Zendegi

by Greg Egan

  ‘Farshid said Mama went to Paradise.’

  Martin hadn’t been prepared for this, but he could hardly blame Farshid. Javeed treated him like a sibling, with no adult mystique, no power to bluff and delay. Javeed would have known that he knew something, and would have worn him down until he disclosed it.

  Martin said, ‘No, Mama went to sleep and she didn’t wake up. She got knocked out, too hard to wake up.’

  ‘Did you try to wake her?’

  ‘The doctors all tried. But she couldn’t do it.’

  ‘If she went somewhere,’ Javeed reasoned, ‘she would have told me first.’

  ‘Yeah, of course. She’d never just go away.’ Martin put a hand on Javeed’s cheek and raised his face so they were looking directly at each other.

  ‘But—’ Javeed hesitated.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Is Mama dead?’

  Martin said, ‘Yes.’

  Javeed’s eyes narrowed. ‘She’ll never get better?’

  ‘No. She was hurt too much.’

  ‘But—’ Javeed’s struggle persisted a moment longer, then he gave up trying to untangle the impossible knot. He sagged to the floor and started wailing, ‘I want Mama!’

  Martin bent over and cradled him in his arms. ‘I know,’ he whispered. ‘I do too.’

  Omar helped organise the burial. Martin was still barely functioning, and the only other funeral he’d arranged had been his mother’s, almost twenty years before, in a country where he’d understood the culture inside out.

  In her will, Mahnoosh had mentioned Khavaran Cemetery, where religious minorities and apostates were interred. Omar suggested that a proper Muslim burial might yet be attainable, to spare her family some distress, but a few hours later he’d changed his mind. ‘I spoke to her father,’ he told Martin. ‘They won’t come, wherever it is.’

  Martin suspected that Mahnoosh would have shrugged this off, entirely unsurprised, but he still felt his fists tightening with anger. ‘What did he say to you?’

  Omar shook his head. ‘Forget about it.’

  The funeral took place the next morning. Javeed had been clinging to him ever since he’d returned from the hospital, and Martin had been dreading even this brief separation. ‘I’m going to go and get some friends of Mama to come here to say good-bye to her,’ he explained. ‘I’ll be a couple of hours. Is that okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ Javeed agreed.

  There were less than a dozen people at the cemetery. Martin had emailed Behrouz in Damascus, but his flight would not arrive until the afternoon. Along with Omar’s family there were some old friends of Mahnoosh’s, Farah and Yalda, their ex-husbands, and two relatives Martin had never met before, a mother and daughter that Omar had managed to track down.

  When the gravediggers had lowered the coffin into the ground, Omar stood with upturned palms and recited a prayer in Arabic. Mahnoosh would have rolled her eyes - and whispered to Martin that for all of Omar’s sweet hopes, the mullahs had consigned her soul irrevocably to hell - but she wouldn’t have silenced him.

  Martin had no eulogy prepared; everything had happened too quickly. ‘Mahnoosh noor-e-ruzhayam bud,’ he began. Mahnoosh was the light of my days. It was the truth - and he knew this was the way he was expected to express it - but even as he spoke he recoiled from the idea that he owed the people around him a single word on the subject. To speak about these things with anyone but her was not an affirmation of his love, it was a kind of debasement.

  Surely he owed her more than silence, though? Whatever belonged to the two of them alone, he could still recount her virtues in the company of friends. ‘I never knew anyone so fearless,’ he said. ‘So honest, so kind.’ He stared into the grave, unable to continue; he felt as if someone were holding a gun to his head, forcing him to recite these flaccid incantations even though he knew they were just driving her away from him. Yalda stepped in, praising Mahnoosh’s generosity and sense of humour.

  Back at Omar’s house there was a photograph of Mahnoosh propped up on a table, surrounded by flowers; it had been taken not long after Javeed was born - after six years of IVF - and Martin could see both the defiant light of triumph in her eyes, and a sense of humility and tenderness. It was a beautiful picture, but he wished he’d thought to dig up one of the dishevelled twenty-year-old Goth to put beside it.

  Rana and her mother-in-law, Nahid, had been cooking since dawn. Martin was enthroned on a couch in the living room, with Javeed beside him. The guests ate, talked among themselves, and came to him to offer their condolences. Martin was growing dazed and weary, and the effort needed to maintain even a minimal level of sociability made his head ache. Part of him longed to curl up on a bed in his own silent house with Javeed in his arms and let the blackness engulf them. But he didn’t trust himself to fall that far and then emerge into the light again. At least all the irritating rituals and false notes served a purpose: like a concussion victim being slapped and prodded, he knew he should be grateful for anything that kept him from drifting away.

  When Behrouz arrived, Martin was finally jolted out of his stupor; he hadn’t seen his friend face-to-face for three years, and he couldn’t just exchange a few desultory words with him then let his eyes glaze over.

  Behrouz embraced him. ‘I’m so sorry, Martin.’ He bent down to kiss Javeed, who flinched away. ‘You don’t remember me?’

