Thirty Shadow Birds, page 12
“For me you’re still a knot, Piruz,” she says, letting out a long sigh. “Without your old charm, though.”
Those days, when she was young and naïve, Piruz gave her a kind of cinematic impression—there was something, not in his face or physique, but in his manner, that reminded her of Paul Newman as the tough guy in The Long, Hot Summer.
“What the hell are you watching down there so eagerly?” Piruz would ask her with implicit disdain.
“You don’t hear their cry for revolution? Things are going to change soon.”
“Ah! I know those stupid huddled masses are turning everything upside down.”
“Do you think all these people in the street are idiots who don’t know what they want?”
“Look, Yalda, you’re too young to realize that people are herd animals….”
“What’s happening outside this office is not architecture, Piruz. The real life of society does not have the beauty and order of a magnificently designed building.”
“What a tactful employee I have! You’re right, though. Revolution is not my specialty; it’s my nightmare. I’m going to put it out of my mind by going to an expensive restaurant this evening. Would you like to come with me? To celebrate the impending release of your boyfriend from prison?”
Yalda walks around the room again, trying to remember more examples of Piruz’s charm. Her other boss, Piruz’s business partner, would call these the “Wonders of Piruz.”
“You remember, Piruz, I was not the only person who couldn’t predict your reactions,” she says aloud, still staring at his old phone number. “Under those damned wartime conditions, you wouldn’t allow me to take my Little Bird with me back to Tehran. Even with your strong feelings about fundamentalism and fanaticism, you took advantage of the terrible circumstances. Yes, you did what a fanatic male parent would do. But when I took our son to Europe with no return ticket, you made zero effort to assert your Islamic male parental rights. By then, you’d stopped bothering. You hardly kept in touch with our son, only calling him now and then, or sending him a postcard….”
Noticing her rapid heartbeat and hasty steps, she stops and reminds herself of the other side of the coin. No matter her reasons, she’d deprived him of his son. And what did he do? Among all options, he chose his favourite Taoist tactic: doing nothing. Why didn’t he take some action? Was he trying to get revenge on his disobedient wife? Or to punish his innocent kid? Or just to protect himself from having to take any responsibility?
“Maybe now you’re the super happy man I always wanted, Piruz,” she murmurs, “far from the mess I’m sinking in, safe and sound in your orchard haven.”
Tired of dealing with an old knotted thread, Yalda collapses into the lounge chair and closes her eyes for a moment, trying to imagine a magic tool that could cut her loose from her tangled relationships, old and new. Nothing appears other than red dots behind her closed eyes. The pain in her back has finally left her alone. Getting ready to go back to work, she takes a deep breath. Before putting the cell phone in her bag, she remembers Nandita’s call and decides to listen to her new “messtory”: “Hello, ex-teacher, you are there? No? Long time, no call, Mrs. Teacher. You forget Nandita? No? Asuntha? Rima? Teacher, I told you Asuntha story. No call from you. Now, Mrs. Teacher, I tell you Rima story. Rima son missing, Teacher, his Uncle say he is jail, not Canada jail, Teacher. You understand, no? Good night, Teacher!”
21.
WITH HER BACK TOWARDS THE SUN and the lake, Yalda takes her sunglasses out of her purse and spreads the straw beach mat on the sand. The old mat, a second-hand gift from her first landlady in Toronto, is still in decent shape. It was left folded up for ages; Nader hadn’t shown any interest in a beach outing in years. During their outings to Guildwood—a period that now feels like a faded dream—it was unfolded but never used, for Nader always preferred to perch on a stone.
She looks at her watch. It’s half past six. When she got behind the wheel, it was almost dawn. With no destination in mind, she left it to her metallic silver horse to take her away from home once again. This time, it wasn’t because she was trying to give Nader space or to occupy herself during a day off, but because she wanted to flee from herself. She wanted to remove herself from a situation where she was tempted to disrespect her son’s right to privacy.
