The Gaze

by Elif Shafak

  Love is a corset. The day will come when, in the least expected place, at the least expected moment, one of the clasps will burst, or its threads will unravel. Before there’s even time to understand what’s happened, the fat will have long since come out into the open. In the midst of this confusion, your body returns to its former state in the blink of an eye. Love is a corset. In order to understand why it lasts such a short time you have to be exceedingly fat.

  Because something will always happen to spoil the fun. An unravelled thread, for instance, that gets caught in the front door of the building, or that can’t be completely removed from the article of clothing it belongs to. Like a hole that causes a balloon to leak, or the sudden cessation of continuity, or not turning at the corner…or an unhealed wound, or an unrealised dream, or a stain in one’s pupil, or a crack in the plate…or an uncompleted task, or an unformed substance, or an unfinished story…some things are always lacking something. However much we vomit out, at least one mouthful of the cake we’ve eaten will remain in the seclusion of our stomachs; like a weight that clings to our ankles and won’t allow us to levitate, no matter how much we inflate ourselves and no matter how many jugs of milk we drink. And no matter how clean we might be, every cleaning of the eyes leaves some dust hidden under the carpet; a memory we can’t forget or cause to be forgotten. There’s always something left over. There’s always something lacking.

  theatrum mundi: According to this belief, the world is a huge theatre with a single spectator.

  I could have followed B-C. Because he was unique, because it was worth not breaking it off with him, and not being stubborn about his absence. I could have chased the giant rhythm of his dwarf heart through the streets. Because he’s much more agile than I am, who knows how long I could have followed his trail; or…

  …I could have decided not to follow B-C. I could have gone far from here, never to see him or to be seen by him, and remain forever unprocessed material for the Dictionary of Gazes; down the steep hill to hell, with the heaven of the Hayalifener Apartments at the top.

  But now I…

  ultrason (ultrasound): Babies captured on ultrasound will later have their every movement watched carefully.

  …was going to do something else. Because I was hungry!

  I was so hungry it was as if I’d always been left hungry. As if I hadn’t been stuffing myself all my life. I was a big lie, a huge denial. I was a failure. No matter how I tried, I simply couldn’t lose weight, I can’t be free of the pincers of my body. I was stuck. I couldn’t stop thinking about my fatness for a moment. I was alone. I’d become closed within myself, afraid to look within. I was apprehensive. I was apprehensive about everything, but mostly about myself. I was angry. I couldn’t control my nerves when people watched me in order to add colour to their lives or to have something to talk about. I was restless. I was bruised by tossing and turning in bed as if my dream was a river. I was unhappy. Like my stomach, my unhappiness grew the more it was fed. Of course it was possible to exist outside of these things; but I wasn’t there. Now I am in the belly of hunger.

  I’d never been this hungry before.

  I opened my mouth wide. I opened my mouth so wide that the hydrosphere was afraid I would drink up all the water and finish it; it decided to sacrifice all of its fish on the wet, mother-of-pearl alter in order to appease my hunger. I ate all of its fish. Before long, I shouted angrily from the top of a mountain of fish bones, ‘Where are your oysters pregnant with pearls, your sluggish octopuses, your hideous monsters, your sweet, sweet starfish, your treacherous whirlpools, your sunken ships full of hidden treasure?’

  The hydrosphere hurriedly placed a whale stew in front of me.

  I opened my mouth wide. I opened my mouth so wide that the earth feared my teeth would sink into its core; the fruit of all the trees came to me quickly on a command from underground. I finished all the fruit. Then, from the bottom of a hole caused by ripping trees out by their roots, I cried angrily, ‘Is this the extent of your generosity?’ It anxiously covered up the mole hills. I paid no attention. ‘How about the mushrooms that don’t even know that they are poisonous, your fat and delicious rocks, your wirehaired maize, your bountiful fields, your missing buried chests; your hilarious landslides…where are they?’

  The earth hurriedly placed a vegetable garden in front of me.