  Javeed shook his head.

  ‘I had some adventures with your father when we were young. Once we saw a dragon fall from the sky; it almost landed right on top of us.’

  Javeed buried his face against Martin’s side.

  ‘How’s work?’ Martin asked. Behrouz was now a correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, which these days seemed to mean as much video journalism as prose.

  ‘Not bad.’ Behrouz smiled slightly. ‘Business people might be the last paying market left for real news. If they’re convinced that they’re getting fearlessly objective information, they’ll keep shelling out for it - while everyone else gives up caring and buries their head inside their favourite consensual reality.’

  Martin laughed softly, self-conscious but grateful for a few words of real conversation, a lifeline out of the pit. ‘You’re not a fan of News Five Point Oh, then?’

  ‘Don’t get me started. HigherTribe is worse, but they’re all pathological. What isn’t filtered and spun is just invented out of whole cloth.’

  ‘Yeah.’ The replacement of journalism by rumour aggregators and group-think salons was a serious matter, but Martin’s enthusiasm for talking shop was already beginning to falter. ‘How’s Shadi?’

  ‘She’s in Canada; she’s doing a Ph.D.’

  ‘Jesus. Everyone’s kids got old so fast.’

  Behrouz smiled down at Javeed. ‘We had a head start on you. But you’ve still got the best part to look forward to.’

  Martin struggled to keep his composure. Mahnoosh should have seen Javeed growing into adulthood, studying, flourishing, making his own life. He didn’t know where to direct his anger at the injustice of it. He’d heard people muttering about a court case; the truck driver was in hospital but was expected to be discharged soon. The man probably deserved to be imprisoned, but Martin wanted nothing to do with the process.

  ‘How long are you staying?’ he asked Behrouz.

  ‘I have to fly out again tonight. I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s okay.’ Martin suddenly recalled that he’d be in hospital anyway; he was in no position to play host. He shook Behrouz’s hand. ‘I’m glad you came.’

  Roused from his paralysis, Martin moved among the guests; Javeed clung to him, saying little. Mahnoosh’s second cousin, Nasim, and her mother, Saba, had been at the cemetery, but Martin had barely registered their presence there. Saba, he now discovered, was a retired economist; Nasim a computer scientist.

  ‘I’m afraid we never managed to get in contact with Mahnoosh after we came back from the US,’ Saba lamented. ‘She was a teenager when we left Iran. But we had as much fri
ction with the family as she did.’

  Martin said, ‘She mentioned you fondly, just a few days ago.’

  ‘Oh.’ Saba grew distraught; her daughter put an arm across her shoulders comfortingly. Nasim said, ‘I was ten when we left, and I have to admit that I didn’t get on with her parents even then. If I’d realised that she was fighting with them too I would have tried harder to stay in touch with her.’

  Javeed looked up at her. ‘Are you fighting with my grandfather?’ He sounded more intrigued than affronted.

  Nasim looked at Martin guiltily. ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t have—’

  ‘It’s okay.’

  Nasim addressed Javeed. ‘Not really fighting, but we weren’t good friends.’

  ‘What brought you back from America?’ Martin asked.

  Nasim said, ‘My mother had a job with the Ansari government. I came back thinking I was riding the same wave, though I’m afraid I ended up with less lofty ambitions.’

  Martin had heard that story before. ‘I expect everyone who returned has helped the country in some way. So long as you’re not sending out spam.’

  ‘Actually I work for Zendegi.’

  Javeed had lapsed back into shyness, so Martin spoke on his behalf. ‘My son’s a big fan.’

  ‘Really?’ Nasim turned to Javeed. ‘What games do you like?’

  ‘I only went once,’ he said. ‘Mama was going to take me.’

  Martin said, ‘I’ll take you again, as soon as I can.’

  Nasim dug her notepad out of her handbag and did something in a blur of thumb movements. Martin’s own notepad chimed softly in response. ‘Use this certificate,’ she said. ‘Unlimited access; it won’t cost you anything.’

  ‘I can’t accept that,’ he protested.

  ‘I insist,’ Nasim replied firmly. ‘It’s done.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Martin looked down at Javeed. ‘Say thank you to Aunty Nasim.’

  ‘Thank you, Aunty,’ he said.

  At dusk, Martin lay down beside Javeed in Omar’s guest room. ‘I want to tell you something, but you have to promise you won’t get upset.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Promise me first.’

  ‘I promise.’

  ‘I need to go back to the hospital tomorrow, so they can make sure I’m completely better.’

  Javeed did not look happy, but he struggled to keep his word. ‘I want to go with you.’

  ‘No, pesaram, you stay here with Aunty Rana. Or you can go to the shop with Farshid and Uncle Omar.’

  ‘But you won’t come back!’ Javeed was crying now, snot running down his face. Martin fished out a tissue and wiped it away. ‘Shh. Of course I’ll come back.’

  ‘Everyone wants to leave me alone,’ Javeed sobbed.

