The Time Regulation Institute (18 page)

I was wringing my hands, and my temples were covered in sweat.

“Doctor, please!”

“Now, there's no need for that. Your condition has been diagnosed. I had in fact already stumbled upon the possibility of such an illness while listening to your life story. It became more evident to me in your dreams. And today I saw it all with great clarity. It is impossible that I have erred in my diagnosis.”

My very soul was atremble as I listened.

“Then what do I have, Doctor?”

“A grave illness . . . , which could have been worse. And there's certainly no need for you to be alarmed, for this is something we can address easily. A typical case, but harmless . . .”

He stepped away from me and pulled out a chair from the other end of the room as if he might crouch down behind it. Leaning against the back of it, he continued:

“As I said, your father, you don't like the man, apparently you never did.”

“For goodness sake, Doctor!”

“Listen to me. Please try to listen. You never liked your father, and instead of eventually taking his place, you have never stopped looking for new father figures. In other words, you never fully matured. You're simply still a child! Wouldn't you agree?”

I leapt out of my chair. This was surely going too far. It was clearly slanderous, perfidious, not to mention cruel; in one fell swoop he had rendered me an outcast from society.

“Such a thought would never cross my mind. And never did. That's ridiculous, sheer nonsense! Why would I look for another father? I'm the man's son whether I like it or not. How could I deny my own father?”

“Sadly, this is just the case. It's been like this all your life. This is the source of the continuing confusion in your life, at work, and in your sense of self.”

I looked around the room in utter bewilderment. No one was there to rescue me from this terrible situation. If I was going to get out of it, I'd have to do it myself. So I rallied all my strength.

“Look, Doctor,” I began, “there's nothing wrong with me. I just have bad luck. I always end up embroiled in the most unseemly scenarios. And I don't know where this bad luck will
take me next. Now I find myself stuck in this absurd situation. And why? I spoke out when there was no need. One little word dropped from my mouth, and around it they concocted an entire fairy tale. And they went as far as to make it my ruination. Sadly, I'm the victim of a lie that I myself devised. How could I have done such a thing? Why did I do such a thing? I really don't know. But that's just how it happened. I just rambled on and on . . . Nothing more than that. Perhaps I'm no different from all the rest of humankind combined. We are enslaved by our own stories. But mine was on a different scale—for I ended up paying dearly for it, and my children and my wife are paying for it too. Try to understand me. These people simply thrust it all upon me. There's really nothing else to it . . .”

If I had thought it possible, I would have thrown myself on the floor and groveled at his feet. This was how I saw myself throughout my tirade. I wanted to embrace something, to beg and plead, until everyone, even fate itself, believed me.

“Calm yourself, Hayri Bey,” he kept saying. But I continued.

“It's a lie. Please understand. An insignificant, simple lie. A joke!”

I tried to pull myself together and explain.

“Simply take out the lie and nothing's there—I'd be saved. I'm not sick at all. If you're looking for someone who is, well, there's my wife! I'm terribly worried about her—she's very ill. She looked dreadful the other day. She wasn't that bad when I left home, but as for myself, I'm absolutely fine! A man in perfect health.”

Oh, the sound of my voice then. How well I know that voice and the way it makes my entire body heave. How many times in my life have I woken up from dreams with this same fear inside me, with this voice wet with tears still ringing in my ears? Fear. Fear and man, fear and man's destiny, the struggle of man against man, and needless hostility. But who was I fooling? To whom could I explain myself? For what can a man ever really convey? What grief can one man truly share with another? The stars might speak to one another, but man can never communicate with man.

The worst of it was that Ramiz Bey had no intention of trying to understand what I was saying, let alone even listen. He was interested only in my illness, or, rather, his diagnosis. And really, why would I ever disavow my own father?