  I couldn’t eat my fill. My mouth didn’t close. As one corner of my lips collected drop after drop of water, the other corner collected balls and balls of dirt. Neither water nor dirt could satisfy my hunger. I saw that it wouldn’t work, so I decided to try air.

  I turned on the gas.

  I didn’t know why I did this, I wasn’t aware of what I was doing. Nor of what might happen. Until now, whenever I was seized by an eating crisis, I had eaten whatever I found without thinking, and didn’t look for taste in what I ate. If I looked for taste could I be called a glutton? Again, I did what I always did. Now the hydrosphere and the earth must have heaved a sight of relief, seeing that I had turned my attention to the atmosphere. The gas started filling me. I felt myself being inflated. My brain was being numbed. As my brain was numbed, what I knew was being erased, and the numbers were decreasing. As the numbers decreased, ounce after ounce of weight was lifted from me. I was getting light-ter. Time was going backwards. And it wasn’t obliged to continue flowing in a straight line from yesterday to today. When time lurched backwards, a person realised that somehow everything could have been different.

  Everything could have worked out differently. That means every story can be told differently.

  Of course if it hadn’t been necessary to see everything, if it had been delivered at the beginning…

  ‘TWO!’

  1868 — France

  One night, for no reason, Madame de Marelle told her husband she wanted to redecorate the mansion. She got to work right away. Every morning she walked from room to room with maids following her, rearranging some of the furniture, and having the rest removed to make way for new furniture. One day, she entered an unused room in the attic. There, at the bottom of a chest, she found a rather large box. A relief in the shape of an eye glittered on the lid of the box. The box was locked and it seemed the key was missing.

  ‘What’s in here?’ she asked as she fiddled with the lock.

  ‘There is a picture, ma’am,’ the eldest of the maids said. ‘Just a picture.’

  ‘A picture, ma’am,’ said the eldest of the maids. ‘Just a picture.’

  ‘Fine, where’s the key?’

  At the same moment, she thought of how to open the lock. She took out the long hair-clip she always used to fasten her hair. Her hair fell over on her shoulders. She began trying to pry open the lock with the sharp end of the hair-clip. But the old servant seemed to be disturbed by this. ‘Don’t take it out of the box’ she whispered. ‘According to the villagers, the young man in the picture is so beautiful, everyone who sees him suffers. Particularly…virgins in particular loose their heads over him.’

  Madame de Marelle hesitated. She felt that she could get the lock open if she tried a bit more. She was curious about this young man and his famous beauty. She wanted to see. She stood silent for a moment, holding her hair-clip. As the old maid watched her anxiously to try to see what she was going to do, she stood looking at the box as if she was spellbound. Then, suddenly, whatever it was that passed through her mind, she let go of the box. She’d changed her mind about opening the box. She already had too much else to do, and didn’t want to linger in that unpleasant room.

  Then take it out of my sight,’ she said, gathering up her hair and rearranging it into the bun she always wore. When she finished arranging her hair, she left the room wearing a stern expression on her face.

  ‘You’re right, ma’am. It’s not always necessary to see everything. Some things should remain kept out of sight!’ murmured the old servant behind her. She seemed reassured.

  In time, Madame de Marelle forgot this incident. She wa
s never curious about the figure of this young man who turned heads and caused suffering, and she never saw it. She gave birth to rusty-haired coloured children. She raised rusty-haired children. As the new names echoed through the mansion, and the branches of the family tree grew heavier, the name La Belle Annabelle was never encountered.

  If Madame de Marelle had insisted on seeing what she shouldn’t see, this sin would in the future result in Annabelle being surrounded by people who wanted to see her terrible beauty. But because the box had never been opened, nothing like this happened. La Belle Annabelle was never born. There was never such a person. She didn’t exist. There was never a figure, no matter how beautiful it was, that lived simply in order to be looked at. Even the most beautiful of the beautiful, the most beautiful jinn of the poisonous yew forest had the right to remain far out of sight. Without her, the spectators in the cherry-coloured tent had no need to open their eyes wider and wider. Two never was. One number was missing.

