother had left, various treatments had been inflicted on her. She was hung upside down by her ankles, breathed on by the village imam, and subjected to the many folk remedies prescribed by all and sundry. After a few days, she had expired and was laid to rest in the old, overgrown graveyard outside the village, the haunt of snakes and centipedes.

  In the afternoons, Meryem’s aunts and stepmother would lie on their beds in the two-story stone house. Resting their heads on soft cushions, they chatted for hours. With the exception of her mother’s twin sister, all of Meryem’s aunts were fat, their buxom bodies bulging in every direction without any definite shape.

  No longer could Meryem listen to their gossip, join them in the garden, or share their meals in the kitchen. She had no right even to eat the fish from the lake. In fact, the waters of Lake Van were so alkaline no fish could live there, but the mullet caught near Erci, where the river flows into the lake, were delicious. Canned fish were eaten throughout the year. Meryem was now cut off from everything that might be termed enjoyment.

  Her father’s third wife, Döne, brought her food occasionally, and she was permitted to relieve herself in a secluded corner of the garden. But that was all. She had no other link with the outside world, and no idea what was to become of her. Once or twice, Meryem had plucked up the courage to ask Döne, who was near to her in age, about this matter, but always received the same malevolent reply, “You know the punishment for what you did.” This only served to frighten her more; the next time Döne came, she mentioned Istanbul.

  Meryem had not seen her father since the incident when the sinful part of her body had been violated. Her father was quiet and withdrawn, and her uncle dominated the family. No one, not even Meryem’s father, dared to speak freely in front of him. He was highly regarded, not only in their village but throughout the neighborhood, and visitors, bearing gifts, would often come to kiss his hand and pay their respects. Strict, quick-tempered, and intimidating, he recited verses from the Quran, invoked the hadiths of the Prophet Muhamm
ad, and acted as a guide in all matters of daily life. As he was the head of the religious sect of that area, he had many followers, even in Istanbul on the other side of the hill.

  It was Meryem’s uncle who had confined her to the barn. She could still hear his furious shout, “Lock up that accursed, immoral whore!” and the memory of his cruel words made her tremble even more.

  As Döne was quick to tell her, Meryem had thrown the family honor into the dust. No longer could they walk through the village with their heads held high.

  “What happens to girls who get into trouble like this?” Meryem had asked her stepmother.

  “They get sent to Istanbul. Two or three have already gone there.”

  Meryem’s fear lessened. Her punishment would only be to go over the hill there behind them. But then she noticed Döne’s expression—as if she were saying, “You’ll get what you deserve, my girl!”

  Döne had always despised Meryem as much as the sin she had committed, and the sneer on her face sent a chill through Meryem. As she walked out of the barn, Döne added, “Of course, the ones who hang themselves aren’t sent away. Some have solved their problems by finding a rope.”

  After her stepmother had gone, Meryem gazed at the braided halters and coiled ropes lying in heaps on the floor around her. Had they shut her in the barn so she could hang herself? The beams on the ceiling, the cross timbers, the ropes, all were ready there at hand. If someone wanted to hang herself, the barn was just the place to do it.

  Meryem began to understand the implication behind Döne’s cruel words and sneering face. She must have discussed the matter with Meryem’s father. As his youngest and newest wife, who had given him two children, she had influence, while the second wife remained barren.

  So this is what her family had decided her punishment should be. Meryem was to hang herself in the barn quietly, without fuss, and soon all would be forgotten. Who in this place would think of inquiring into a young girl’s death or suicide? When, previously, two young girls had hanged themselves, everyone, assuming the false mask of grief, had gossiped about it endlessly in every detail.