She assumed she would find herself at Guildwood. A lakeside park, like Cherry Beach, particularly on a summer Sunday, is not her type of place by any means. In fact, the groups of picnickers bother her; they distract her from feeling in touch with nature. Nonetheless, Yalda is here, not at Guildwood. Maybe her fear of being alone on a remote beach was stronger than the appeal of its serenity. Or perhaps the idea of going out there without Nader was disturbing.
She turns towards the horizon. She’s decided to ignore the lake and to focus on the sun; it’s as though they are having a private meeting. She is also careful not to look at the face of the sun before the right time. She feels as though the splendour of the sun at this time of the morning demands something special, a sort of solo ritual—civilized, easy to do, and tailored to her needs. After all, she may have a drop of Mithraic blood in her veins. She takes off her sandals and sits on the mat in a meditation posture: back straight, legs crossed, hands on knees, but with her purse on her lap signalling her attachment to inconsequential belongings. With no intention to watch her breath and with no white wall in front of her to stare at, she keeps her head up and faces the sun.
Quietly, she begins to chant: “Not because you’re the lord of the earthians, or the master of life, but because you’re the illuminator, I’m begging you to eliminate this damn dark dot.” She pauses to swallow her saliva. “I don’t mean the suspicion in his mind, but the questioning inside me. Please help me not get caught in the trap of motherly prying. He’s testing me by leaving his mail and papers in a certain pattern to see whether or not I touch them—as if I’ve never seen any detective movies in my life. O Beautiful Lord, Beautiful Mithra! Don’t I have the right to know what my son is doing with his soul?” She pauses again to collect herself. “He’s lost his trust in me, if he ever had any at all. He never believed I didn’t open that letter intentionally. Well, I didn’t. But now I feel a strong urge to open this new envelope. As soon as I saw it in his mail, my heart started to beat hard. I bet it’s about his application. He didn’t open it yesterday, though. Instead he left it on his desk, beside the others. This kind of organization is not his habit. To be honest, this morning when I noticed he was not home yet, I was about to yield to the temptation of examining the envelope and opening it.” She smiles nervously.
The sweet face of the sun starts shaking and vibrating. Yalda, mesmerized by the rounded ripples and twinkling colours, feels a sort of epiphany: a pebble dropped in still water, a silent splash, and no end to the widening circles.
But who dropped the pebble? And when did it happen?
She takes her wet eyes off the sun, puts on her sunglasses, and lies down on her back with the purse on her tummy and her palms on the warm sand. The gentle breeze, carrying the smell of water, sweeps over her body and takes her mind back to the past.
Ali could be a good role model for my baby, she had thought after seeing him sitting on the steps of the Place de l’Hôtel de Ville, elbows on knees, with little Nader’s school bag between his legs and a cigarette between his fingers. He was watching Nader wobble on a new skateboard, a birthday gift. Yes, he was certainly becoming a father figure for her son. When Yalda didn’t know how to manage attending l’école, working at the lingerie store, and taking care of Nader—in his first year of school in Saint-Étienne—Ali appeared. He was like an angel who had come down from heaven to babysit for her. It was hard to ignore such a miraculous offer. He’d assured her that it wouldn’t be a hassle for him. He ran a restaurant with Natalie, and being self-employed gave him flexibility. Plus, he enjoyed spending time with a boy who was the son of a dear friend and had the name of another dear friend. When he’d uttered “dear friend,” Yalda had noticed his face flush. The blush was living proof of what his sister, Afi, had already told her during her visit to The Hague: Ali was in love with Yalda. At the time, Yalda had interpreted it as a family trait, something both sister and brother had in common: falling in love with someone they had never met. Perhaps this tendency was due to a sort of Eastern romanticism of their generation, which had its hands in harsh reality and its head in idealistic illusions. Afi’s love for her Nader, which had arisen from her brother’s description of his prison-mate, seemed to Yalda like the fantasy of a young provincial woman whose contact with men had been limited to almost nothing. Ali’s love for his adored friend’s girlfriend was the other side of the coin. After all, Ali, although his sister saw him as very learned and mature, was, in fact, a provincial young man whose experience with women could hardly be more than a couple of visits to Shahr-e Now (New City), the well-known whorehouse in the south of Tehran. It was no wonder that such a man would allow Natalie to have the upper hand.
