The Book of Ordinary People

by Claire Varley

  Niki shrugged, pouting. Aida racked her brain. Her pockets were empty. She had nothing to give.

  ‘How about a story?’ she said desperately. ‘One story and then we keep going?’

  Niki nodded, a huge yawn enveloping her face.

  ‘Okay,’ Aida began. ‘What story?’

  Niki thought. ‘Tiddilick.’

  Aida stared at her. She had no idea what this was. She assumed it was something she’d picked up at kinder, just like the tooth fairy business.

  ‘Well, I don’t know that story. How about a Persian story? Do you know any of those?’

  Niki shook her head.

  ‘You don’t know any? Niki! These are the stories of your people. What kind of Irani girl doesn’t know her own stories? Good thing I’m here then.’

  Niki looked like she didn’t particularly share this sentiment. Aida thought for a moment.

  ‘Okay, you know the story of Rostam?’

  Niki shook her head again.

  ‘Well, Rostam is one of the champions of Iran. He was a strong man, tall as a cypress tree and muscles like a mountain. When Iran’s King Kavus is captured by the sorcerer King of Mazandaran, Rostam is sent to save him. On his way he has to overcome seven labours, his haft khan, each one harder than the next. He fights lions, witches and demons, all with his cunning horse Rakhsh. He even fights a dragon, Niki.’

  Below her, Niki’s eyes were wide with interest.

  ‘This is my favourite part, the dragon. Rostam is sleeping near the dragon’s lair, Rakhsh keeping watch. As Rostam sleeps, Rakhsh sees the dragon, his claws sharp and his breath fiery. He wakes Rostam with a cry, but when Rostam looks around he cannot see anything so he falls back to sleep. Each time Rakhsh spots the dragon creeping towards Rostam he whinnies to wake him, and each time, the dragon hides in the darkness so Rostam cannot see him. Rostam becomes angry with Rakhsh because all he wants is to sleep. The third time the dragon roars and Rakhsh runs away in fear, but then he remembers his love for Rostam and returns to wake him. And this time the lights shine down upon the dragon and Rostam sees it and kills it. This is just one of his trials, Niki. Before he can rest, Rostam must lead the Persians into battle to defeat the sorcerer king once and for all and free King Kavus so that he can return to the throne of Iran. It is difficult, Niki-joon, but do you think he gives up? Never. Even when he is tired and weary. Even when it all seems too hard and he has nothing left. Even when he faces the sorcerer king himself.’

  She paused, looking down at Niki.

  ‘It’s a pretty long walk home, isn’t it? What do you think Rostam would do?’

  Niki considered this.

  ‘Do you think he would give up, like us?’

  Niki shook her head. ‘Walk.’

  ‘You think so?’

  She nodded with certainty.

  ‘You think we should try?’

  Niki mulled this over. Aida couldn’t believe it was going to work. Perhaps this parenting wasn’t so hard at all.

  ‘Carry me.’

  Almost. She leant over and lifted the little girl onto her hip, her body smelling of sweat and tears. As they entered through their little rusty gate Aida swooped down and checked the letterbox. Empty. Inside the house a light was on in the kitchen and the smell of spices and tomatoes filled the hall promisingly. She released Niki, who ran down the hallway with excitement and burst into the kitchen, throwing herself around Elham’s legs.

  ‘Niki-joon!’ Elham cried, smothering her in kisses. ‘How late it is! You must be so hungry.’

  Aida joined them in the kitchen. Elham was juggling Niki on one hip while she stirred a pot.

  ‘And what have you been up to?’ she asked Niki.

  ‘Telling stories,’ Aida replied, observing Elham. She showed no sign of her earlier torpor. ‘Niki knows all about Rostam now, don’t you?’

  Niki nodded, her face buried in her mother’s neck.

  ‘Rostam!’ Elham beamed. ‘He learns how to be strong and good so he can take over from his father. It’s a good story, Niki-joon. We all have our labours, big and small. But we need them if we are to grow up strong. You know, Niki, that story is from the Shahnameh. We learnt all about them in school. Everyone does in Iran.’