“Please stay calm,” he said. “Unfortunately you don't like the man but not liking someone doesn't mean rejecting him out of hand. You're rather mixed up about the whole thing. The confusion began with the Blessed One. Its past exerted an exalted and sacred stranglehold on your home. Domestic values were turned upside down, and your father was relegated to second fiddle.”

“The clock!? That wretched thing? A crotchety old clock . . . a family heirloom?”

“Don't you see? Miserable, old, crotchety . . . You continually speak of it as if it's a human being. Pay attention to your words: first ‘wretched' and then ‘old.' What I mean is that first you spoke of it as if it were a human being, and then you caught yourself and said it was ‘old,' as if to characterize it as just a piece of furniture. But you weren't entirely satisfied with that word, and so you added the word ‘crotchety' . . .” He riffled through his notes. “On the first day you used the following words and phrases: ‘strange,' ‘bizarre disposition,' ‘flights of fancy,' ‘idiosyncratic,' and ‘those things it would always do.'”

“And?”

“In other words, you spent your childhood in a home dominated by this clock. Even your father was jealous of it. Although your mother named it the Blessed One, your father called it the Calamity. I'm surprised the man never smashed it to pieces, because your father realized the danger it presented well before you did.”

“But he never wanted to smash the thing. He wanted to sell it.”

Delighted, the doctor bounced out of his seat. I'd supplied him with yet another piece of evidence for his case.

“So he wanted it out of the house.”

I bowed my head. It was true. My father behaved as if the clock was a bitter rival, and he would often moan, “The thing never leaves me alone. Oh, the Calamity has practically taken over my home.”

Again I rallied my strength and began to explain. What else was there for me to do?

“Doctor, please! All this is quite unreasonable. Just because the poor man let a few words slip . . . No one could really be jealous of a clock. Have you ever seen someone jealous of an object? I could understand if it were a person . . . but why would someone be jealous of their own property? Perhaps they might find it distasteful or become tired of it or throw it away—sell it, burn it, smash it to bits, but . . .”

“And then there's Nuri Efendi, Seyit Lutfullah, and Abdüsselam Bey.”

“Nuri was my master, and the best man I've ever known. Lutfullah was a hopeless madman, but I was always amused by his words and actions. I liked him as I might like a fairy tale. As for Abdüsselam, the man was very kind to me.”

“Yes, but they all fit into different periods of your life. You followed a different man at each stage in your life.”

Panic slowly welled up inside me. Was that really the case? There's no doubt I was in some way attached to all these men. Dr. Ramiz suddenly and quite mercilessly interrupted my thoughts:

“How do you explain Abdüsselam naming your first child?”

I held up my hands and once again implored him to return to reason and logic, the only sound approach to all this.

“Have mercy, Doctor, a little mercy . . . It was a matter of courtesy, for I was living in his home. He had been so kind to me on so many other occasions. He was my benefactor. So call it whatever you like: a blessing, an act of piety to the man, or as the elders call it ‘an auspicious consecration.'”

“So, in a word, he was a father to you. And you wholeheartedly accepted him as such. You accepted him to such an extent that you even allowed the poor man to give your daughter his mother's name.”

“And that is my fault? He gave her the name—and by mistake.”

“Naturally you were the one who thrust the role upon him. A matter of influence . . . You're a powerful man, Hayri Bey, or, rather, a powerful patient.”

By this point all my resistance was broken. There was nothing I could do but stare at him, transfixed by his interpretation. It was the same way I had, for days, stared at everyone in the courtroom in utter surprise. In the same state of mind I had cried, “How can these people actually believe all this?” I suppose it is this state of shock in the face of our fellow human beings that prevents us from going mad several times a day.

Snuffing out my cigarette, I stood up.

“Don't you think this has all gone too far, Doctor?” I asked. “True, I was never a great admirer of my father. He had such strange moods. He was cantankerous, and he spoke too much, and he had no self control. All in all, he wasn't the kind of man anyone really loved, respected, or, for that matter, held in much esteem. He'd had bad luck—that was certain. But he was still my father. I pitied him even if I didn't love him. He had such a soft and battered soul . . . To look for someone to replace him, and so many years after he passed away? Now, maybe if I
were
my mother, I might be able to choose another man for myself . . .” He gestured for me to sit down.