“How come you’re smoking while babysitting, Ali?” Yalda said smiling, patting him on the shoulder and sitting beside him on the step.
Ali, preoccupied with his thoughts, didn’t welcome her the way he used to. He smiled faintly, though, before collecting himself. “Hey, you’re early today!”
She shook her head no, watching her little Nader with glowing affection. “I just ran all the way,” she said. “Little Bird, Mom is here! Come give me a kiss!” With no response from little Nader, who was trying to control the skateboard, Yalda turned towards Ali. “I can never thank you enough, Ali.”
“Don’t mention it, please!” he said with a husky voice.
“Was my Little Bird a good boy today?” she asked, wondering why he hadn’t yet told her what they had been up to that afternoon.
“Oh, yeah! He was a bit grumpy, but he had his sandwich and orange juice. He did his homework, too.”
“He didn’t get on Natalie’s nerves, did he?” she asked, a little worried.
“Well, you know, Yalda,” his voice fell to a deep whisper, “it seems that Natalie has no desire to get along with this little boy.”
“He’s not naughty, just stubborn, just….” She stopped, not recognizing her own voice.
“Not his fault at all. Kids can always tell who’s a friend and who’s a foe….”
He sounded sad and guilty, Yalda remembers. His words were disturbing, and she tried to block them out, but at the same time she instinctively inclined her shoulder towards his. She knew she should not trust her instincts, though. Ali, who was unable to fight back against his demanding partner, could not be a support for her or for her son.
The clamour of children nearby interrupts her thoughts. Opening her eyes, she turns in the direction of the sound, and pushes her glasses up onto her forehead to look around. The beach is filling up with people who seem to be here for anything but swimming. A Frisbee flies through the air; Yalda follows its arc and then shuts her eyes again after it lands on the ground.
Suddenly, she is back in the past again. A shiny yellow Frisbee! Not the right toy for a two-year-old toddler, Yalda thought. Piruz looked more excited than his son, and assured her it would be fun to try it in the park that afternoon. It was a time when Piruz, in between trips to his newly purchased orchard on the shore of the Caspian Sea, would sometimes try to manipulate her by offering to take little Nader out. It was an obvious tactic to avoid arguing over disagreeable family matters, like budgeting and parenting. A bribe, a tactic, a trick—whatever it was, Yalda accepted it, despite her hesitation, with some suppressed anger. She’d already learned that something was better than nothing. Although she didn’t trust Piruz to take care of her Little Bird, she’d let them go so that she could have a break and work on her own project for a few hours. She was so exhausted from shouldering all the responsibilities of her family that she sometimes felt like she hated both of them, Piruz and Nader, and along with them, all the people on the planet. When they came back home with ten stitches under little Nader’s chin, she directed her hatred at herself for letting her Little Bird out of her sight. That evening, after Piruz explained what had happened, her hatred returned to its original target: a careless dad who had forgotten the baby while playing Frisbee.
Lying motionless on the beach, Yalda begins to feel the sun’s golden needles pricking her. She grabs her purse and puts it to the side, takes off her sunglasses, and rolls over onto her stomach. Leaning her face against her palm, she picks up a handful of sand with her free hand and holds it tight to feel its warm solidity before loosening her grip to let it dribble through her fingers.
“Poor boy! He must have a father,” said Sister Eti. They were in Essen, and it was the first time they had seen each other in fifteen years. Yalda restrained herself from saying, “How could I follow Piruz when he left his job and family to seclude himself in a tangerine orchard along the seashore?” Eti, kissing and caressing little Nader, who was exhibiting a new shyness towards strangers, repeated this remark over and over during the year they stayed in Essen.
