Hotel Bosphorus Read Online Free PDF Page A

probably equal to six months’ rent for my place, but the hotel was worth every penny. Can a hotel room make a person
happy? Well, this one could. I dragged Petra inside, shut the door and was engulfed by a wave of indescribable happiness.
    We called room service, ordered some wine and cheese, and settled ourselves on the balcony where we could hear soul music coming from the hotel’s famous jazz bar. I had no complaints about my life, and Petra was in good spirits. I became talkative and told her about my past love affairs and what I had been doing with my life.
    I talked first. Then it was her turn.
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    By the time I’d reached a state where I could no longer listen to what Petra was telling me, it was long after dawn. I’d consumed far too much alcohol in an attempt to fortify myself against the misery my friend had suffered. We left the hotel and walked in silence as far as Dolmabahçe. The early-morning coolness made me feel better, even if it didn’t quite bring me back to reality. We went to the stand-up café next to Dolmabahçe Palace where, along with other drunks, we drank tarry tea to obliterate the feeling of helplessness and those turbid nightmares of the past…
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    It was almost noon when I returned home. I had a long shower and went to bed, where I tossed and turned at length before going to sleep. The moment I was alone, Petra’s words overwhelmed me all over again. What she had gone through was very real and very scary. Something seemed to have changed in me, as if an innocent part of me had been corrupted. And this corruption seemed to have been chiselled into my heart. I was still a small child when I first learned how other people’s personal
tragedies could affect you and destroy your belief in human nature. Even if you had not yet had any personal experience that might be termed true tragedy… Still…
    My sleep was interrupted by the phone that kept ringing and the nightmares that kept appearing. When I finally decided to get up, I felt more tired than ever. As Petra’s words went round and round in my head, everything started to seem even worse than the previous night. I didn’t think I could spend an evening and night alone at home, so I jumped into the car to see Lale, which is what I did whenever something painful happened to me.
    When I opened my eyes the next morning, Lale had long since left for her beloved work. However, it was still so early that normal people, even civil servants, had not so much as thrown back their duvets. I called Pelin at home, waking her to say I wouldn’t be at the shop until the afternoon. I wanted to collect my thoughts and decided I’d feel better if I strolled around the streets for a bit or went to a comedy film. In the end, I could do neither. I had to see Petra. It would help just to sit at the edge of the film set. The only way I could escape this distress, this nightmare, was to be with Petra and see how she dealt with it. That was the best solution I could think of.
    My heart seemed to have been replaced by an enormous hole that was draining away my feelings. I wanted to cry, but couldn’t. I wanted to talk to Lale, yet the previous night I’d been unable to say anything. I’d spent the whole evening staring vacantly at the TV. Thanks to the sleeping pills Lale recommended, I’d managed to sleep a couple of hours, but no more. Now, at the crack of dawn, I was sitting in the garden with a
coffee cup in my hand wondering how I’d get through the endless hours ahead of me.
    At about eight o’clock, I decided to give Petra a call. I thought she must be awake because they were filming that day. In any case, Petra was not the type to sleep until noon. For many people, discipline and success go hand in hand, whereas people like me flounder around in the muddy waters of life without managing either.
    The phone in Petra’s room was answered by a male voice speaking in Turkish.