Rooftops of Tehran

by Mahbod Seraji

  Doctor’s face stiffened with rage. He batted the mullah’s hand from his shoulder and turned on his heel to march out of the mosque. I hurried to follow, and heard Doctor cursing under his breath. “Fucking prick!” he spat. “He’s trying to pick up my grandma. If he even thinks about her, I’ll rip the turban from his ugly head and strangle him with it.”

  Doctor could be sentenced to many years in prison if the SAVAK—the Shah’s secret police force—catches him with his collection of government-banned books. One day, we are walking home from a bookstore when I tell him about how my father used to keep banned books in a little vault he had built in the closet.

  “When I was six years old, the SAVAK raided our house,” I say. “My mother tried to stop them from entering the yard, but they pushed her out of the way. My dad was reading in his study, but when he heard the commotion he dropped the book on the floor and ran from the room. Instinctively, I picked up the book, walked into the vault and shut the door behind me. I have no idea why, except maybe because my father used to call the vault ‘our secret’ and made me promise not to tell anyone about it.”

  The bright smile on Doctor’s face encourages me to finish the story.

  “The agents searched the house for a couple of hours, but didn’t find anything. They left empty-handed, and since then my father doesn’t keep banned books in the house.”

  “I’m glad you didn’t run out of air in there,” Doctor says in a worried tone.

  “I don’t remember it getting bad at all,” I say.

  Doctor takes his glasses off and puts a gentle hand on my shoulder, speaking softly. “Has anyone ever told you that you have That?” I must look thoroughly confused. “You’ve never heard of That?” he asks, surprised.

  I shake my head no.

  “It’s a priceless quality that’s impossible to define, really,” he explains, “but you recognize it in the actions of great people.”

  Showering friends and strangers with inflated but disingenuous compliments is a customary tradition in Iran called taarof, but looking into Doctor’s eyes, I don’t think he’s taarof-ing.

  Some great person I am, I think, as the heat of embarrassment is joined by the heat of shame climbing up my chest and neck, secretly desiring my friend’s fiancée and itching to use my new boxing skills to break the face of some bully.

  Sensing my unease, Doctor changes the topic. “You know how they caught the gang, don’t you?” he says, referring to the group of young men and women who have been arrested by the SAVAK for plotting to kill the Shah. “They were looking for illegal books in the home of one of the members and found the plans.”

  I nod, aware that for weeks now the media has been promising that a sensational trial will be broadcast live on television, the first time in our history that an event like this is being shown on TV. Most of the time the fact that the opposition even exists—the Toodeh party, the Communists, the Islamist Marxists—is denied, or those groups are referred to as kharab-kars—subversive activists, terrorists, and people who commit appalling acts in the name of politics. According to the media, Iran is a unified nation in the service of the King of the Kings: the Shahanshah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. Acknowledging the existence of political opposition is considered blasphemous by the SAVAK. One may as well deny the existence of God. So despite the arrests, the tortures, and the incessant suppression of the opposition groups, adulation of the Shah continues as if the country is a model state for democracy.

  “People say that the gang members will cry and beg for forgiveness on live television,” I add, “and then the Shah will pardon them in an orchestrated attempt to make him look like a benevolent, merciful leader.”

  I see a strange expression spring to life on Doctor’s face, almost a sneer. He shakes his head and says, “But the circus and its ringmaster may be in for a surprise.”

  In the alley, Doctor and I find Ahmed’s grandmother wandering around as if lost.

  “Have you seen my husband?” she asks, peering sweetly at us.

  Doctor and I exchange a look, knowing that her husband died two years ago.

  “No, I haven’t seen him for a while, Grandma,” Doctor says. “Is there anything we can do for you?”

  Grandma pauses to think. “It’s very strange,” she muses. “No one has seen him since we buried him a couple of years ago. Have I ever told you how my husband and I met?” Both Doctor and I have heard this story a million times, but we smile and shake our heads no. Grandma describes again how she met her husband at a party in the American embassy, and even though he was married to forty-three other women at the time, he fell in love with her and divorced all of his wives to marry her. She says he remained faithful to her until the day he died trying to save a cat from a burning house.

