Black Milk Part 3

And that is how they remained . . . apart.

Outside on the street, behind the half-drawn curtains, the wind speeds up, rustling the leaves of the acacia trees through the slanted evening light. Simultaneously, time speeds up. It now flows so fast that I feel a surge of panic as though I'm late for something, but what exactly, I don't know. How old am I? Thirty-five. Numbers start to go up like the spinning digits on a gas pump. Thirty-six, thirty-seven, thirty-eight, thirty-nine . . . How many more years can I postpone the decision to have children? The clock on the wall, the clock inside my head, the clock in my heart, the clock in my uterus, they are all ticking at once. Suddenly I undergo a strange emotion-as if all these clocks were set to go off at the same time: now.

It is precisely then that the mini women inside me begin to bang against the walls of my chest. They all want to get out. They all want an urgent meeting.

Doing my best to look confident and collected, I jump to my feet. "I am sorry, may I use the restroom?"

"Sure, it is up there to the left," says Ms. Agaoglu, scrutinizing my face with those dark brown eyes of hers.

But I have no time or wish to explain. I dash to the bathroom, lock the door behind me and turn on the faucet to scalding water so that Ms. Agaoglu doesn't hear me talking to myself.

"Okay, you can come out now," I whisper.

Dead silence. On the counter in front of me there is an aromatic candle that smells of green apples. I watch its flame bob with the draft of my movements.

"h.e.l.lo? Come out already!" I know I am yelling but I cannot help it.

That is when a liquid voice drenched with lethargy responds, "Oh, stop shouting like you have a stomachache, will you?"

I wonder which one of them she is, but prefer not to ask.

"Why aren't you coming out? I thought you wanted to have an urgent meeting. Because of you, I've locked myself in the toilet in a house where I am only a guest."

"We had wanted to meet, but then we realized it was dinnertime. Everyone went home to grab a bite, so we can't come outside just now."

"Oh, great!"

"Don't be cranky. I'll tell you what, why don't you get yourself down here, dear?"

Unlike Alice in Wonderland, I do not need to drink some magic potion and shrink to thumb size in order to travel to another realm, because it is not my body but my consciousness that is doing the traveling. I can take on any shape I want and still have no shape at all. Knowing this, I take a deep breath, grab a candle and start descending the mossy stairs to the dungeons of my soul.

It is time to have a serious talk with my four finger-sized women.

The Harem Within It is dark and foggy down here. With its labyrinthine alleys and secret pa.s.sages, my soul is a perfect setting for a gothic novel or a vampire movie. As I look left and right, I realize that I am completely disoriented. So many times I have walked these cul-de-sacs and dimly lit side streets, and yet I still get lost.

Far ahead there is a crossroads from which four separate paths spill. Blinking repeatedly, I lift the candle up to eye level and peer into the thick, uninviting fog. Which way should I go? I try to think of a giant, round machine, something between a compa.s.s and a wheel of fortune. This is a mental exercise I visualize when I am indecisive, although I am not sure if it really helps. In my mind's eye, I spin the wheel as fast as I can until it slows down and comes to a stop at the letter W. I quickly determine that this means West, and dutifully head in that direction.

There, in a city as neatly organized as Brussels, in a chic and modern flat furnished minimalist style, lives Little Miss Practical. She is the side of me who has great common sense and even greater pragmatism. I press her doorbell and, upon being screened by a camera, hear a buzzer that lets me inside. She is sitting at her desk, looking sprightly and sporty. On the plate in front of her is a sandwich of goat cheese and smoked turkey on wheat bread. Beside the plate is a thimbleful of Diet c.o.ke. She has been watching her weight for as long as I can remember.

She is four and a half inches tall and weighs barely thirteen ounces. She wears casual, comfortable clothing: a breezy beige s.h.i.+rt, red boneframed gla.s.ses and a pair of brown linen pants with lots of pockets to keep everything at hand. On her feet are leather sandals; her dark blond hair is cut short so that it doesn't need extra styling. Was.h.i.+ng (shampoo and conditioner all in one) is good enough. Drying her hair would be one step too many.

"Yolla, Big Self," she says cheerfully. "What happened to you? You look awful."

"Yeah, thanks," I grumble.

"What's up, yo?" she asks. For some reason beyond my comprehension, she loves speaking in rapid-fire sentences peppered with slang, sounding like a street kid by way of Tucson.

"Oh, Little Miss Practical, you've got to help me," I say.

"Nema problema! Help is on the way."

"Did you hear the question Ms. Agaoglu asked me? I don't know how to answer. Is it possible to be a good mother and good writer at the same time? Do I want to have kids? If not, why not? If so, when, why, how?"

"Hey, be easy, Sis," she says as she pats her mouth dry with a napkin. "Don't sweat the small stuff. One can be a writer and a mama, why not? All you need to do is to trust me."

"Really?"

"Yup. Here's what we'll do. We'll split your time into two chunks: writing time and nursing time." She pauses with an impish smile, measuring my reaction. "That means you'll have to start wearing a watch."

