Rooftops of Tehran

by Mahbod Seraji

  “Why don’t they tell us where she’s buried?”

  “Because they’re a bunch of bastards,” he spits.

  “The family never got her . . . the body?”

  “No, never. As far as the world is concerned, it never happened. She didn’t exist. It makes you want to scream, doesn’t it? Fucking bastards! They do whatever they please, and there’s nothing anyone can do.”

  “Did she make it to the hospital?” I ask, my voice a whisper.

  Ahmed shakes his head. “I’m not sure anymore.”

  “Have her parents had any contact with the SAVAK?”

  “I don’t think so—not any that they’ve shared with the rest of the alley. As I said, they hardly ever talk to anyone. They don’t accept company, and they rarely leave the house. Every time her name is mentioned, her father just cries. It breaks your heart. The man was an Olympic champion, for God’s sake. Can anything be worse than losing your child?” Ahmed looks at me and stops himself.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it that way,” he apologizes.

  I shake my head to let him know he shouldn’t worry. “Were her parents given any information about her at all?”

  “Nothing that I know of. When I was in prison, I did hear that she was alive for a while—but you can’t trust the information you receive in prison.”

  I wipe more tears from my face and wish that someone would either take the dagger out of my heart or push it in deeper to put an end to my miserable life.

  “How long were you in jail?” I ask.

  “Not long,” he says, as if it wasn’t a big deal.

  “What did they do to you?”

  “The regular stuff,” he says with a flat, hollow laugh.

  I can tell from his squinted eyes that he’s not telling the truth. I watch him silently and persistently, to let him know he’s not off the hook.

  “They take you in because they want information,” he finally explains, throwing his shoulders up as he talks—a tight, awkward gesture I’ve never seen him make before. “It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, I swear,” he continues. “They kick you, punch you, and curse you out. You know, the regular stuff you hear people talk about.”

  I keep looking at him. I think he realizes that I’m still not satisfied with his answer, because finally he starts to elaborate without the shifty eye movements. He says his first days in jail were the hardest because he didn’t know what had happened to me or to Zari, or if Faheemeh had also been arrested. The SAVAK investigators were nice to him in the beginning because they wanted to win him over and entice him into telling them about Zari. After all, he was just a confused kid to them. As he denied any association with the Communists, the banned political party known as the Toodeh, or any other political groups, they threatened to beat, torture, and even kill him.

  One night, late, they woke him up in his cell and took him to a dark room, where they tied his hands behind his back, blindfolded him, and left him in an comfortable chair for two or three hours. Occasionally he would hear a couple of guards whispering, and then nothing. He was becoming more and more agitated as time went on, expecting the worst during the long periods of silence. Without warning, someone grabbed his knees and pulled them apart, and he felt a crushing blow to his groin. The pain was so devastating he instantly began to vomit. Minutes passed, and nothing else happened. Just when he was beginning to feel okay again, someone began to beat him with a long, thick cable. He didn’t know what to do except scream and cry, but they wouldn’t stop. The harder he screamed, the harder they hit him. He could feel welts rising on his back, shoulders, face, and head. He must have passed out as they were still beating him up.

  Back in his cell he found a new prisoner who had also been savagely beaten a week or two earlier. His new friend’s name was Javad. He was a young man of about twenty-three or twenty-four, tall, strong, and quite handsome. Javad told Ahmed everything about himself. He was a member of the Communist party and a student in the College of Law at Tehran University. A friend who had lost his life under torture had exposed him. He and his group were planning to rob a bank to finance their anti-regime activities. He had not been allowed to see his relatives, and wasn’t sure they even knew he was still alive.

  He showed Ahmed his maimed left hand and described in excruciating detail how they cut off two of his fingers in one night. Another night, he said, they stuck long, thick objects inside him and the pain was so overwhelming that he passed out. Javad was so bitter about what the SAVAK had done to him that he never stopped talking long enough to hear Ahmed’s story. “These motherfuckers are servants of the West,” he would say. “Don’t you ever trust them, and don’t you ever let them think that they have the upper hand.”

