He was both in pain from the beating he’d taken the previous night and in agony over finding himself in bed with a person who had a cock. He could have killed that transvestite right then and there. But first he had to find his switchblade. Where was it? Where were his clothes? His pants, his military underwear and undershirt... He began searching the room like a madman. The transvestite quickly pulled herself together; she drew the red bed sheet over her body and tried to explain. She said she’d found him near dawn, close to the hotel, in a pool of blood and urine, on the verge of freezing, delirious and mumbling. Of course she recognized him right away. She picked him up and carried him straight home. She figured since he’d been wandering around that hotel with a switchblade in his hand for days, he must have an enemy, a score to settle, someone he was after. And so that’s why she didn’t take him to the cops or the hospital. So... what? Had she done something wrong? Could he just calm down a little?
But there was no calming him down. “Where are they?” he screamed, spewing a muddled list of demands. Where were his pants? His shirt? His jacket?
“I washed them. They haven’t dried yet.”
He’d lost his virginity. Inside he was still raw, pure, naïve. And he was yelling at the transvestite like a rabid animal. But the transvestite, for whom every day was virtually an act of suicide, didn’t seem at all frightened by this comely young man; on the contrary, he brought a flutter to her heart. She was only too willing to play the role cut out for her in this performance, or so it seemed. She immediately brought him his damp clothes.
First he put on his pants, then he realized he’d forgotten to put on his underwear, so he took off his pants again. This time he put them on in the appropriate order. Then his T-shirt, his shirt, his jacket... He ripped his switchblade out of the transvestite’s hand.
He was walking out the door when the transvestite yelled after him, like a desperate mother to her stubborn child, “Don’t leave like that! You’ll catch cold!”
His past was a fog, his future a dead end. The gaping hole within him continued to grow. While his mind was busy thinking about how to take care of one dirty mess, his body had been sullied by another. Now no matter how much he scrubbed the damp clothes that clung to his body there in the winter cold, the dirt would never wash off.
And now, in that bone-chilling cold, his head spinning with hunger, in the face of a browbeating storm, and still without anyone to fend for him, he was walking amongst the crowd on Mercan Hill, going forth, unable to protect his feet from the melting snow, his ears from the boisterous salesmen, his shoulders from the blows of passersby, his eyes from the umbrellas.
And you can’t be a hero when you don’t have a dime to your name. It was a moment when he wished to die. But he couldn’t. He could not possibly pass from this world without first killing. He owed it to his mother. If he didn’t do it, what would he say on the other side? How could he possibly look his mother in the face?
“You still want to pay back your debt?” he asked when the transvestite opened the door. With his weakness he betrayed his masculinity, with his tongue he betrayed his soul. His body was full of defects, his self was full of the transvestite, and his tongue was vapid.
“I thought I did,” the transvestite responded flirtatiously. She stepped aside, inviting him in.
When, chilled by the morning frost, he entered the living room, a wave of cigarette smoke and incense sent his head spinning. Why had he missed the transvestite? Why did he want her? Because she stirred his juices? Because she was the only person in his life who had ever reached out to him? Because her home, her bed, her food was warm? Or was it because he was actually dealing with himself for the first time?
They made a pact. They made a pact with the wordless knowledge and the profound pain of being alone in this world from which they had long ago been severed, and which would never take them back.
He was waiting in the darkness of the bedroom, the switchblade in his pocket.
Several days and several nights had passed, but his stepfather had somehow managed, again and again, to avoid falling into their trap. Either the transvestite’s timing was off, or the stepfather just wasn’t drunk enough when she made her move. Sometimes he ignored her because there were others with him. The transvestite devoted all of her time, her energy, her concentration, and her care to seducing the stepfather, seeking out every opportunity to make the big catch. Finally, that night, she’d collared him, drunk and eager.
When he heard the key turn in the lock, he held his breath and ran his fingers over the switchblade again. The light came on. The transvestite didn’t call out to him, which meant that the old man was with her. This time, tonight, she had brought him. God willing, she had brought him. He sat up straight again, swallowed, held his breath. He heard some voices, some laughter; he pricked up his ears, but he couldn’t understand a word. Just some drunkard spouting expletives, and the transvestite’s trite responses. Then, footsteps. The living room light seeped under the bedroom door. The footsteps stopped. The living room door squeaked but didn’t close. Every now and then the transvestite burst into laughter.
“Would you like something to drink, sweetheart?”
“Do you have any rakı?”
He quietly opened the door, having taken off his shoes so they wouldn’t squeak on the parquet floor in the hallway. He pressed down on the switchblade’s button — chaak. Making his way down the hallway, he counted silent prayer beads in his head: Kill him, kill him, kill him... On the inside he was now like a small child poisoned with hate. He felt neither the fear of death nor the fear of killing. He was flushing the poison of fear out of his system by taunting death, by challenging it. His fear would be dulled to the point of irrelevance once he’d finished the job and disappeared into the night, light as a bird.
He approached the living room, leaning his ear in closer. He could hear his stepfather’s voice. “Oh baby, yeah, go on, bitch — faster, faster!” Tormented, he wavered there before the door of decision. Finally, he slithered through the half-open door, silent as a snake. That’s when he saw his stepfather sitting on the couch, legs spread wide, head thrown back, eyes closed, and the transvestite kneeling in front of him sucking the head of his cock, which she held firmly in her hand. She was raising and lowering her head in a swift motion, doing all she could to revive the dead.
He watched his stepfather sitting there in a state of complete and total submission. His throat stretched back, bared, the thick veins popping out, begging to be cut. Just a few steps later, with a swift motion, he thrust the switchblade into his stepfather’s neck. Dark red blood spurted out impatiently. He stuck the blade in again, and again, twisting it firmly. With each stab the blood continued to flow, though never quite as much as at first. It was as if he could hear the blood draining out of his stepfather once and for all. Then, still holding the switchblade, he stepped back and observed his stepfather. The old man made a wet wheezing sound, and his eyes shined, no longer with hate, but with amazement at the courage of his namby-pamby stepson.
The young man held the bloody switchblade and continued to look his stepfather right in the eye, as if wanting to be absolutely certain that he had paid his debt, that he had finally avenged the loss of his mother. Across from him lay a hairy, disgusting, cowardly slab of meat that had nothing to do with the mother in his mind, and all of the values that he attributed to her.