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boat that sounds really fast and a car that goes even faster. Ceylan brought the drinks. They sat for a long time talking, glasses in hand.
    “Anyone want to listen to some music?”
    “Where are we going tonight?”
    “Hey, didn’t you say you had an Elvis album?”
    “I do. Where is that ‘Best of Elvis’?”
    It all must have been too exhausting to consider, or maybe it was the sun, but they fell silent for a while until they piped up again, but then they stopped before they spoke again and stopped once more; during that last lull, some awful music blared out from an invisible speaker and I thought it was time for me to say something.
    “This is really banal music!” I said. “In America they only listen to stuff like this in long elevator rides.”
    “Long elevator rides?”
    Yes, Ceylan, and as I spoke, I watched you looking at me pretending that you weren’t, because, yes, I probably believed I was in love now, so though I was embarrassed, I explained it to you, Ceylan. I said how important to the lives of New Yorkers these elevator rides were, how the Empire State Building was exactly twelve hundred and fifty feet and one hundred two stories high, and how there was a fifty-mile view from it, but I didn’t mention that I hadn’t been to New York and seen that view yet, only that according to the 1957 edition of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica
in our school library the population of the city was 7,891,957, while, according to the same edition, it had been 7,454,995 in 1940.
    “Ugh!” said Fafa. “You memorized it like a little brownnoser?”
    When you laughed at her, too, Ceylan, I had to prove that I wasn’t somebody who memorized things just to brownnose, and so to give an idea how smart I am, I announced that, for example, I could multiply any pair of two-digit numbers in my head.
    “Yes,” said Vedat. “This guy has an awesome brain, the whole school knows it!”
    “Seventeen times nineteen?” said Ceylan.
    “Eight hundred thirty-three!” I said.
    “Seventy times fourteen?”
    “One thousand eight!”
    “How do we know it’s right?” said Ceylan.
    I was excited, but I just smiled at her.
    “I’m getting a pen and paper,” said Ceylan.
    Because you couldn’t stand that irritating smile on my face, Ceylan, you jumped up from your seat and ran inside among that awful furniture returning a little later with a notepad from some Swiss hotel and a silver fountain pen and an angry look on your face.
    “Thirty-three times twenty-seven equals?” “Eight hundred ninety-one.” “Seventeen times twenty-seven equals?” “Five hundred thirteen.” “Eighty-one times seventy-nine equals?” “Six thousand three hundred thirty-nine!” “Seventeen times nineteen equals?” “Three hundred twenty-three!” “No, three hundred seventy-three!” “Please multiply it again, Ceylan,” “Okay, three hundred twenty-three!” “Ninety-nine times ninety-nine equals?” “That’s the easiest: nine thousand eight hundred one!”
    “You really memorized them all, like a brownnoser!”
    I just smiled and thought how those cheesy books that say all love begins as hatred were right.
    Afterward, Ceylan went waterskiing on Fikret’s boat, and I immersed myself in thought about the phenomenon of competition, realizing right away that I would probably be at it until the middle of the night, because Goddamn it: I believed I was in love now.

6

Recep Serves Breakfast

    I woke up, put on my jacket and tie, and went outside. It was a beautiful morning, still and bright! There were crows and sparrows in the trees. I looked at the shutters, all shut; they were still sleeping, they got to bed late last night. Faruk Bey drank, and Nilgün watched him. Madam shouted something from upstairs once in a while. I hadn’t even heard Metin come in. I worked the pump slowly, not to disturb them by its creaking; I splashed the cold morning water on my face, then I went inside, slicing myself two pieces of bread in the