  ‘Don’t say that.’ Martin forced himself to keep his voice steady. ‘You know Mama didn’t want to leave you. She would have done anything to stay. And this is just . . . the doctors put some Band-Aids inside me for my cuts, and now they have to check that they’re okay.’

  ‘They put something inside you?’ Javeed sniffed, his curiosity piqued.

  ‘Absolutely.’ Martin hesitated; would it frighten him more, or would it help him to understand? ‘They had to open me up to put them in.’ He lifted up his shirt and twisted to show the stitches along his side.

  Javeed gazed at them unflinchingly. ‘Did it hurt?’

  ‘No, I was sleeping. And now they need to make sure everything’s okay. Like when you cut yourself: we always change the Band-Aid a few times, to make sure it’s clean and the cut’s getting better, don’t we?’

  Javeed pondered this explanation. ‘I want you to get better,’ he conceded.

  ‘So I can go and see the doctor?’

  Javeed said, ‘You can go.’

  In the darkness, Martin felt Mahnoosh beside them, close enough to touch. If he’d been alone with her he would have lost himself to grief, dancing with her memory halfway to madness.

  But she wasn’t a wild spirit, begging him to dash himself on the rocks beside her. He heard her voice calmly, in their child’s slow exhalations. And she asked nothing else of him but to do what she could not.

  Martin woke before dawn and managed to extricate himself without disturbing Javeed. Omar insisted on driving him to the hospital. As they parted at reception Martin tried to thank him for everything he’d done since the accident.

  Omar cut him off. ‘What do you expect? You think I forgot who broke me out of prison?’ Martin wasn’t at his sharpest; he almost opened his mouth to protest that he’d done nothing of the kind before he caught the self-deprecating joke. Omar wanted no praise for what he perceived as ordinary decency.

  Martin spent an hour sitting by his bed before a doctor appeared. His stitches were examined and the area palpitated; it was all over in a matter of minutes.

  The doctor addressed him in Farsi. ‘There’s something more we need to discuss.’ He’d told Martin his name, but Martin had forgotten it immediately.

  ‘All right.’ Martin prepared himself for a lecture on post-operative wound care.

  ‘After the accident you were bleeding. We did a scan in order to locate the source, and I’m afraid we also found a problem with your spine.’

  Martin laughed. ‘That? I’ve had that for years.’ He had never entirely recovered from being landed on when that man had jumped out of the tree during the siege of Evin Prison. ‘It’s been treated as much as it can be, but I’ve been told it’s not worth an operation on the discs.’

  The doctor glared at him reprovingly. ‘I’m not talking about a minor disc problem. I’m talking about a mass lodged next to your spine.’

  Martin didn’t reply. He was tired, and he wanted to get back to Javeed. He couldn’t understand why people insisted on putting needless obstacles in his path.

  ‘At this point,’ the doctor continued, ‘we believe it’s a secondary growth from a cancer in your liver. We need to operate immediately, to remove the spinal tumour and to try to resect the primary tumour.’

  ‘How long will that take?’

  ‘Maybe four or five hours. We’ll do it this afternoon.’

  ‘And then I can go?’ Martin pressed him. Javeed would start fretting if he wasn’t home by nightfall.

  The doctor switched to English. ‘Have you understood what I’ve been saying?’

  ‘Of course.’ Martin was offended. ‘What do you think I am, a tourist? I’ve lived here for fifteen years; my wife’s Iranian.’

  ‘You have cancer, Mr Seymour. We need to operate on your liver and your spinal cord. I can’t say how long it will take to recover from the surgery.’

  Martin’s skin tingled with fear, as if the gruff, middle-aged man seated in front of him had just brandished a knife in his face. It wasn’t that he’d lacked the vocabulary to understand the message the first time, but for him, sarataan carried none of the terrible resonance of its English equivalent.

  ‘I have cancer?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But it’s operable?’

  ‘The operation will help,’ the doctor assured him.

  ‘How much?’ Martin understood how absurd it was to demand certainty when he’d barely been diagnosed, but he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. ‘Can you cure it? If you cut out what you’ve found then follow up with drugs and radiation, will that finish it off?’

  The doctor said, ‘We’ll see.’

  14

  As Nasim sat waiting for Blank Frank to be rebuilt, she suddenly had a vision of herself standing at the edge of an aquarium pool, trying to persuade a two-hundred-tonne blue whale to swat a ball through a hoop with its nose. However smart the animal was, and however agile it could be in the open ocean, the real trick was finding a way for it to move without crushing everything in sight.

  She’d managed to shoehorn the project into Zendegi’s existing lease of computing resources from the Cloud; even so, the petabytes of data she was manipulating were almost choking the allocated racetrack memory. Paying for mo
re storage wasn’t an option; the boss had agreed to let her play around for a while to see if this wild idea panned out, but only if she could keep the whole thing from showing up in the accounts.

  The model-building algorithm she’d used all those years ago on the zebra finch data did not scale well, but after she and Bahador had spent a fortnight trying to refine it, to no avail, she’d decided to plough ahead regardless. They needed some results to show to investors as soon as possible; elegance and efficiency could come later.