(6) UGLY

She never loved me.

I knew it even though she never openly told me.

We were sitting outside... The waves were constantly splashing to the shore... A full moon was flirting with the sea... Grasshoppers were chirping madly to mate... And she was crying silently... Just next to me leaning her head on my shoulder...

She murmured: why?
I foolishly repeated: why what?
She stayed silent for a while and then said: Why we have to be miserable?
I smiled in pain: Because you don't love me...
She smiled with teardrops on her face: but, as you said, you are ugly..
I smiled back: That's true...
She replied with a giggle: Don't change the subject... Tell me why he doesn't love me?
I said: Because he is stupid... because he is not capable of love anybody but himself...
She smiled in pain: You love me, I love him and he doesn't love anybody but himself... what could be worse?
I smiled again and replied: he could be gay and could be in love with me...
She bursted into laughter... laughed and laughed and laughed. .. we laughed for a long time... until I tried to kiss her...

I don't remember when I decided to kiss her. But I remember how I felt: A warm liquid was running into my heart... Turning me into a transparent creature... I could see my heart pumping like a crazy horse... I could see all my blood vessels trying to withstand the immense pressure... Waves were forming and traveling through my liquid skin... I wanted to freeze the time... I wanted to be this transparent creature for the rest of my life... I wanted to conjure her, to become one with her, never let her go...

But in a split second, she pushed me away... I resisted first, but she pushed harder and I let her go... let her go with my shattered dreams lived only a split second. ..

She started crying again and shouted: Why? 

I didn't speak... She shouted again: Why do you have to ruin everything? 

I asked hesitantly: Because I love you?

She continued crying and murmured: Because you kissed me... Everything was in a thin equilibrium and your kiss broke it.. It will never be the same... Please just go... And do not call me back again...

She went inside and slammed the door... I did not know what to do for a while... I had been in heaven for a split second and now I was sent back to the hell, to the deepest point with no hope... 

I don't know how much I stayed in that late summer garden... I was desperately hoping  she would come back and hug to me... She would say she loved me... I would beg her for a bit of love, crashing further the remainings of my manly proud... Couldn't she love me for only one night, one hour, one minute? I wanted to hear only once: I love you honey... You have an incredible heart... I want to be with you... I want you kiss me again...

After a while,  my hopes fainted... I realized that the dream was over... I had nobody but my gloomy self... I had lost my only girlfriend that I could share something... Even if it was not love... She was right... It would never be the same... I had bitten the forbidden fruit... And God banished me to the hell...

I wandered through the beach... The waves were stopped, the sea was flat as if you could walk on it like Jesus had done miraculously centuries ago. However,  grasshoppers were still chirping madly to lure their mates. I also wanted to chirp madly until she came back. Seriously thought this for a moment...

In the end, I bought a pack of cigarettes and sat on the beach. I had quitted smoking a while ago since she had wanted me quit... She had said that I could forget kissing her one day if I had not stopped smoking.. I wished I wouldn't...

I fired a cigarette and thought about killing myself... I felt  like the hunchback of the Notre Dame...  I was ugly for sure, maybe not as ugly as the hunchback, but still... Ugly... My life would be miserable, alone, excluded. .. I would always be begging for love... I was neither smart nor funny to compansate my ugliness... Maybe funny a little bit... Women liked funny guys huh... I should have got my father's pistol and smashed my head...

No, I was not brave enough to do that... 

Instead, I continued to sit on the beach and smoking until I finished the whole pack. I tried to remember, in all tiny details,  the most important split second of my life so far. And inscribed it into my memory... I didn't want to lose it... I could kill myself anytime, even might find more civilized ways to do that... It was a beautiful night. The sea was sleeping and the moon were kissing her tenderly...  Caressing her with his soft touches... He might even be whispering an ancient song to his love... And the grasshoppers were madly chirping to mate... 

(5) Small Talk

He said: It is very difficult to forget...

We were sitting in a bar drinking our cold beers with french fries...

He was one of my young cousins and he had just been dumped by his love...

I said: It is very difficult to remember...

I was visiting my home town after many years... It was a strange feeling for me... I was trying to remember my childhood and early youth... I was having difficulty in seeing myself living here in those years... As if he was not me but somebody else... Somebody you saw as a silhouette in your dreams... Some sort of ghost lurking from your past... Who was me at those years? Was I still the same pimpled ugly bookworm summoned from another world? If not, who was I now?

He looked at me with a question mark on his face... I didn't make any further explanation...

We silently continued drinking our beers...