  Ahmed was beaten up every other night, each time more savagely than before. “They’re not interested in investigating your crimes,” Ahmed tells me now, puffing on his cigarette. “They want a confession, and they will do anything to get it. They told me they were going to cut off my fingers and my toes one at a time. They said to ask Javad how much it hurts, and I did. Javad didn’t say anything. He just turned away and began to cry.”

  After each beating, Javad would tend to Ahmed’s wounds while telling him about his vision of the future, which always included an armed rebellion against the Shah’s regime. One night, he suggested to Ahmed that they should introduce their groups to each other. “It is only through the union of forces that a revolution can be successfully carried out in this country,” Javad explained. “The government has created such an environment of suspicion and mistrust that revolutionary forces can only operate in isolated cells. That’s because it’s much easier to control and rule a small cell than a large one. Although there is always the risk of unwanted elements infiltrating larger groups, it is clear to me that you come from a well-organized, superbly trained group because you never talk about your comrades.”

  Ahmed shook his head and laughed. Javad wanted to know who Ahmed was, whom he was associated with, and if these “motherfucking servants of the West” had arrested anyone else from his group. Ahmed told him about Doctor, Zari, and me. He told him about our days under the cherry tree, Keivan’s birthday party, and our nights on the roof. He told him that he loved Faheemeh, that I was his best friend, and that Zari was my first and only love. Zari’s story touched Javad and made him cry while cursing the Shah and his “hell-bound” family.

  Ahmed worried that Faheemeh’s parents would force her to marry her neighbor while he was in prison. After all, they didn’t know he was still alive. He told Javad that his heart broke every time he remembered me running after Zari with that look of total disbelief and horror on my face.

  “That’s the kind of stuff that crushes your spirit, breaks your heart, and weakens your soul,” Javad cried. “It isn’t fair for a young man to see what he saw on that ominous day.” Ahmed said he wanted to smash his own skull in every time he thought of us under the cherry tree. Life was so good, and it had all come to a screeching halt when they took Doctor away.

  During the days and nights Javad and Ahmed conversed, no one came to torture him. They would occasionally take Javad away, but he would come back promptly and without any visible signs of physical abuse on his face or body. Late one night, the agents took Javad away permanently. Ahmed never saw him again, and worried that they had executed his only friend and sympathizer in that hellhole. It wasn’t until a couple of days before Ahmed was released that he learned that Javad was a SAVAK agent assigned to win his trust and expose his associations.

  “They do that a lot, especially to the first-timers,” he explained. “How are you supposed to know? He looked so genuine.”

  Ahmed says it wasn’t being in prison that almost shattered his spirit, but the conflicting stories he heard about Zari, Faheemeh, and me. They told him all along that I had been executed, and that Zari was dead. Then they told him that she’d survived the fire, had confessed to being a kharab-kar during an interrogation, and died under torture. The
y had him believing that Faheemeh was arrested and was being gang-raped in the room next door at that very moment. They claimed that she would be raped repeatedly until Ahmed confessed to his crimes.

  “I wished I could kill myself,” he murmurs. “And I would’ve if I could’ve found a way.”

  It’s getting light out as we walk out onto the roof. There is a thin sheet of ice covering it. We walk carefully, remembering Mom’s mantra that hundreds of people fall off roofs every year. Looking toward Zari’s room, I feel the weight of a mountain on my chest. The curtains are closed, but the light inside the room is on. My heart skips at the sign of life in that room. “Zari,” I whisper.

  Ahmed puts his hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he says. “The Masked Angel must be doing her morning prayers.”

  The dawn chill makes me wish I was wearing something warmer. It’s quiet outside, but here and there a light flickers, an infant cries for a brief moment, a door squeaks as the neighborhood gradually wakes up.

  “I never used to notice these sounds,” I say to Ahmed.

  “Neither did I.”

  “How’s your spirit now?”

  “As strong as ever, now that I have you and Faheemeh back in my life. Those motherfuckers can kiss my ass if they think they can break me with a few bruises!”

