The phone calls never stopped. From time to time people still called to shout and swear and threaten us. Baba said that this was because word had got out about the plot.
'Sick people are taking advantage and trying to frighten us,' Baba said. 'Terrorism isn't just about killing people, it's about making them scared that they will be killed. Don't be scared or they will have done their job.' It was very hard not to be scared, but I tried.
Dear Ayatollah Khomeini,
I'm not sure if you got my other letter, you might have got it but just ignored it because some men came to London to kill my dad. They didn't manage to do it, the police stopped them and we all had to go and stay in Windsor for a few days while it was all sorted out.
At first I thought that you had come to Ealing yourself to do it and I kept worrying whenever we went to the shopping centre in case we saw you. (It's a very new shopping centre, the Queen came to open it and my friend Rebecca and I got to watch her do it!)
Baba told me that you didn't come yourself but sent other people instead to kill him.
It was frightening, but we are all okay.
The reason I am writing to you is that I thought, after what happened, that my baba would stop writing Asghar Agha but he says he is going to carry on with it. It's not my fault, or my brother's.
I really want you to know that I tried to stop him. I tried, I begged him not to write the magazine any more and to stop upsetting you but he didn't listen to me. I want you to know that Peyvand and my mum and I never help him write stuff about you and Peyvand and I can't read Farsi well so we don't even read what Baba is writing. If you still want to kill him, PLEASE make sure that you don't accidentally kill Peyvand and I and my maman too.
Yours sincerely
Shaparak Khorsandi
Madar Jaan waddled around our bedroom, picking up books and clothes and other mess. 'You don't have a problem with terrorists coming to get you,' she tutted, 'if they see your bedroom, they'll think you've already been hit by a bomb.'
Madar Jaan coming to stay meant that I had a whole six months of watching EastEnders and going to Ealing and having McDonald's in secret with her. I wasn't allowed to have McDonald's now because I was getting fat and Madar Jaan wasn't allowed it because it was full of salt, which is bad for old people. So, the two of us plotted and lied to the family, saying we were going to Ealing Broadway to feed the pigeons on the green, but instead I would spend my pocket money on hamburgers, fries and Coke. It didn't matter if Maman had dinner ready when we got home. Madar Jaan and I could always eat again after we had been to McDonald's.
Madar Jaan liked to sit at our bedroom window and watch what was going on in Madeley Road.
'That man across the road has been fighting with his wife all morning,' she'd tell me. 'He stormed out and slammed the door, then she came out in the drive and shouted something at him, then he went back in and she stormed out and got in her car and drove off. I've seen no sign of him since, but she'll be back later and we'll see what happens.'
Sometimes I sat with her and we'd talk about the people we saw walk by and make up stories about who they were and where they might be going. Madar Jaan did not think much of the Ellen Wilkinson girls. She did not think that girls should laugh so loudly in the street 'trying to get the attention of boys'.
It was the summer holidays before I started High School. I was going to Drayton Manor in West Ealing.
I was going to miss Montpelier, but I was so excited about starting my new school.
On my first morning, Madar Jaan warned me not to sit on the toilets because she had heard about AIDS and told me that's how you can catch it.
My new school was huge. I would never find my way around. Penelope Sargin was the only girl from Montpelier who was in my new class so she had to be my best friend until I found someone else.
I had never seen such big boys before or girls with so much make-up on even though they were only my age. Everyone laughed when the teacher called out my name on the register and turned around to see who it was with such a weird name. Everyone else had normal names like Sophie and Sharon and Sangeeta.
At lunchtime people pushed and shoved and a boy called me a 'fat Paki'. It was nothing like Montpelier.
Rana had gone away for the whole summer to stay with her dad. Her holidays were longer than mine. I had missed her. Peyvand was right. I didn't really have the sort of friends you hang around with after school. He had missed her too but would never in a million years have admitted it. She came to see me the moment she got back.
She'd left her birds for me to look after and together we carried them in their cages back to her house. I told her a lot of the kids were nasty. She shrugged and said, 'They're just immature, when people are mean like that it's because they are not very happy in themselves.' Rana often said things like that, things that grown-ups usually say.
Even though so many kids at my school were black or Asian, or from an Arab country, I found it hard to tell anyone I was Iranian.
'What are you?' a big, loud boy shouted across to me in maths class.
I didn't know what he meant at first.
'What are you?' he repeated. 'Arab? Pakistani? Bengali?' The boy himself looked Indian.
'I'm Iranian,' I said.
The boy and his friends spluttered, laughing. 'You're all terrorists innit,' he said and my face burned. All they knew about Iran was what they saw on television. I couldn't say a word. Flustered and upset, I looked away and tried not to cry.
I needed to be at home, not just because my school was huge and unfriendly and fights broke out every day even among the girls. I didn't care about the big boys who shouted 'What are you?' or the girls who talked in loud voices and called me 'posh cow', who wore their hair in ponytails at the top of their head and were always threatening to slap you if they noticed you. I needed to be home because I needed to know my family were all right. I knew it was impossible for us to just huddle together and never go anywhere, but that is what I wanted to do. How did we know, really know, that Khomeini hadn't sent anybody else to kill Baba? How did we know that they didn't hate me and Maman and Peyvand just as much or just didn't care if they blew us up alongside Baba? When the four of us were not together I was in a silent panic.