 

(4) Prince

The summer was about to come and my mom had gone to visit my grandmother who was sick for a while... The school was unbearable with the prospect of oncoming summer holiday... Each second of the lecture time was strecthing to the infinity... After hours of torture, the last lecture finished, and I left the school like an arrow released from the bow... Suddenly, I remembered that I had to go to my father's office instead of home... My father had told me that we were going to visit one of the relatives nearby...

I generally hated the visits to the relatives... They always squeezed your cheek in the name of  showing some kind of care and they talked to you like you were a baby boy no matter how old you were... Also there was a never-ending  "routine talk", starting with the question of mutual well-being, continuing with the well-being of other relatives, and streching to the infinity just like the last lecture of the school... It was like: "How are you? I am  fine and how are you? Not too bad and how is your old mother? She is also not bad and how is yours? She can't walk much due to pains on her knees but thank God she is ok otherwise, how is your dad? " Oh, man... Please somebody shoot me...

I hurried to my father's old and dusty office... He grumbled a little for my late arrival and then we started to walk in the narrow streets of Bodrum...  My father was not a talkative person... He didn't mention anything about where we were going... It took about half an hour to arrive at our destination...

It was an old stone house on the far hills of the town... It had old, ruinous walls hiding a small garden from the alien eyes... Even though it was the middle of the spring, we were soaked in sweat...  My father was constantly using his handkerchief to wipe the sweat on his forhead...

We followed the wall and arrived at the dusty iron gates of the house. An amazing smell was being spread from the gates... It was impossible not to feel; the freshness of the air, the strange beauty hidden behind the walls...

I was expecting an incredible woman, like an angel, summoned to the gate and take us in... But instead; a tall, bony man with a sunburnt face approached to the gate... Opened the door, bended and kissed my father's hand... "Uncle Ali! You are welcome..." My father gracefully replied: "It is nice to see you Memet, how nice your garden is!"...

We walked through a small garden, full of beatiful flowers... You can hear the constant buzz of the bees, visiting the flowers with an unbridled hurry... There were a few stumpy mandarin and lemon trees, carefully pruned, leaves swept... At the far end of the garden, there were tomatoes, green peppers, green unions, mints, fresh beans clinging to the bamboo sticks... The garden was really something... Something from heaven...

Memet accompanied us to the courtyard of the house... Then went in and boiled some tea... Also offered home-made cake and some grapes, probably cut off  from the vine surrounding the courtyard and providing shade... 

Memet was a talkative guy... But talking only about small things... Like his garden... his flowers.. how he rooted the weeds and insects... how difficult it was to keep garden green during summer season... how much it did cost to him to whitepaint the outer part of the house... how he liked cooking fresh beans with tomates and mint...  And also continuously thanked my father for arranging his job in the municilpality... As if my father was a small god, and he was a humble servent... He seemed a bit weird to me... Like a man who was lonely, very lonely...  Losing his connections to the world outside of this garden...

My father listened to him without talking much... Nodded and smiled most of the time... I could feel the pain on my father's face... He intended to say something... something difficult to say... Just trying to find the appropriate context... But sometime later, Memet stopped talking... He was just sitting on the sofa, in front of my father, and sipping his tea... The silence was very heavy... Heavy enough to squeeze us under...

My father suddenly raised his eyes to me, but I pretended to read the book I brought with me... He cleared his throat and started talking slowly: "Look Memet, you have an amazing garden here... but you are alone...It is not good for a man to live alone..." Memet smiled back and said: "I am happy here Uncle Ali... very happy indeed... I have a job, a house and a garden... Also I am not alone here... I have Prince!"...

My father's eyes were rolled in confusion: "Who is Prince??!"... Memet gave a big burst of laughter and then shouted: "Prince... Prince... Come here boy!!!"

Suddenly, a huge rooster jumped in to the courtyard that we sat together. It was an unbelivable animal with its shining colors and bloody red crest... He directly went to Memet and jumped on to his lap. Memet was in a great joy, caressing the rooster with his bare hands... And the rooster was sitting on his lap,  like a purry cat... Gut gut gut.... gurrrttt... gut gut gut... Memet gave him a grape bead and he swallowed it with one gulp... Then he raised his eyes on us... Like trying to assess how to treat us...

My father and I were stone frozen... We had never seen such a big rooster sitting on a lap and purring like a cat...  My father couldn't talk for a while... Memet was certainly aware of our astonishment and really cheerfull about it... "See... My good boy... He never leaves me... Always watchfull... Very intelligent..."

[... will continue]