“This is true, quite true . . . But what can be done? Such is your condition. Your own words indicate as much. Didn't you say the deceased was not the kind of man to be loved, respected, or esteemed? Yet a father should always be loved—should be someone who is always respected. This is the case whether you like it or not. You see, you aren't at all envious of your father, but normally a father is envied. Things would be quite different if there were envy. But you were never envious of your father.”

“What aspect of the man could I envy?”

Every time I spoke, the doctor's smile took on new shades of meaning.

“You were never envious of him because you never found anything of merit in the man! Now, now—there's no need to panic. These kinds of conditions are found in almost everyone. You're just a little late in this regard. You still haven't become a father. But when you do, all this will pass.”

“I never became a father?! But I have two children. I even named the second child myself. Goodness me, I was the one who decided on the name Ahmet.”

“Because Abdüsselam Bey is now dead. But with the death of your father you should have achieved a certain freedom or maturity. The question now is how to free yourself of the consequences of this complex. Yet as the complex exists in the subconscious mind it's insignificant, as long as it remains the same—insignificant and in fact entirely natural, especially in today's society. For in today's world almost all of us suffer from this condition. Just look around: we all complain about the past; everyone is preoccupied with it. This is why we seek to change it. What does this mean? A father complex, no? Don't we all, both young and old, wrestle with this very condition? Observe our obsession with the Hittites and Phrygians and God knows what other ancient tribes. Is this anything but a deep father complex?”

I stood up again. I wanted to flee, but our coffees had just arrived and so I sat down.

“Isn't this enough for today?” I begged.

“No, sit down and listen. You know well enough that psychoanalysis . . .”

I lowered my head and opened my arms.

“But Doctor, whatever could I possibly know about it? I'm an uneducated man. You've heard my life story ten times over. I never really went to school. My father never demanded anything of me. He never forced me to go to school.”

I suddenly stopped. I was giving myself away again. I was yet again speaking unfavorably of my father. I tried to change the topic.

“All I know is a bit of this and that about watches and clocks, nothing more!”

Of course once I mentioned clocks, the Blessed One and my supposed second father, the late Nuri Efendi, came to mind, and I went quiet. This father complex was a terrible thing. It could stop you from speaking at all.

Thank God, Dr. Ramiz wasn't listening. He never really did.

“Yes, I know all this . . . I'm aware. But you mustn't worry. Do you think anything would be different if you had completed your studies? If you do not understand psychoanalysis, then everything is . . .”

He thought for a moment, opened his briefcase, and took out his cigarettes. He offered me one and then lit his own before locking the pack back in his briefcase.

Why doesn't he keep them in his pocket? I thought angrily. Then I felt angry with myself. I had contracted the most ridiculous disease in the world, and here I was worrying about other people.

Dr. Ramiz looked at me with something akin to compassion.

“Best would be to start from the beginning. I will teach you the basics. Psychoanalysis—”

“Have mercy, gracious no! Fire! Anything but psychoanalysis . . .”

My first lesson continued until nightfall. Before he left he gave me one of his conference papers published in German. That night, as I lay on my bedroll, I began mulling over everything that had befallen me. It was nearing the end of the second week, and still there was no sign of a report. And even worse, I'd seemingly just enrolled in a course on psychoanalysis. I picked up the publication; it was written in that horrible language, German. But had it been composed in my dear native tongue, what would I have understood? I tucked it under my pillow, thinking the subject matter might be revealed to me in a dream.

The following day I was informed I had a visitor. It was Emine. Her face was even paler than before, and her cheeks were drawn. She looked at me hopefully, but she could hardly hold back her tears. I tried to seem cheerful so as to offer some consolation.