"You know I never wear a watch," I say. "Watches, the color white and wasabi . . . The three Ws I'd rather stay away from."

"Well, there's a W word you might welcome," she says mysteriously. "Because it happens to be the answer to your problem."

"What is it?"

"Winnowing!"

Seeing me draw a blank, she laughs. "Separating the grain from the chaff," she remarks. "That's exactly what you need to do."

Again I look vacantly: Again she smiles with confidence as if she has the pulse of the world under her finger.

"Think of it this way, Sis. The human brain is like a set of kitchen drawers. The cutlery is placed in one drawer. The napkins in another. And so on. Use the same model. When you are nursing, open the 'motherhood' section. When you are writing, pop open the 'novelist' one. Simple. Close one drawer, use the other. No confusion. No contradictions. No fretting. All thanks to winnowing."

"Wow, that's splendid, but there is a small detail you left out: While I'm writing, who will take care of the baby?"

"As if that's a problem," she says with a snort. "h.e.l.lo. The age of globalization is here. Snap your fingers. You can find a nanny. Filipino, Moldavian, Bulgarian . . . You can even choose her nationality."

Little Miss Practical thrusts her hand into one of her pockets and produces a paper. "Look, I've made a list of all the information you'll need. Phone numbers of the nanny agencies, babysitters, nursery schools, pediatricians. You should also get an a.s.sistant to answer your e-mails. It'll make life easier. And if you get a secretary and a tape recorder, you can stop writing altogether, ya' mean?"

With a heavy heart I ask, "What do you mean?"

"I mean, instead of writing your novels, you can speak them. The recorder will tape your voice. Later, your secretary can type up the whole text. Isn't it practical? That way you can finish a novel without having to leave the kid."

"Just curious," I say as calmly as I can manage. "How exactly am I going to afford a nanny, an a.s.sistant and a secretary?"

"Oh, you're being so negative," she says. "Here I'm offering practical solutions for material problems and you see only the downside."

"But money is a material problem," I object, my voice cracking. For a brief moment neither of us says a word, mutually frowning and sulking.

"Besides, even if I had the money," I say, "I still couldn't do what you suggest. It goes against my sense of equality and freedom. I can't have all those people working for me, as if I were a raja or something."

"Now you're talking nonsense," snaps Little Miss Practical. "Don't you know that every successful female writer is a raja?"

"How can you say that?"

"How can you deny that?" she asks back. "Remember that wolf woman you adore so much."

Just when I am about to ask what wolf woman she is talking about, it dawns on me that she is referring to Virginia Woolf.

"Do you think that lady of yours had only a room of her own? No way. She also had a cook of her own, a maid of her own and a gardener of her own, not to mention a butler of her own! Her diaries are full of complaints about her many servants."

Laden with curiosity I ask, "Since when do you read about the lives of novelists?"

Little Miss Practical's readings are based solely on two key criteria: efficiency and functionality. How to Win Friends and Hearts, The Key to Unwavering Success, Ten Steps to Power, The Art of Knowing People, Awaken the Millionaire Inside, The Secret to Good Life . . . She gobbles up self-help books like popcorn, but never reads novels. Fiction, in her eyes, has no function.

"If it's useful, I'll read it," she says defensively.

"And what is the use of the wolf woman?"

She turns a disparaging dark gaze on me. "That lady of yours used to write orders to her servants on sc.r.a.ps of paper. What ch.o.r.es needed to be done, what dishes needed to be prepared, which dresses needed was.h.i.+ng . . . She would write them down. Can you imagine? They lived under the same roofbut instead of talking to them, she wrote to them. . . ."

"Well, we don't know her side of the story," I say meekly.

"Everything was her side of the story. She was the writer, Sis!"

I don't feel like quarreling. With a ruler in her hand, a calculator in her pocket and plans in her head, Little Miss Practical is used to measuring, calculating and planning everything. I take the list she has prepared for me and leave in a hurry, still feeling uneasy.

I spin the wheel again. It stops at letter E. This time, I walk east.

There, in a city as spiritual as Mount Athos, beyond a wooden door, sits Dame Dervish-her head bowed in contemplation, her fingers moving the amber prayer beads. On the tray in front of her there is a bowl of lentil soup and a slice of bread. Her thimble is full of water. She always makes do with little. On her head is a loosely tied turban that comes together in the front with a large stone. Patches of hair show from beneath the turban. She wears a jade dress that reaches the floor, a dark green vest and khaki slippers.

Seeing she is in the midst of a prayer, I sneak in and listen.

"G.o.d, Pure Love and Beauty, may we be of those who chant Your name and find restoration in You. Don't let us spend our time on Earth with eyes veiled, ears deafened and hearts sealed to love."

I smile at these words and I am still smiling when I hear her next words.

"Please open Elif's third eye to Love and broaden her capacity to grasp the Truth. Connections are the essence of Your universe; please don't deprive her of Your loving connection."

"Amen to that," I say.

She flinches as she surfaces from her thoughts. When she sees me standing there she breaks into a smile, lifting her hand to her left breast in greeting.