  “You still think about the stars?” I ask, looking toward the skies.

  “Of course.”

  “You still have the biggest star up there. You’ll go on to live the life of a king, with Faheemeh as your pretty queen in a big palace.” I stop and take a deep breath. Ahmed lowers his head and stares at his toes. “The strength of our friendship is the only thing that has kept me sane. You’re my brother, my comrade, and my friend for life.”

  Ahmed claps me on the back and smiles without saying anything, but I can tell from the soft expression on his face that he’s deeply touched.

  Out of the corner of my eye I see the Masked Angel walking out into Zari’s yard. She’s heading toward the bakery to buy hot fresh lavash , just like Zari used to. Her stride strikes me as unusually fast. I had heard from Zari that the Masked Angel was the calmest, most centered person in the world. I wonder why she’s rushing, as if someone’s chasing her. As I watch her, tears fill my eyes again. Ahmed asks if I want to go back inside, and I say no. He rubs the back of his neck with the palm of his right hand.

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “Life’s not supposed to be like this at our age.”

  “I know.”

  “Promise me that you’ll do your best to leave the past behind.” As I nod, he extends his right hand. “Let’s shake on it,” he says, looking directly into my eyes. As we do, I remember the night before Doctor’s funeral, when we vowed not to cry at the cemetery. I don’t think I can keep my promise this time.

  I look to the eastern end of the alley and see the Masked Angel returning. As I look at her burqa floating around her, I remember our religion teacher, Mr. Gorji, and his theories about unveiled women making themselves objects of sexual desire for men. I also remember thinking that Iraj was in love with Soraya, even though he had never seen her face.

  “Is Iraj still . . . ?” I ask.

  “Iraj is mesmerized by her,” Ahmed says, smiling. I can’t help but smile back.

  The Masked Angel walks into the yard and shuts the door behind her. At that moment she looks up and sees Ahmed and me on the roof. She stops abruptly, as if she has run into an invisible brick wall, then rushes into the house.

  “She must be shocked to see you,” Ahmed says. “They’ve been worried about you, you should know that.”

  “We’ll go to see them soon.”

  25

  Caged Souls

  It’s been more than twenty-four hours since I’ve slept. Ahmed and I go downstairs and eat breakfast with my family. My mother keeps pushing food onto our plates because guys our age need to eat well or we won’t grow strong. Ahmed says we better listen to her before she brings out the engine oil and the horse urine. I smile. My father has to go to work, but promises to come home early and take us out to dinner. We’ll have chelo kebob—a skewer of ground beef mixed with onions and domestic Persian herbs, and a skewer of filet, served over basmati rice that has been prepared with butter, the savory Persian herb somagh, and baked tomatoes.

  “I really don’t want to go out, Dad,” I tell him.

  He nods. He says he understands, but I think he is surprised by my candor.

  After breakfast, Ahmed and I step into the alley. Neighbors come over to say hello. I thank them for waiting up for me the night before to welcome me home. The men hug me and shake my hand. “You look great, you look great,” one neighbor says.

  “He looks fantastic,” another interjects. “A little thin, but that’s expected.”

  “Oh, yes, he looks thin, but his mother will nurse him into fine form in no time,” Ahmed’s mother says as she hugs and kisses me. “I missed you so much,” she says, tears in her eyes. “I prayed for your safe return every day. Oh, if you only knew what your poor, helpless mother went through. She was like a lost soul the entire time you were away. A mother without her child is like a vein without blood.” Then she whispers in my ear, “You should see Zari’s mother. She looks like a ghost. Poor, poor woman.”

  Ahmed’s grandmother is standing a couple of meters away. It seems she’s aged twenty years in a matter of months. Ahmed whispers that Grandma’s mental and physical state is deteriorating fast.

  “My husband went away once,” Grandma says. “For thirty years, or was it forty years? I never thought I’d see him again, but he came back.” Then she turns to Ahmed and asks, “He did come back, didn’t he?”