And each time she heard Eti’s prickly reminder, she would wonder what her older stepsister, who could have been her mother with their twenty-year age gap, really meant. Was she implying that Yalda should make up with Piruz, or find a substitute for him? Yalda had chosen to be a single mother, and she found her stepsister’s comments annoying, if not offensive. To avoid a bitter argument, she refused to ask for clarification. Before arriving in Essen, Yalda had promised herself to be careful not to get trapped in any awkward conversations with Eti. She had even made a list of strictly forbidden topics: the murder of Dadash Yunes, the execution of her Nader, and the affiliations of Sister Eti’s son, Kami, with SAVAK. She had considered other potential hosts and destinations in Europe, and Eti in Essen, she now admits, was eventually chosen by her head, not her heart. In the back of her mind, she had assumed that Sister Eti’s husband had squandered away their inheritance from Agha Jun. Hadn’t he tried to invest their money in growth stock, and failed? It had always bothered her that afterward Dadashi had been forced to quit school to make a living. Nevertheless, from her sister’s perspective, family bonds came first and foremost. From Yalda’s point of view, Sister Eti was still wealthy, and her apartment would therefore be the best place for her son. His welfare was her main priority. Yalda thought that Eti would feel the same way, and that their agreement in this respect would ease the long-term discomfort in their relationship. Yalda saw two more advantages to living with Eti: her stepsister was living alone after the death of her husband, and she was not in touch with her son Kami and his family, despite living in the same town. For this, Yalda, without remorse, was thankful to someone called “that termagant” by Sister Eti. “That termagant” was Sister Etil’s daughter-in-law, who had effectively cut Eti out of Kami’s life.
Her eyes closed, Yalda runs the sand through her fingers and tries to picture her stepsister’s face. Nothing pops into her mind. She keeps trying, but she can’t seem to imagine it. Not Sister Eti in her heyday, when Yalda saw her as an intrusive older stepsister, or in Essen, when Yalda saw her as a woman who had been destroyed and was living in exile. Nor was she able to call up an image of Sister Eti in her last days, when her only child, Kami, was too busy to visit her on her deathbed and Yalda was miles away in Saint-Étienne, rushing between l’école and the lingerie store and the den in her small flat.
Even though she can’t picture Eti, Yalda can remember that she looked different in Essen. She was in her fifties, but she looked as if she had fast-forwarded to her seventies. She had craggy lines on her sagging skin, a paper-thin triple chin, flabby layers of fat around her bust, and a full head of thin silver hair. But the biggest change in Sister Eti was her new, lenient tone of voice; it had replaced the habitually stern tone that Yalda remembered from her childhood.
“Poor boy! He must have a father.”
Yalda hears Eti’s words in her head again, but now, to her surprise, she finds them wrapped in sympathy. Eti’s comment had come at the end of a hard day with little Nader—he had had a tantrum after Eti had been unable to help him climb the slide in the nearby playground. The words, disappearing with a sudden warm breeze, leave Yalda pinned to the ground. Lying on the mat with the sound of the beach in her ears, she sees herself: plopped down on the mustard yellow couch in Eti’s living room, which looked as gloomy as the dull grey day slinking by outside the window. Hearing Eti’s remark, she felt a brief panic. Her Little Bird, as still as a small statue, sitting in a W position on the floor, had his back to her and Eti and his face to the TV. Sister Eti, looking down at the incomplete crochet project on her lap, was perched on the antique love seat that had been overly decorated with small white crocheted doilies. She looked like a big-bellied Buddha, except that she was clearly unhappy. Eti’s lips, pursed together, seem to be sealed for good after her remark. The image, unable to last, disappears from Yalda’s mind. Bitterly, she remembers the fear she felt for the first time on that ash grey evening in Essen. It is a fear that has never left her: that growing up without a father would negatively impact her son.
Although she had resolved to ignore her remarks from day one, on that grey and gloomy day Eti’s words succeeded in targeting her conscience and damaging her confidence as a capable single mother. The crack was tiny and the cut was minor, but both kept growing over the years. Now, she has to admit that they hurt a lot.
Crushed dream, crushed willpower. Yalda touches the grains of sand with her fingertips, feeling the sun on her back. She rolls over to open her eyes and face the great illuminator who’s going to blind all her greedy admirers. To have her last words with the sun, Yalda sits up and puts on her sunglasses so she can maintain eye contact. The blue-green lake looks like a narrow strip on the bottom edge of the sun’s skirt.