  “What a beautiful story, Grandma,” Doctor says. “He must really have loved you, and he certainly was a brave, compassionate man.”

  “Yes, he was a brave man,” Grandma echoes, as she shuffles away. “He was a compassionate man.”

  Doctor and I tip our chins to our chests, both aware that Ahmed’s grandfather never visited the American embassy, didn’t have forty-three wives, and definitely would not have risked his life to save a cat because he hated them passionately.

  That night a number of our family and friends come over for dinner to watch the trials with my parents and me. The house buzzes with excitement and anticipation. The alley has emptied by the time the judge’s gavel announces the start of the proceedings.

  The accused take the podium one by one, most of them confessing and begging for the Shah’s pardon. They read their testimonies from prepared documents whose words are carefully chosen to ensure that any mention of the royal family is respectful. Some of the gang members weep openly, appealing to the queen as the mother of the nation. “Help your unruly children to be forgiven,” one woman cries out. “You’re a mother, have mercy on my children.”

  I roll up my sleeves with quick, efficient jerks, then press my clenched fists to my mouth as I watch their faces on television. Each accused manages an expression of polite distress; most are clearly terrified, while others seem to have already left their bodies and the whole situation behind.

  Golesorkhi, the group’s leader, is the last to stand and testify. His name means “the red rose.” His likeable face, medium height and build, square jaw and thick mustache make him look like a young Maxim Gorky. He takes his jacket off, rolls up his sleeves with slow, deliberate thrusts, and walks to the podium.

  “This court is an illegal institution,” he yells, his fist crashing down on the podium with such force that we all jump in our seats. “The Shah is a tyrant, a servant of the Americans, and a puppet of the West.”

  My breath has caught in my throat, making it hard for me to swallow. I sit up straight and busy my hands with turning my sleeves back down, but the very air in the room seems to be carrying an electric current.

  “Is he not afraid of dying?” one of my dad’s friends murmurs. “They’ll torture him to death tonight, pull his nails from their beds with a pair of pliers, then cut off his fingers and toes one at a time.” He stops when my father fixes him with a warning look, suddenly aware that the women in the room are in tears. The judge orders Golesorkhi to be quiet, but he will not be silenced.

  “You, sir, may go to hell,” Golesorkhi says, chin high and eyes unblinking. “People, take note of what he looks like,” he shouts, addressing the whole room. “Make sure he is identified everywhere as a crony of the greatest dictator alive.”

  “It’s about time someone stood up to these bastards,” Dad whispers, careful not to look over at me. Not that he has to, because the space between his beating heart and mine feels taut, as if they’ve been tied together with a string.

  My mother is crying. “He’s so young,” she wails, “not a day over thirty. His poor parents, his poor wife!”

  Golesorkhi’s testimony is stopped abruptly by the judge and the broadcast is terminated. The screen goes black, and the
n crackles back to life with a repeat episode of an American soap opera called Peyton Place.

  I retreat to the roof without bidding our guests good night, knowing that Ahmed will spend the evening trying to soothe his family, probably making jokes and doing impressions that will soon have everyone clutching their sides with laughter.

  The night is well into morning when I finally close my book and stand up with a sigh. I had hoped that reading would take my mind off Golesorkhi’s explosive tirade, but the words on the page look foreign and I have to read every line twice to drown out his voice booming in my head. Most of the windows are dark, but I can feel that I’m not the only one who is too agitated to sleep.

  I decide a walk might calm my mind, and make my way out into the alley. I am stepping slowly and methodically, hands in my pockets, willing my thoughts to slow when the silhouette of a man crosses swiftly through the pool of yellow light cast by a streetlight ahead of me. His head is covered with a hat, and he is working quickly to glue something to the wall. He dips a brush into a small pail, then strokes a large X on the wall and slaps a large piece of paper up, moving quickly up the alley. I creep forward to look, and see a poster with a red rose at its center.