  ‘ONE!’

  1648 — Siberia

  Timofei Ankidinov couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw that huge sable go into the basket and disappear. He left the sailor who was in danger of freezing on the sled, and started circling the basket in curiosity.

  ‘Perhaps it would be better if you didn’t look. It could be a trap for hunters. Or a Siberian curse!’ said the sailor from where he was lying. He was quite the man for groundless beliefs. He’d witnessed so much in Siberia that his mind couldn’t grasp, and he was wary of the natives of this land.

  Timofei Ankidinov hesitated. When he lifted the lid of the basket, that huge sable’s valuable fur would be his. Who knew, perhaps there were lots of sables at least as big as this one under the basket. Indeed he might even have found a way that led to Pogicha. If that was so, he’d return to his home with a fortune large enough to buy everyone. He stood there holding his dagger. As the sailor watched him anxiously to try to see what he was going to do, he was looking at the basket as if he was spellbound. But suddenly, whatever it was that went through his mind, he took a step backward. He’d changed his mind. He wasn’t going to open the basket, he wasn’t going to look inside. Indeed he already found the place spooky enough, and didn’t want to linger.

  ‘If that’s the case, let’s leave right away.’ He said. He sheathed his dagger, and went to the front of the sled.

  As they set off again the sailor whispered in a low but self-assured voice, ‘You’re right, let’s go. It’s not necessary to see everything. It’s better that some things remain well out of sight!’

  As the two men moved off into the distance, two souls were about to unite inside the basket. A while later, the basket opened of its own accord. The beardless youth emerged having taken part of the sable’s soul and having added part of his soul to the sable’s. He was now the tribe’s shaman. Until the moment of his death, whenever he remembered that day, he’d remember that, for reasons unknown to him, he’d felt a terrible fear of being seen; he would never take the talismanic power of eyes lightly. He and his descendants lived for centuries and centuries, until the despicable races that chewed up Siberia had dried up. In the family tree of the shamans, which had its roots in the sky and its branches in the ground, the name Sable-Girl never appeared.

  If Timofei Ankidinov had insisted on seeing what he shouldn’t see, this sin would in the future result in the Sable-Girl being surrounded by people who wanted to see terrible ugliness. But because he didn’t open the box, nothing like this happened. The Sable-Girl was never born. There was never anyone like that. She never existed. There was never a figure, no matter how ugly she was, who lived simply in order to be looked at. Even the ugliest of the ugly, the most wretched, plagued creature had the right to remain far out of sight. Without her, the spectators in the cherry-coloured tent had no need to close their eyes so tight. One never was. The number One was missing.

  Keramet Mumî Keşke Memiş Efendi ran up to the westward-facing door of the cherry-coloured tent. He was out of breath. He looked everywhere. The Sable-Girl wasn’t there. He stopped for a moment to try to think where she might have gone, but at the same moment a worse suspicion was aroused. He ran to the eastward-facing section of the tent. He looked everywhere, searched every corner. What he’d feared had come to pass. La Belle Annabelle was also missing.

  That day, he didn’t say anything to anyone until evening about his two most popular actresses having run off. He didn’t say anything, but in any event the truth would soon come out. And when the truth came out, he was going to have to give up this enterprise. Without the most beautiful of the beautiful and the most ugly of the ugly, it wouldn’t be possible to keep the cherry-coloured tent going for even a single day.

  Did this grieve him? No one could tell whether or not he was grieved. As always, his eyes were a curtain of mystery. But surely he wasn’t all that grieved? In any event he wasn’t going to remain in his present form. Time was endless, and space was limitless. Surely one day he would melt; he would melt, and solidify again, solidify and then melt again. In any event he would return to this world at another time, much much later but very soon, and in another place, very very far away but just here.