"I need your help," I say. "Have you heard the question Ms. Agaoglu asked me? I don't know how to answer it."

"I heard it indeed and I don't know why you panic so. G.o.d says He sometimes puts us through a 'beautiful test.' That is what He calls the many quandaries we face in this life. A beautiful test. There is no need to rush for 'the answer' because all answers are relative. What is right for one person may be wrong for another. Instead of asking general questions about motherhood and writing, ask G.o.d to give you what is good for you."

"But how am I supposed to know what is good for me?"

She ignores my question. "Whether you have children, write books, sell pastries on the street or sign million-dollar business contracts, what matters is to be happy and fulfilled inside. Are you?"

"I don't know," I say.

Dame Dervish takes a deep breath. "Then let me ask you another question. Are these novels of yours really yours? Are you the creator of them?"

"Of course they are mine. I create them page by page."

"Rumi wrote more than eighty thousand splendid verses and yet he never called himself a creator. Nor did he see himself as a poet. He said he was only an instrument, a channel for G.o.d's creativity."

"I am not Rumi," I say, a bit more harshly than I intended.

Our eyes meet for a second and I look away, uneasy. I don't want to confer the authors.h.i.+p of my books to another, even if it be G.o.d.

"Let me tell you a story," Dame Dervish says. "One night, a group of moths gathered on a shelf watching a burning candle. Puzzled by the nature of the light, they sent one of their members to go and check on it. The scouting moth circled the candle several times and came back with a description: The light was bright. Then a second moth went to examine it. He, too, came back with an observation: The light was hot. Finally a third moth volunteered to go. When he approached the candle he didn't stop like his friends had done, but flew straight into the flame. He was consumed there and then, and only he understood the nature of the light."

"You want me to kill myself?" I ask, alarmed.

"No, my dear. I want you to kill your ego."

"Same thing, isn't it?"

Dame Dervish sighs and tries again. "I want you to stop thinking. Stop examining, stop a.n.a.lyzing and start living the experience. Only then will you know how being a mother and being a writer can be balanced."

"Yes, but what if . . ."

"No more what-ifs are needed," she says. "Did the moth say 'what if'?"

"Okay, I am not Rumi, I am not a moth. I am a human being with a mind and four mini women residing inside me. Surely my way of dealing with things is more complicated."

"Uh-huh," says Dame Dervish, chewing her bread.

It is the kind of "uh-huh" that can mean only, "You aren't ready yet. Like a fruit that needs more time to ripen, you are still hard on the inside. Go and cook a little, then we'll talk again."

Shuffling my feet, I take my leave and walk toward the south.

There, in a city as crowded as Tokyo, behind a thrice-bolted door, is the relentless workaholic Miss Ambitious Chekhovian. Four and a half inches in height, ten and a half ounces in weight, she is the skinniest of all the finger-women. She is always eating away at herself, so naturally she doesn't gain any weight.

"Time is not money, time is everything," she is fond of saying.

In order not to lose time, instead of cooking supper and setting a table she munches on crackers and chips and takes a lot of vitamins as supplements. Even now, there is a pack of biscuits, tiny cubes of cheese and a minuscule box of orange-carrot juice in front of her. There is also a vitamin C tablet and a gingko biloba pill beside her plate. This is her dinner.

Of all the statements made by men and women since time immemorial, there is one by Chekhov that she has taken up as her life's motto: "He who desires nothing, hopes for nothing, and is afraid of nothing, cannot be an artist." That is why she is a good Chekhovian. She desires, hopes and fears, all abundantly and all at the same time.

Today, Miss Ambitious Chekhovian is wearing an indigo skirt that reaches just below her knees, two strands of pearls around her neck and a matching jacket with an ivory silk blouse inside. She has a tiny bit of foundation on her snow-white skin and is wearing dark red lipstick. Her chestnut hair is held back in a bun so tight that not a single strand of hair manages to get loose.

Every inch of her is groomed, clipped and buffed, as always. Her porcelain teeth gleam in their straight rows like expensive pearls. She is determined, resolute and hardworking-excessively so.

"Miss Ambitious Chekhovian, will you please help me," I say. "You heard what Ms. Agaoglu asked. What is your answer?"

"How can you even ask?" She frowns at me with her thinly plucked eyebrows. "Obviously, I am against you having a baby. With all that we have to do ahead of us, it is hardly time for children!"

I look at her with puppy eyes.

"But I was next to Dame Dervish a minute ago and she said that there is no point in running amok in life."

"Forget that crazy finger-woman. What does she know? What does she understand of worldly desires?" she says offhandedly. "She has lost her mind somewhere inside those prayer beads of hers."

She pops a biscuit into her mouth, then a vitamin pill, and takes a sip of juice to wash it all down. "Listen, dear, let me summarize again my philosophy of life: Did we ask to be brought into this world? Nope. No one asked our opinion on the matter. We just fell into our mothers' wombs, went through arduous births and voila, here we are. Since we came along in such an accidental manner, is there anything more sublime than our desire to leave something worthy and lasting behind when we depart the world?"