  Elham tested the thickness of the stew. ‘It means the book of kings,’ she continued, ‘because all the stories are about the great kings and heroes of Iran’s past.’

  ‘What do you think our book would be called?’ Aida asked, stretching the knot in her neck.

  ‘Ours would be the book of ordinary people,’ Elham replied. ‘And the exceptional Niki, of course.’ She nuzzled into her daughter, who let out a delighted shriek. ‘Now, who is ready to eat?’

  Later, once Niki had fallen asleep on the couch, Aida turned to Elham.

  ‘Do you want to talk about today?’

  Elham’s eyes remained on the television. Aida tried again.

  ‘Do you . . . Do you think you need to . . .’

  Elham cleared her throat.

  ‘Stop it. I don’t want you looking at me like that. With sympathy or pity. It’s enough every day to remember you have no place without everyone looking at you with those sad unhelpful eyes all the time.’ Elham sighed heavily, placing her hands flat on her thighs, the palms calm and steady.

  ‘What about you, Aida? You want to talk about everything that has happened? Let it all out so that we can relive it again and again and again and still end up in the same place as before? You think I don’t notice? That I don’t have questions? Why don’t you keep in contact with anyone from detention? Friends, lovers? You write all the time – always writing, never sharing – but where are your people? Go on, tell me your story.’ She waited, small and fiery, but Aida said nothing.

  ‘I didn’t think so.’

  Elham turned back to the television. Aida did too.

  *

  Days passed and Elham did not speak of much to Aida. Not of her sadness or her incapacitation, nor the lost day that had come and gone as if it had never been. Aida retreated into her own life, working long hours at the café and burying herself within her writing in the safety of her closed bedroom. She overheard Niki once, explaining to one of the Cyruses the cunning and intelligence of Rostam, though the story ended abruptly when Niki seized upon the idea that perhaps Cyrus could be her Rakhsh and attempted to mount the startled feline, who lashed out in panicked displeasure, leaving three little nicks in Niki’s leg. But apart from this, Aida kept to herself despite the moments when the pitter-patter of those busy little feet hesitated outside her door and a small part of her wished they’d come in.

  Elham, it seemed, had returned to her usual self, or at least a version of herself that refused to make eye contact, spoke mostly through Niki and gazed intently at the television, offering little conversation. She fretted over little things: spoons that were missing, clothes that would not dry, and new chips in crockery that had been chipped to begin with. Niki’s appointment with the specialist came and went and Aida never knew the outcome, for Elham awoke one day with a renewed determination to see everything in a positive light. She refused the idea that they might not get offered protection visas, laughed off the notion that Iran would do a deal to take them back involuntarily, and spoke of their financial struggles as if they were nothing but a game to while away the time until a more lavish lifestyle was at their disposal.

  Aida now started work earlier and finished later at the café, though Peter still placed the same dismal amount of money into her palm regardless. It was something to do, she reasoned, even if it wasn’t particularly enjoyable. Her nights seemed longer as she caught sleep in furious bursts of restlessness that pinged her from one vivid dream to the next. She fought them, writing long into the night until exhaustion caused her to fall into slumber, her notebook resting against her nose as she shuddered through sleep. It was on one suc
h night that she awoke with a start, her phone singing beside her. She groped for it, lighting up the screen. 12.45 am. She didn’t recognise the number, though she recognised the Iranian country code.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Aida-joon!’

  The voice was crisp and full, as if coming from within the room. She sat up in bed.

  ‘Maman?’

  ‘Yes, azizam, it’s me.’

  ‘What are you doing calling? Is everything okay?’

  Her mother’s voice was reproachful.

  ‘You’ve never answered when I’ve called you before and you’re so unreliable with messages so I borrowed Farzaneh’s phone.’

  Despite being the most recent of Uncle Asadollah’s ex-wives, Farzaneh and her mother had forged such a strong bond that this time round her mother had decided to keep Farzaneh instead of Asadollah. Her mother waited expectantly.