  “Yeah, Grandma, he came back.” Ahmed smiles gently as he puts his arm around her. “How could he stay away from a good-looking chick like you?”

  Grandma looks at me and asks, “Where’s your wife? Does she know you’re back yet? I didn’t know my husband was back for quite some time.” Then she turns to Ahmed. “It was quite some time before I found out, wasn’t it?”

  Ahmed nods his head yes.

  “It was quite some time before I found out, quite some time,” she rambles. “Why didn’t he let me know right away?”

  “He wanted to surprise you, and show up when you least expected it,” Ahmed reminds her. “What would be the point of going away if you couldn’t surprise your own wife when you came back?”

  “Oh, yeah!” Grandma says. “What would be the point?” She pauses, and then asks, “I was surprised, wasn’t I?”

  Ahmed turns to me. “You remember, don’t you? Wasn’t she surprised?”

  Grandma is standing right next to me. I put my arm around her shoulders and say in her ear, “Grandma, you were very surprised. I’ll never forget the way you smiled when you saw him.”

  Grandma’s face lights up. “You should surprise your wife, too. She’d like that, just like I did.” Then she slowly walks back toward Ahmed’s house. “Yes, I remember being very surprised.”

  Ahmed winks at me and I wink back.

  The kids in the alley are excited to see me. A couple of the younger ones keep their distance. After all, I’ve just been released from a mental hospital. Most of the kids, however, shake my hand and want to know if I still play soccer, and if I would like to play later on in the day. I thank them and tell them that I’m too tired, that it has been a long time since I’ve slept.

  Ahmed and I go to his house. His mother brings us tea and sweets, and tells us that she’s been dreaming of this day when we would be together again. She’s a small woman with a thin face, skinny body, and pale complexion. She has the voice of a storyteller, kind, warm, and trusting. There is always a point—a lesson or a moral—to her stories. She talks of Ahmed’s prison days as the worst of her life. “Life isn’t the same when a piece of your heart is ripped away from you,” she says. “It’s a blessing and a curse to be a mother, that’s for sure!”

  Ahmed ducks his head. I guess he’s embarrassed.

>   Ahmed’s mother advises me to visit Zari’s parents. “They’ve suffered a great deal. First Doctor, and then that rose of a girl. So young, so vibrant. It is unbelievable what has happened to that family. If there is a God, then there is a Day of Judgment, too, and her poor mother will see justice.” She wipes the tears from her eyes. “Oh, yes, you should pay your respects soon,” she continues. “I saw the Masked Angel watching you from the terrace on the third floor when everyone was gathered around you in the alley. I’m sure she has told the family that you are back. They probably expect you to pay them a visit today.”

  Ahmed says, “Yeah, we should do that.” Then he turns to his mother. “She saw him on her way back from the bakery today. We could tell she was surprised.”

  “The Masked Angel has been a godsend to that family,” Ahmed’s mother says. “They were devastated until she showed up and brought some peace back into their lives. She must be a true angel. God’s ways are amazing, aren’t they?”

  I nod yes, thinking that if there is a God, he sure has an amazing way of showing his love for Doctor and Zari.

  “Of course she will never fill the void that Zari has left in their lives,” Ahmed’s mother says. “That would be impossible because no one—and I mean no one—can replace your child. At least the Masked Angel is there to nurse them, and be a sister to Keivan. That poor boy! How they ever explained his sister’s tragic loss to him, I’ll never know. What a storm must be brewing inside him! God help him, I just hope he doesn’t try to get revenge when he grows up. Thank God for the Masked Angel. I hear she spends most if not all of her time caring for him. She has devoted her life to that family. She never goes anywhere, never socializes with anyone. She is entirely focused on helping that family cope with the pain of losing their dear child. God bless her.”

  We hear Grandma walking toward us. Ahmed’s mother shakes her head. “She’s getting worse every day. Just a few days ago she fell down the basement stairs because she thought her husband, God bless his soul, was waiting for her at the bottom of the steps. It’s a miracle she didn’t break her neck. She sees him everywhere now.