More: A Novel by Hakan Günday Page B

holidays, Dad.”
    “I know that, kid! I want to know how it’s going—did you pass?”
    “I got the letter of commendation, Dad.”
    A few more bills were peeled away from the sheaf. It appeared that I was about to get an award. The world had really turned upside down! In my elation I’d forgotten to mention that I was top of the class. I’d forgotten to mention that, as a matter of fact, I’d even been handed a stupid book called Robinson Crusoe as a prize for having the highest average in the entire eighth grade. On a very insidious whim, I’d even considered mentioning that Ender, son of the Heroic Sergeant Yadigar, had gotten such bad grades that he was nearly expelled, but been unable to do even that and was left only thinking it.
    “Well done!” said Ahad. For the second time! As though he was sparing my life. “What grade are you in now?”
    How was it possible to hate someone this much but still want his approval just as much? How was it possible to house these two urges inside the same body? Who could know the suffering that was taking place inside me just then? The fight that was being fought? How violently they were laying into each other? What kind of a war was it? It was gruesome, surely. That must be why I was feeling nauseated. Yet the moment I opened my mouth, it was clear who the winner was:
    “Ninth … first year of high school.”
    Unable to gain dominion over the tongue, vanquished in a blind battle of denial, the hatred of the losing side withdrew into the barricades to multiply even more. I could hear its footsteps. It was going to search for a way out. And out it would go, at first chance. It would either become an act unleashed in a weak moment or a thousand curses to spew from my mouth. It would either land on Ahad or whomever else it would be that I happened upon … all hatred ended up at the same place in the end: tomorrow. It could wait. It would wait. I would wait with it. I was a true coward after all. And hatred was the coward’s vengeance. I was an expert! One blacked out, sank into his chair, and hated himself to death. But he would be the first to die. From a brain tumor! A vengeful tumor! A tumor the size of a marble! From too many fantasies of vengeance. Unfulfilled vengeances. Unfulfilled, vaporized vengeances. We breathed it all in! We’d absorb it through our pores if we could! The air of vengeances comprised of curses hurled behind backs … and a bit of oxygen. Not enough to kill. Enough that you’d still be good for something … Of course human life was sacred but only as long as it was good for something. Consequently life was only as valuable as the value of the thing it was good for. So if someone were to up and cover that cost, the life in question would thereby become redundant and expendable. It was all mathematics. Only subtraction, actually. If I could subtract my hate from this life and behold what was left, the whole story would be over. Because the only thing from then on would be daily life … and maybe some morphine sulfate.
    “You’re old enough to be going to high school, already?”
    “I dunno …”
    “You’re old enough to hoist yourself on that girl, aren’t you, though!”
    What had he just said? I hadn’t heard that!
    “Come now, come now, don’t blush! I don’t mean anything by it, but you should be careful. You could catch a disease or something …”
    I still couldn’t hear!
    “Take it easy, kid! I said I don’t mean anything by it! But if you have to do shit like that, at least lock the door of the shed!”
    That I’d heard. And only because there was a command in his words. It was habitual.
    “I will …”
    He laughed … How much had he seen? Had he watched until the end? I couldn’t think about this now. Later! I should be laughing. I should be doing whatever he was doing. I laughed. Or something close to it …
    “You’re not mad at me that I didn’t let you take that exam?”
    Presumably he was talking about the