Rough Road to Happiness

"Lawrence?" Layla laughed, "There has only been one Lawrence here. Lawrence Durrell, the famous writer. I know no young man in the village called Lawrence."

When I drove my car filled with my few possessions on to the ferry on Monday afternoon, I doubted I would ever return or ever see Lawrence again. And I was devastated. More than I would have believed. And I wondered who he really was.

Two weeks later I was at a colleague's house in Istanbul for dinner, and I suddenly felt dizzy, and instead of waiting for the maid, I made my own way to the kitchen to get some water. There was a TV up on top of the fridge tuned to the local TV station, and as I passed it, I glanced up, and was even dizzier. He was there. Lawrence. In a suit and tie. I hardly recognised him. He was sitting stiffly in a chair on a small stage, his dark eyes magnetic, he mouth moving more than I had ever seen it move before, as he spoke in a language I couldn't understand properly. The other chair was occupied by the smooth, ageing Turk who was hosting the programme, Tayyip Babacan, who was interviewing Lawrence. I grabbed the maid by the arm and pulled her over, not taking my eyes from the small screen.

"Who is he, who is he? The young man in the chair on the TV?" I demanded.

She turned up the sound and watched for a few minutes. "Some guitarist. He plays the Baglama too," she added, pleased at that. "They say he is famous, from some big island. Cyprus, our side. The most famous man ever to come from there. And now he is going to Europe on tour."

"His name?" I asked.

"Baril."

"What is his family name?" I asked her, frustrated.

She shrugged, "They are not saying."

Then she twisted free of my grip, and I stood mesmerised, watching him. Knowing how his hands felt on, and inside me, wanting to feel them again and feel him filling me and mining me, for the sounds I made, telling him how good it was. Or to just have him watching me with those huge bedroom eyes of his, with their long deceptively demure lashes, as I stroked myself and he played his guitar to me.

But the maid had turned to continue with her work.

"I need to know," I said, and she half-heartedly tried to watch the TV and lay small pieces of Baklava on a large plate at the same time.

Baril moved off the small stage and to one side, where two young women and a man stood waiting. Then he sat down and took up his Baglama and began to play. The women were now smiling and joined him, singing some popular folk song. Both women were beautiful in the dark Turkish way, and I felt my heart sink as I wondered if one of them was his wife or girlfriend. Or if the man, who was rather gaunt and ugly was being fucked by him.

I had rarely had bouts of jealousy, and I was surprised by my reaction.

When the song was over, the host of the programme appeared with the group to thank them, and gave their names to the audience.

"Baril, Baril Ergun." I caught it. And it meant nothing to me.

"Baril Ergun," the maid said, "That is his name."

And then she hurried from the kitchen, carrying a large tray laden with small coffee cups and the plate of Baklava.

The programme ended, and I filled a glass with bottled water and downed it before returning to the living room.

"I have to go," I said to my host and his wife.

I explained, apologising and saying I was still not feeling right. A taxi was called, and I gave my address. But once the cab door was closed and we had moved off, I leant forward to the driver and changed our destination.

The taxi double-parked in the busy street and I looked across at the front of the television station building. It had taken over thirty minutes to get there, and I was sure he would have left already, but I paid off the taxi and sprinted across the four lanes of traffic to the footpath on the other side, outside the building. And then I hesitated and paced around before I walked in and asked if Baril Ergun and his group had left yet, hoping it hadn't been a pre-recorded show. Tayyip Babacan's show was supposed to be live, but I never believed everything I saw on TV.

The man on the reception desk didn't understand me, so I had to stand outside the building. Waiting. Sure Baril and the others must have left the studio already but unable to go until I was certain I had missed him.

***** In front of the British club café Mustafa finally released me from the embrace he had held me in and stood back, "And Baril, he will play for us tonight?" he asked.

"Yes," I replied, knowing it was expected. "He is taking our bags up to the villa in the car while I walk. He will come back for me."

He shook his head. "Ah, and why? Why was it you whom old Layla said in her will should be allowed to buy the villa? I wonder that. She had so many young men like you live there after the famous writer, that Durrell man left."

I shrugged. But I was overcome anew by gratitude to Layla for her decision, and for the warmth of the island sun, the scent of the sea and by a wave of lust for Baril Lawrence Ergun, my lover ever since that night in Istanbul when he had suddenly emerged from the glass doors of the television studio building, and we had embraced on the pavement outside.