  “Golesorkhi,” I say out loud, clapping my hands over my mouth when I hear how my voice rings out.

  The man turns, startled; his face is painted black, his round glasses glittering.

  “Doctor?” I whisper, squinting.

  He freezes, and I know we’ve both stopped breathing. Reactions flash in his eyes—fear, regret, conviction, anger? After a moment that feels like a month, he runs away without answering, and I’m left with a pounding heart to add to my racing mind.

  The next morning the neighborhood wakes up to walls papered in red roses.

  “Who put these up?” everyone wants to know.

  “What does it mean?” another person asks.

  “Oh, the Red Rose,” some people say, understanding.

  “Red is the color of love,” one person tells another.

  It’s also the color of blood, I think, my heart sinking to meet a rising stomach when I consider the risk my friend has taken. If the SAVAK ever finds out that he’s responsible for this, he’ll be finished.

  Five days pass before Doctor finally comes to see me on the roof.

  “Listen, I’m going away,” he says, his eyes anxiously scanning the horizon. “I’ll be away for some time.”

  “Where’re you going?” I ask, my voice flat with frustration.

  “To a village up north by the Caspian Sea with a bunch of my college buddies.” Doctor continues quickly, “It’s no big deal, we do this every year.”

  I think back to the previous summer and know he didn’t go away then. The fact that he’s lying makes me furious. He must sense my anger because he can’t seem to get the words out of his mouth fast enough.

  “People in the villages need to be educated,” he says passionately. “We’ll be teaching the adults how to read and write. We’ll teach them about health issues. We’ll help them dig wells and show them more efficient irrigation techniques.”

  “Really?” I snap. “The government suspects people who engage in those kinds of activities.”

  His shock is plain, both at my words and the fever behind them.

  “When I come back, I plan to marry Zari,” he says, more calmly, really looking at me for the first time since he arrived. “I need to settle down. I love her so dearly.”

  The sound of Zari’s name and the poised way in which he declares his love for her jolts me. Suddenly, all my anger about his thoughtless bravery evaporates into the vast warmth of his gentle brown eyes.

  “Does she know?” I ask.

  “No,” Doctor says. “This will be our secret, okay?”

  “Okay,” I say, ignoring the sharp pain at the center of my heart.

  “After what we all saw on TV a few nights ago,” Doctor adds, referring to Golesorkhi’s trial, “I need Zari in my life.” Doctor’s eyes fill with tears. “Golesorkhi is the most compassionate man I’ve ever known, and he’ll be placed against a wall and shot to death like a common criminal.” He roughly wipes the tears from his face. “It’s time . . . ,” he begins fiercely, then stops.

  “Time for what?” I ask.

  Doctor draws in a deep breath, then smiles and asks, “What’s the most precious human commodity?”

  “Life,” I answer, without the slightest hesitation.

  He laughs good-naturedly and shakes his head. “Time,” he says. “Time is the most precious thing we possess.” He touches my shoulder and says, “It’s time to understand that we can’t waste any more time. ‘It is not the consciousness of men that determines their social being; it’s their social being that determines their consciousness.’ Do you know who said that?”

  I say Karl Marx, and he smiles again but doesn’t confirm the answer. His quote reminds me of my grandmothers, who attribute everything to God—including the most dreadful calamities—and are then unable to explain the reason behind God’s inexplicably unmerciful actions. I quickly check the blasphemous thoughts and discreetly bite the skin between my index finger and thumb. This is the gesture you’re supposed to use when you say or think something sacrilegious, so that God will forgive you rather than causing the roof to collapse on your head.

  Doctor reaches into his side pocket and takes out a book called The Gadfly. “This is for you,” he says. “It carries a sentence of at least six months, so be very careful.”

