OBLIVIOUS KILLER

                                                 OBLIVIOUS KILLER

He seemed suspicious and even worse, he didn’t want to hide his suspicion at all. In his blinking eyes, I saw a hungry hunter hiding among the trees, waiting for the weak moment of his prey.

“So you are saying that you opened the door and found this dead body here, right? And you want me to believe this story?”

His hand was on my left shoulder. It was clear that this wasn’t a friendly approach but still I have no choice other than playing the game with his rules.

“Yes, officer. That is exactly what has happened. Actually I should not have said that I found her. As you see, I mean you know better than me as a professional crime solver but… She came to my door so shouldn’t we say she found me. As soon as I saw her I called 155. I swear!”

I saw the tiny movement on his lips and the weak light emitting from his eyes. His sarcasm was wordless but powerful, something that I cannot dig into.  

“And you don’t know this woman, right?”

“Exactly. I have never seen her in my entire life. Actually when I first saw her I thought she might be the woman I met a few years ago at a picnic but when I looked carefully my hesitation has gone away. No, she is not her. I am very certain.”

He stepped back, removed his hand from my shoulder. He seemed like a losing boxer who believes that the game is not over yet. There is a long way to go and this is just the beginning. I took a long breath and he did the same thing, perhaps as a retaliation.

“You don’t know her so why is she here? And she is dead! Do you know what this means? Dead! Someone killed her or she killed herself. Are you sure she is not one of your ex-girlfriends? This is usually what we end up with when we deal with a dead woman. Please look at her carefully. She has been dead for at least eight hours. Her face is pale, her body is stiff and but still she did not change that much. Look closer, she can remind you someone you knew in the past.”

“No, officer; what girlfriend, what ex do you talk about? I have never had a girlfriend in my life. At least not that I can recall.”

I was trying to be sincere, knowing that sincerity may not work when having a conversation with a police officer. However, I have nothing to hide and being sincere is the only choice I got.

“What do you mean? You never loved anyone? How old are you? You look at least 40 to me.”

“No, I don’t mean that. I might have loved or might not have loved! Maybe I fell in love but I did not realize I was in love. You know it happens sometimes.”

“What the hell are you talking about? Did you or didn’t you fall in love in the past? Stop giving confusing answers. It is a very straightforward question and deserves a straightforward answer.”

I sensed some anger in his voice, regardless of the fact that he was trying to hide his emotion. This gave me some courage as if I might be winning this silly war of words. Innoncence come with price, especially when one has to prove it.

“I loved… I don’t know how I should say… Maybe I loved, maybe I did not. Do you understand what I mean? Certain things in my head cannot reach my tongue. It becomes tangled, you know? My heart and my mind speak different languages. I sometimes have difficulty to find a midway between them.”

“I think the problem is in your head, not in your tongue. Hurry up please! The forensic team finished their work and will take the body away soon. Give me some clue that I can work on. Something that you know about this woman. There is no one living on this floor other than you”

“But officer, I cannot say anything certain. I am not sure of… Let me explain again. I am a person who believes that neither my words nor my actions can affect anyone in this world. All my life I thought I am useless and nobody cared about me. I cannot say further than this. What else do you want me to say?”

“Say it brother, say it! Continue speaking. If not a few words now, you will learn how to sing in the police station anyway!”

At this moment I realized that he was clueless and he was ready to do what clueless people do when they have no other options: take risk and be cruel. I had to act better, perhaps play a bit down and make him understand that I have nothing to do with the murder case –assuming there is a murder-.

“Po po police station? Why? Why do I have to go to the police station? How am I related to this dead woman? I opened my door like in any other morning and I found this unknown lady at the threshold. It seems she looked for a place to die and finally found my door. You don’t even know why and how she died. If a woman falls on my car while I am driving on the highway, does this make me a criminal? In what way are these two different from each other?”

I was defending myself more than I needed. He threatens me with taking me to the police station. I might be naive or indifferent to the events around, but I know what it means to go to the police station in this country. Their job is to find the criminal and charge him with the crime. When they cannot find the right person they appropriate the evidences such that they can blame anyone. Once the stain sticks to your skin, it will never come off.

“To find her here won’t make you a criminal but it definitely makes you the main suspect. Now, please stop speakig nonsense and answer my question. Can this woman be one of your ex-lovers?”

“No, officer! I already told you. I have never had a romantic relationship in my life. Not in the past, not at the present and it seems not in the future either. What I mean is I…”

He sighed. The sigh of wasting time, of encountering a hard shell, of falling into a vicious cycle…

“We talked, talked, talked and came to the same point. Stop being so childish. Confess whatever you know. Captain will come soon. If he sees me I got nothing from you for all this time he will first get disappointed and then angry and aggressive. So speak now or you will regret later.”

“Officer, you need to understand me! I have never seen myself as a man who deserves to be loved. I mean I cannot imagine a woman who would fall in love with me. This is what I want to say. Why would she do that? Look at me? My nose looks like the fat end of an eggplant, my ears are so large that even my mother used to call them satellite dishes, look at my eyes, what do you see other than two popping balls? If a woman loves me all I can say is she pities me. She lies to me so that I will not feel sad about myself. Thinking about it more thoroughly, if I was a woman I wouldn’t get close to me.”

“Get close to who”

He looked bewildered for a second. Perhaps his mind was at somewhere else. His eye balls kept rolling like loose cannons, trying to hit something worthed.   

“I mean if I was a woman… I the woman wouldn’t get close to the I the man! Do you understand?”

“You speak nonsense again. Ok, I got it. You are not a model but I am sure there is a woman out there who will find you attractive. You are not particularly ugly and not all women are Angelina Jolie. You know this, right? Perhaps you have some secret admirers. Just because you speak absurd like this none of them approaches you. Maybe there are some nice ladies out there who like you but because of your constant indecisive mode they keep distance from you. Maybe if you stop being hesitant, they will come closer. Don’t you think it is possible?

“Don’t joke with me, officer. Who and why would someone admire me? You see, you also started looking down on me. This talk, the way you generalize things, the way you want to change my mind… All signify one thing. You too, pity me and try to help me by matching me with someone. Who am I? Why would someone care for me? I know my position in this society as much as I knew my place in my family. Look at the face of the deceased woman. She is very beautiful. What can she gain by being around a guy like me? I know myself or I think I know myself. I mean most of the times…”

He scratched his head, shrugged his shoulders and sighed again. Maybe I was doing the right thing. I will wear him off and once he gets tired he will be gone without me.

“I have seen many men before but never seen an indecisive guy like you. You neither know what you know nor know what you don’t know. Perhaps the woman who wanted to get close to you ran away after seeing all this ambiguous logic and low self-esteem that you have put around yourself. You created it to look down on others and disguised it in other way around, in the name of being humble. Look, one of these poor women is lying on the floor. Most probably because of you.”

“When you said ambiguous, do you mean the word coming from the root “ambigere?”

“Shut up, you idiot! That’s enough! Give me your wrists?”

He shouted at me first time, losing his temper and losing his patience. What about me? What was I losing? My freedom?

“Wrists? My wrists? Why?”

“I will put a bracelet on them. Ha ha ha, give me your wrists now. Hurry up!”

I showed him my hands, extending my arms towards him. There were other policemen behind so there was no way of running away.

“Are you arresting me?”

“I have no authority to arrest you. All I can do is to take you into the custody.”

“But, but, what did I do?”

“I don’t know. What I know is if I take you into the custody there will not be another dead woman at your door tomorrow morning. This is what I am sure of ad enough as a reason for taking you.”

                                                                 

                                                        Written on April 4th 2017

                                                        Translated on April 11th 2017