  In any event…one more…and one more…

  ‘ZERO!’

  1999 — Istanbul

  ‘Open the door!’

  They’re banging on the door. I have to get up and open the door but I’m too weak, much too weak. I can’t move. And it’s not as if I’ve suddenly stopped and frozen to the spot either, but I am completely motionless for perhaps the first time in my life, and can’t move. I am like gelatine. I am in a dense fog. Sometimes I close my eyes, sometimes I open them. It doesn’t make any difference either way. The eye doesn’t see here.

  ‘What are you waiting for. She’s not opening the door. Break the door down. Break it down!’

  This voice sounds familiar. It must be one of the neighbours. Which one, I wonder? What did they cook for us this time, what are they bringing us? Is it börek or is it a sweet, is it pilaff or is it dumplings…I can’t make out which of the neighbour-ladies is shouting.

  unutmak (forgetting): Cleaning the eyes.

  The door breaks with a terrible cracking sound. With the breaking of the door, an uncountable number of neighbour-ladies rush in, pushing and shoving each other and uttering bloodcurdling screams, and jump on top of me.

  At the same moment I start rising into the air.

  veda (farewell): ‘Why did you turn and look at the city that provoked God’s wrath?’ shouted Lot’s wife angrily. ‘Why did you look to see what you’d left behind? Tell me, why does a person have to turn and take a last look at what he’s leaving behind?’ But he couldn’t give his wife’s petrified lips an answer to this difficult question.

  I was so inflated with gas that I was as round as a ball. In this state I look like a huge Zero; the fattest of all numbers, the only number lighter than air. I was pleased. Since I’d counted my way to Zero, since I’d become Zero by no longer existing, I could comfortably rise into the sky and above the clouds.

  At first my feet rise only a few inches above the ground. Later I rise further, and approach the ceiling. I open and close my arms and legs as if I’m swimming. By doing this, and moving to the left and right, I’m able to shake off the neighbour-ladies’ hands. They don’t stop screaming for a moment. Struggling not to loose my balance, I approach the door to the terrace. Since my feet didn’t touch B-C’s rocking chair, I must be quite high up in the air. At that moment I see the cat. It’s looking at me from below, with all of the fur on its back standing on end. I wave to it. It hisses at me. The door to the terrace is wide open as usual. I swish through the curtains, which were blowing back and forth gently like the curtains in films about haunted houses, and go out into the open air. I’m leaving the house, in a way that I’ve never left the house before.

  vitrin (shop window): A section of glass used to display what a shop sells.

  I’m level with the roof of the Hayalifener Apart
ments now. My feet are swinging back and forth in the emptiness. I’m looking at the people climbing up the hill and the people descending the hill. I’m looking at those who slide on the ice and roll down into the flames. As I rise, I see first the hill, then the whole neighbourhood, then the entire city. And the city is completely different when you look at it from above like this. The neighbourhoods spread out fibrously like boiled chicken, the apartment buildings are layered like pastry, the people are like grains of badly cooked rice that stubbornly refuse to stick to each other. As I look at the city I realise that I’m not the least bit hungry. My stomach is so full that I suspect I might not be alive.

  From the sky I look down on the tombs of saints, the crosses on pale-faced churches, fountains in peaceful courtyards, wooden houses under whose eaves demons chat at night, street dogs who rush at strangers like thirsty jackals, the people who comb through the garbage for food. I look down on the city that collapsed under the weight of the bolts with which she blocked the door against the possibility of her heart being stolen in the nonchalance of the night, thus causing herself to become more introverted. To my eyes, the city looks like a bird’s nest made of twigs and straw. There are millions of newborn chicks in it; and they’re all so hungry. They cry out at the tops of their voices to a mother they’ve never seen because their eyes have not yet opened. The worms that are stuffed down their pink beaks only serve to stop their endless chirping for a brief moment. Every night the city is drawn to this shrewish hunger. And it is never satisfied.