  I take the book and quickly shove it in the side pocket of my jacket. “This will become my most prized possession,” I vow, trying to hide my shame over my secret feelings for Zari, though I am sure they must be stamped on my face.

  “About the posters—” Doctor begins with his head down.

  I interrupt him. “Don’t know who put them up, but it was a nice touch.”

  He lifts his head and looks at me from the top of his round glasses. A thoughtful expression covers his face.

  “And that’s That,” he says.

  4

  Suvashun

  For reasons the adults don’t understand, kids ringing the bell and running away has become a widespread problem in our neighborhood. It happens with more frequency in the early parts of the afternoon when no one is out. Ahmed and I think that the kids are from our own alley. My mom, of course, thinks the kids in our alley are too polite to do that.

  One afternoon when my father is walking home, he sees Ahmed’s five-year-old brother standing by the door to Iraj’s house. “Hi, Aboli,” my father says with a big smile. “What’re you doing?”

  “Can you help me ring the bell to Iraj’s house?” Aboli asks innocently. “I can’t reach it.”

  My father says sure and rings the bell. The second the bell sounds, Aboli grabs my father’s hand and says, “Okay, now run!” My poor father suddenly realizes what he’s done. He lifts Aboli off his feet and starts running toward our house. Ahmed and I are sitting in my yard when Dad rushes in and shuts the door behind him, leaning back against it to catch his breath.

  “What’s the matter?” I ask, surprised by his condition.

  He looks at Aboli and begins to laugh. Then he tells us the story, which makes all of us join in the laughter. When we’ve finally stopped chuckling, my dad lifts Aboli off the ground and says, “You’re lucky you’re so cute, little buddy.”

  The next day, Iraj invents what he calls an “ingenious” device to catch the bell ringers. His gadget is comprised of a little tube connected to a small water pump. The device squirts water at the person ringing the bell. The tube is placed over the door so that it’s hidden from view. He activates the device in the early part of the afternoon in the hope of catching the culprits who ring his family’s bell at least two or three times a week. Of course, his invention never works and everyone remains dry.

  Some days I wish I had the courage to tell Ahmed about Zari. God, if Zari were only a few years younger and not engaged to Doctor, I’d tell Ah
med about her deep blue eyes, her crooked smile, and her beautiful chin and cheekbones. I’d tell him how her walk makes me crazy, that when she talks I can’t breathe and that I can’t stop thinking about her. As nauseating as the thought is, I’d drink an entire pitcher of my mother’s engine oil if I knew it would give me the courage to spill my guts to my best friend.

  I can hardly listen to Ahmed’s stories about Faheemeh anymore because I’m always thinking about Zari. I never think anything sexual about her; she’s too pure for that and I would go crazy with guilt and shame. I imagine Doctor and Zari as a happily married couple with many children, and I accept my role as a good friend in their lives. Instigating Ahmed’s revolt against Faheemeh’s family has soured the daydream for me, though. I know I can’t do what he did. First of all, Zari loves Doctor. Second, I don’t have Ahmed’s courage. Third, I just couldn’t pull something like that on a great guy like Doctor. Sometimes, however, I wonder what my relationship with Zari would be like if Doctor were not in our lives, and each time, I involuntarily and swiftly bite the skin between my thumb and index finger.

  In my mind, I live the rest of my life with a sweet secret that no one will ever know. But one evening on the roof while Ahmed is talking and I’m staring at the star-studded skies of an early summer night, I find myself interrupting him. “I want to tell you a secret,” I say.

  “Is it about you and Zari?” he asks immediately.

  “When did you first know?”

  “When did I know my best friend was in love?” He grins. “I guess every time he got restless when a certain individual walked by, or when he couldn’t look her in the eyes even when she was talking directly to him. Like the time she brought us cold sherbet after soccer, and your hands were shaking when she offered you a glass, remember? Oh, and this one is my favorite. She asked you what time it was and you looked at your watch and said five minutes to lunch.”