When Baba left the house now to go to the bank or the printers or to a party it felt as if he was in terrible danger. It was like when we played 'chase' and whoever was 'it' couldn't get you if you were touching a certain part of the wall, the safe place. Inside our house was the safe place. Anywhere else, they could get us.
When I heard his key in the lock again my fear drained away and was replaced by cool relief and my heart could start beating again.
I watched from our bedroom window every time Baba got into his car. I held my breath as he turned on the ignition and reversed out of our drive. I watched him gather speed down Madeley Road.
Peyvand thought he was too grown-up to phone when he was going to be late home. Every moment he was late was a slow torture for me.
'Why don't you call? Why do you let Mum worry?' I shouted at him one night when he was a whole hour late home from school and I had spent every second of it at the window praying that every figure coming into view was him. Sometimes, I would see him and my heart would leap and the relief would come, but as he came closer into view and I saw it was another brown schoolboy, everything inside me seized up again, even worse than before.
'It takes two seconds to call! Why don't you call? I always call!'
Then Peyvand got angry and shouted back at me, 'Shut up, moron. I'm not a baby! It's not my fault you don't have any friends to hang out with after school and I have.'
I didn't mind fighting. I didn't mind fighting because it meant we were together, under the same roof and it was familiar and more normal than standing by the window praying my brother would get home alive.
RANA
I knew it was impossible for us to just huddle together, us four, in the house and never go anywhere, but that is w
hat I wanted to do. It was the only way I would feel safe, but there is no way to say it without sounding mad. How did we know, really know, that Khomeini hadn't sent anybody else to kill Baba? How did we know that they didn't hate me and Maman and Peyvand just as much or just didn't care if they blew us up alongside Baba?
I charged up the stairs to our flat one Thursday afternoon. Peyvand was just behind me. We had decided to drop in on Tazim and Rana. Tazim hadn't been at school for a couple of days and Peyvand missed him, although he would never in a million years admit it because it wasn't cool for boys to miss each other.
Madar Jaan told us as soon as we got in the door. She told us she had seen a coffin being brought out of Tazim and Rana's house. Madar Jaan looked upset. 'I didn't want to go myself to see what had happened,' she explained. 'They don't know me and I can't speak English. You go, you two go.'
I gave Madar Jaan a hug, she was so worried. 'It's probably just the old lady who lives downstairs to them,' I reassured her. 'She was even older than you, Madar Jaan, don't worry. I'm sure Rana's mum is all right.'
Peyvand and I ran out of the flat, down the stairs at double speed. We ran to Tazim's. The old lady downstairs, the one who was even older than Madar Jaan, was standing outside when we got there. I got that feeling, that feeling when you know you are going to hear something terrible. She was arranging some flowers on the ground directly under Rana's window.
'Excuse me?' Peyvand called out, using his poshest voice.
The old lady looked up. She wasn't crying but she looked very sad.
I didn't have time for polite 'excuse me's. I blurted out, 'What happened here today?'
The old lady shook her head slowly.
'She fell out of her window, my darling, and died. Just thirteen years old.'
I had never heard such terrible, awful news before. I had feared hearing it, but never actually thought how it would be when I did. It's a strange sort of sick feeling, as though all of your insides want to run away from your body, your heart, your stomach. They all want to leave you because they can't stand dealing with such terrible news. My brother took my hand and we ran home together as fast as we could. For once his flat feet kept up with me.
I ran straight into the kitchen, threw myself at my mother and cried and cried. Madar Jaan got me some water.
How could Rana be dead? She was a kid like me. She kept birds and was pretty and I liked her so much. Her bedroom window was the smallest I had ever seen.
'Shappi Jaan?' Baba whispered gently much later. I was lying with my head on Maman's lap on the sofa and she stroked my hair as I cried.
'Shappi Jaan.' He knelt down to me and kissed my head. 'I have been to see Tazim's mother. It was a terrible accident. They think she might have been leaning out to get one of her birds.'
It could happen then, at any moment. You didn't have to be a writer, a poet, a politician. You didn't have to be against any regime, you could just be a normal, lovely girl like Rana who kept birds and had a brother and made friends with the kids down the road and suddenly, suddenly you would be gone and your brother, your mum and your friends had to spend the rest of their lives without you.
Dear God,
I am very worried and need your help. I pray in school to thank you for food and neighbours and things like that but I have never prayed on my own before. I tried just now but it felt a bit weird talking to myself so I'm writing to you instead. You probably know that they tried to kill my Baba. Thank you for not letting them and sorry I didn't thank you before now.
The reason I'm writing is because my friend Rana died. She is probably with you now. Can you tell her I miss her and her cousin Bina is looking after her birds? It's made me very worried. If my brother dies, I won't know what to do. Please don't take any of my family away from me suddenly. I love them so much. Please let Maman and Baba and Peyvand live until they are really old.
I promise to thank you every day.
Love
Shappi
I took my letter into the garden and buried it by the old pear tree.