  ‘You always call when I’m asleep,’ Aida muttered, which wasn’t entirely true.

  Her mother, still baffled by the time difference, accepted this explanation.

  ‘Anyway, now that I have you on the phone we can talk. Tell me what is happening. Your messages are so brief. One word, two words... Have you heard anything yet?’

  Aida leant back into the pillow.

  ‘Nothing. You know I’ll tell you whenever I hear something.’

  Her mother said nothing. Aida could hear the tension as she put flesh to her next statement.

  ‘You know if you were to come home . . . maybe it wouldn’t be so bad? Maybe they will have forgotten everything? Bita from down the road, her nephew returned and he’s okay so far. He’s not in the city anymore but no one has troubled him yet.’

  Aida pressed her palm to her forehead, the cold of her flesh spreading across her brow. This was why she did not answer her phone. Because how do you argue with ‘maybe’? Maybe I will be safe. Maybe I will be arrested. Maybe it all will be forgotten. Maybe I will be locked up or tortured or worse. Maybe I can start this all again . . .

  ‘How is Alireza?’ Aida asked, ignoring her mother’s plea. ‘And Amin?’

  ‘As well as can be,’ her mother sighed. ‘Alireza’s firm has given him some time off and Amin comes at night-time, so someone is with Baba all the time.’

  She could sense in the silence her mother forming new words for the same thoughts. As if blinded to all that had happened before by the intense maternal yearning to shed this distance from their lives. Did she not realise how hard this was? This pleading for something Aida would do within seconds were things different? This thing that every pressure, every thought, every moment of every day was pushing her towards, when the ultimate fact was that she could not return. Even if she wanted to. And how very much she wanted to.

  ‘Maybe they will have forgotten?’ her mother tried again. ‘Time has passed now. Ahmadinejad is gone.’

  They both knew how wishful this thinking was. How unfair it was. How cruel. Inside Aida, the weariness of these last few years boiled over.

  ‘Does Baba know you’re talking like this?’ Aida asked sharply.

  She felt instantly guilty in the silence that followed. Her mother’s breath as it travelled through the phone was laden with worry.

  ‘He barely knows himself now.’ Her voice was small and distant. ‘He wakes sometimes but it pains him so much to be as he is that eventually they ease him back to sleep to stop his crying. He cries. Every day. Because he’s not ready yet. Because . . .’

  Because of me, Aida finished her mother’s sentence in her head. Her mother sniffed, the wet thwack reverberating through the phone as she collected herself.

  ‘Don’t listen to me, Aida-joon. Of course you can’t come home. Not now. It’s not safe. Sometimes my head just disappears from reality. It’s just so much without you here. Amin and Alireza, they’re not much for comforting, and Asadollah is useless. He spends more time blubbering in the courtyard with his damn birds about how it should be him than sitting by the hospital bed. That man. Thank god we got Farzaneh, right?’

  Her mother sniffed again, clearing her throat.

  ‘And how is Elham? And little Niki?’

  Aida thought of the last few weeks, how they’d twisted beyond her control.

  ‘Fine,’ she replied. ‘They’re fine.’

  ‘You know every day I thank God that you have them,’ her mother continued. ‘No matter what happens, at least you have Elham and Niki. Enshallah, Aida-joon, enshallah.’

  The phone call ended and sleep refused to return.

  17

  Evangelia

  My mother arrived in Australia in the late 1950s, a quiet, courteous sixteen-year-old. She hadn’t wanted to leave Cyprus but her family had no choice because the fight for independence from the British meant it was no longer safe and the family’s business had been destroyed. My father first saw her at a dance at the Greek club and he suggested her to his family as a potential bride. My mother’s aunt, a well-known matchmaker in the Melbourne circles, was sent to make enquiries. My maternal grandparents knew my father came from a good family, and that they were all hard-working, so eventually they agreed to their introduction. It was good fortune because my parents got on famously, and remained this way for the rest of their lives. My father always said that everything he had made of his life was because of my mother.

  As young children, my mother worked hard to keep my sister and I well dressed and happy. She sewed us beautiful clothing using the neighbour’s sewing machine that she would borrow. We’d take a trip to Myer, point out what we liked, and she’d work long into the night so we’d have something similar to wear to church at Easter or Christmas. My first day of school I wore my beautiful new frock with a matching ribbon in my hair and I remember the teacher telling me how smart I looked even though we were meant to be in uniform. I was selected to sit up the front at assembly and be one of the handful of students who got to sing the national anthem while they raised the flag. Imagine how proud I felt – and how jealous my older sister must have been because she had never been chosen for this honour before.

  Evangelia glanced up from the page, interrupting herself.

  ‘I can tell you what’s wrong with it.’

  Carole and the others were watching Evangelia expectantly.

  ‘It’s all about other people. Every time I try to write about her it slips into being about other people. I know it’s meant to be about her, but the problem was she didn’t do anything for herself. So it keeps wriggling out of my control and becoming about others.’

  She gripped the paper, causing it to crinkle beneath her fingers, and shrugged her shoulders. It had been two months since she’d started the writing classes and she felt further from where she wanted to be than when she’d begun. The story was a fish, slippery and impatient, manoeuvring out of her reach every time she attempted to seize it. To make it what it should be. And each time she sat frustrated before the computer, she chastised herself for making such a mess of her mother’s memory. It was a stupid idea anyway, this story that wasn’t a story, and she’d used the recent school holidays as an excuse not to work on it.

  ‘Sorry. It’s not very good. I don’t think I’m cut out for this.’

  She fled to the safety of her seat, avoiding the others’ gaze. They, in comparison, were thriving, apart from Damien, who had disappeared after the first lesson, never to be seen again. She’d heard something about him being in south-east Asia now as he had discovered Kerouac. The rest of the class, who hadn’t needed to find themselves, were instead working away diligently on their biographies. Sita and Gwen had stumbled across a box of old council ephemera on one of their research trips to the town hall archives and were breathing new life into their pioneering councillor every day. And Terry had found a woman to write about, one who had been a prisoner of war in Changi and singlehandedly masterminded a way of smuggling medicines into the camp th
at aided in the rudimentary surgeries performed by the interned doctors. She was, according to Terry, a woman worth the ink.

  Carole had, in her own aloof way, been supportive of them all, providing little hints and suggestions as they workshopped their pieces together. She’d been kind to Evangelia too, attempting to navigate the story towards clearer waters, but each week as she sat at home behind the computer, Evangelia managed to steer herself back towards uncertainty. She’d tried to make it rhyme, had written bits of it in poorly phrased Greek, had attempted a first-person structure until the weight of looking out through her mother’s eyes had become too much and she’d retreated back to the safety of her own perspective. Nothing made it look how she wanted, and every time she felt herself close, she was dragged away by Peter or the children, or a frustrating phone call from Lydia about something inane to do with the school. Carole’s suggestions had been thoughtful – perhaps there were diaries her mother had kept, recordings or scrapbooks, some source that would help Evangelia to gain entry into her psyche? But her mother had had no time for these things and had left behind no archives to assist Evangelia. She remembered the time she’d attempted to record her mother, who had waved away the voice recorder as if it were a knife held to her throat.

  ‘I’ve told you everything already,’ she’d said, glaring at the recorder. ‘The people who need to know, know. I don’t want my words living forever in that kakos little thing for anyone to find in the future.’

  Then she’d clicked her tongue at the device and refused to have it back in her house.

  So Evangelia had sat there night after night, pulling from the closets of her memory all that she could recall. And when she laid it out before her, all she saw was a woman who utterly missed her mother, and there wasn’t much of a story in that.

  Carole was watching her, brow furrowed, considering her words.

  ‘Thank you for sharing with us, Evangelia, and that was, once more, some good self-reflection on your work. Does anyone else have any other comments or suggestions they’d like to offer Evangelia?’