REFUGEES
That autumn, the Queen gave us permission to stay in England for ever. Baba said that she didn't actually make the decision herself, she had lots of other people to make decisions like that for her, but I liked to think that she had sat at her desk with her crown on and little reading glasses. She had a little pile of applications and she sorted them out herself, deciding who could stay and who couldn't. She had picked up our form and read that Baba was a really good poet and wrote things that made people laugh. She read that he had two children who sounded completely English and their mother was very beautiful and could sing just as well as Shirley Bassey. I imagined the Queen was very upset that people had been sent to kill such a nice family and so she put us in the pile of those who could stay for ever in her country.
We couldn't use our little brown Iranian passports any more. Baba went to the Home Office to get our new passports. They were light blue with 'travel document' written in capital letters on the hard cover. Inside, the words were very official and said that the bearer was entitled to the same rights as British citizens.
Baba said the passports meant we had 'indefinite leave to remain'. I had heard lots of Iranians talking about 'leave to remain' and being very happy about it. 'But what does it mean?' I asked Baba.
'It means they can't kick us out,' Maman said.
She and Baba looked relieved to have the new passports.
Maman said, 'In a few years' time we'll be able to get British passports.'
Peyvand and I shared a look of excitement. We wanted British passports, the smart black ones which meant we could go into the British queue at the airport and not the 'alien' queue, which was really long and the officials at the gate took ages checking who we were, even though Peyvand and I spoke English perfectly and it was obvious we belonged here.
Peyvand had gone on a school day trip to France and his teachers had had to hide him under some coats in the back of the coach when they realised he didn't have a British passport and no visa for France.
I opened my smart new travel document. Printed on the first page, in bold ink, were the words 'Valid in every country'. Underneath these words, in bigger bolder letters, was stamped: 'EXCEPT IRAN'. Every country, except Iran. We all stared at the words in silence. What was there to say? This was official documentation telling us that we were not to go to the country we were born in, to Maman Shamsi's house.
Maman gave hers back to Baba, turned away, breathed in deeply then said, 'Well, thank goodness we have them now.'
Baba raised his eyebrows and puffed his cheeks out a little. Even though he had known going back to Iran was impossible for now, even though he was glad, very glad indeed that England was now our home, his heart broke into yet more pieces.
He looked at us with a quiet smile. 'Well children, that's it. We are officially refugees.'
EPILOGUE: A NEW ARRIVAL
We heard the unmistakable clack clack clack of Nadia's heels coming towards my ward. Then her pretty blonde head appeared around the door, partly obscured by a giant bunch of flowers. 'Oh my God!' she squealed. 'Is that my nephew?'
Nadia and her ten-year-old son Daniel crept into the quiet maternity ward.
'Your great nephew,' my husband Christian corrected her as he handed our newborn son to his Great Auntie Nadia.
Daniel peered at our tiny baby, looked at me with raised eyebrows and said, 'Wow! He's a cross between Christian and Amoo Hadi!'
Nadia held my son to her chest. In those first hours of his life, she whispered her undying love and devotion to him.
I looked at her cooing and kissing him and smiled. My beautiful Auntie Nadia, the feisty north Londoner, was going to be around to be a proper aunt to my son. She was going to spoil and adore him with her love the way only a khaleh can.
Nadia was a world away from the shy young teenager she was when she came to England and we saw her face to face for the first time in years. She didn't get out
of Iran until she was eighteen and had lived her childhood through the Iran— Iraq war. When Baba Mokhtar died, everyone decided it was best for Nadia to come to London. When she first arrived, we took her to a fireworks display. When the bangers went off, she dived to the ground and laid flat, covering her head with her hands.
Over time, she became my and Peyvand's best friend, our long-lost child-aunt from whom we should never have been separated.
Nadia pulled away my baby boy's hospital blanket and re-wrapped him in the expensive soft fleece she had brought. 'We've got to start as we mean to go on, baby,' she told him.
'Tadadadadada!' Baba appeared followed closely by Maman and Peyvand. They had been shooed out earlier by my midwife but now were back with Maman's aubergine and lamb in a Tupperware box.
'Shhh! Baba!' I told him. 'Visiting hours are over, you'll get told off.'
Baba kissed my son's head and said, 'I had my by-pass at this hospital, they know me here, don't worry.'
Peyvand sat beside me. 'I bought a Mars bar, Twix and a Galaxy,' he said, piling the chocolate on to the bed. 'Do you mind if I have this lamb?' he asked before tucking in with the teaspoon on my bedside table.
Peyvand and Baba were about to go on tour together, performing stand-up comedy for the Iranian diaspora scattered around the globe. They had been waiting for the arrival of the newest Khorsandi before they went on their travels.
My son had already been onstage countless times in my belly, kicking me gently as I performed my own stand-up shows at the Melbourne and Edinburgh comedy festivals. We were onstage together for the last time just a week ago.
'He must be glad he's out,' Maman said. 'He can finally get some rest!'
I told my mother about the nurse who had come around asking us the ethnicity of our son. She had needed to know for the hospital records.
A Beginner's Guide to Acting English Page 30