The Shipwrecked (13 page)

       
—No, Boss. They are not into illegal . . .

       
—You're such a simple kid. They'll pull the wool over your eyes. Anyway, put out the fire and let's go in.

There was the hiss of water thrown on fire.

A key turned in a lock. With a wool cardigan and a pair of long pants under my arm, I followed Orange Slippers to the washroom. The windows were steamed up, condensation running down the glass pane. My cheekbones were protruding and a black mole had appeared on my neck. I felt the bliss of warm water on my body when the stall door flung open. It was Orange Slippers. I slid to a corner and tried to cover myself with my hands. “Don't worry,” she said. “It is no stranger. I brought you a fresh towel. Let me scrub your back . . .”

On the way back to the cell, I plugged some courage up to ask, “Can you get me a book or some newspapers?”

“No, dear,” she said, with a chuckle, looking at me quizzically. “There may be a cost involved.”

“By the way,” she said, changing the subject, “your complexion has improved . . . such a pity.”

“How about The Book of Prayers?” I persisted.

“No, I can't do it, dear,” she replied. “Don't worry. I'll pray for you myself. But let me see.”

I lay down on the blanket still relaxed and drowsy after the hot shower. I jumped up to my knees by a loud and piercing shout. I could not tell what direction it came from. I looked around, confused. The floor vibrated briefly, as if a huge boulder had fallen on it nearby. There was the shuffle of hurrying feet and an engine being cranked to a start, followed by the sound of water sprayed from a hose under pressure.

Someone was sobbing audibly on the other side of the wall, mixed with the crowing of a flock of rooks. The sobbing had now subsided to hiccupping. By now the sunlight had withdrawn from the wall of the cell. With the handle of a spoon I scraped on the wall the face of a woman with long braids reaching all the way to the floor. Meals were now being distributed to the cells along the corridor. Behind the wall someone was chopping wood.

       
—Hey, boy, where is your boss?

       
—Who?

       
—What do you mean who? Your boss, Mr. Farmoon.

       
—Oh . . . he just left.

       
—Is the car ready?

       
—Wait. I'll go get the keys.

       
—Tell your boss to come up to the supply office tomorrow.

       
—Yes. Yes, sir.

       
—Tell him Hamed said hello.

Orange Slippers placed two boiled eggs on my plate. “I'm going to put your name down today for visits,” she said.

The skylight was darkened by billowing smoke. I had been there two weeks and this was the first time the boy stayed in the shop overnight. His singing depressed me. It made me feel like I had lost something precious.

The smell of smoke filled the air. The dry wood cracked as it burned. The howling of the stray dogs sounded different, more like growling. In the distance a loud whistle echoed in the air, as the shriek of a malignant spirit haunting the surrounding hills. My knees trembled and I felt hot around the ears. I was overcome by a vague fear.

It seemed as if the black smoke was licked away by the bright red and blue flames of a blazing fire. A dog barked as the shop door was lowered with a loud bang. There was the smell of burnt flesh. My eyes were burning and I had a bitter taste in my mouth. The wall felt hot to the touch. There was a commotion—wailing and cries of pain echoed along the corridor. I beat on the bars of the cell door with my fists. The fire howled like a wild beast. The vision of a lone woman, her mouth wide open, running toward me, was superimposed on a background of fire and smoke. I
was standing alone on the cracked bricks, sweat running down my spine. I felt a cool breeze on my face.

BEHNAZ ALIPOUR GASKARI
is an award-winning writer, and has published two short story collections, a children novel, and several articles. Her latest collection of stories,
Bemanad
, received the Mehregan Literary Award in 2010. She is a college professor and literary critic, and lives in Tehran.

¹
The accent of the natives of Azarbaijan, the northwestern province of Iran.

Intercession

Mitra Davar

THERE IS A PIECE OF FABRIC
in my handbag I can't bring myself to throw it away. There are other items in the bag that I am attached to such as books, papers, ballpoint pens, lipstick, sunscreen lotion, etc. And there are images fixed on my mind: a knife, for example, held in a horizontal position.

But it is this piece of printed fabric, with a green-and-black background, that I try to keep out of sight, hidden in my handbag. Sometimes I get preoccupied with news reports in the paper. But more than anything else I think of the printed pictures of dead bodies, some mutilated or with their entrails displayed in full color, and wonder if the world has an abiding interest in our innards! In one corner of the page there is a picture of the American president, giving speech, or deep in thought.

I wish I could write under different circumstance. Lately I have been getting headaches every time I try to write. I just want to abandon all my belonging, even the contents of my handbag, and go get lost somewhere. I
wonder how I can erase myself physically. There must be a tool for that purpose that operates smoothly. Qazaleh Alizadeh
¹
did not choose the right way: hanging herself! It would have been better if she had taken some pills, or used gas, like Sadeq Hedayat.
²
Although, on second thought, that would not have been a good way either, what with all the gas molecules . . . nasty smell . . . asphyxiation.

A writer, poet, or novelist, must choose a way of dying worthy of his or her craft, such as food poisoning, followed by severe diarrhea and vomiting, then go to an isolated place in the mountains, lie down more or less in the direction of Mecca,
³
by observing the way anthills are lined up, and let his spirit rise from his body.

I don't know why I write about death and dying. Perhaps it is because these nights coincide with the mourning ceremonies for the Imam Hussein's martyrdom.
⁴
These past few nights we have been out joining the mourning processions. My parents and my husband Afshin prefer to stand in the doorway and watch. But my kids drag me into the crowds in the middle of the street.

The passage of time fourteen centuries later has not
detracted our people from the imam's image as a martyr, or the public's longings for the righteousness of his cause.

A man shouts into a microphone of an enormous bullhorn, “Righteous!”

“O Hussein!” the crowd responds.

“Martyr!”

“O Hussein!”

The chant goes on to the deafening beat of drums and cymbals. The street is all lit up with colorful fluorescent lights. There is offering of sherbet and other refreshments. People are dressed from head to toe in black, weeping, moaning, and pounding their chests as an expression of grief. I notice two young men in black T-shirts and khaki pants. They have long, shoulder-length hair and as they move their heads in trancelike motions, the thick gold chains around their necks catch the eye. One of them executes elaborate footwork in time with the beat of the drum. I cannot take my eyes off the gold chains. My children watch them in open-mouth wonder.

All kinds of banners proclaiming religious slogans or displaying verses from the scripture are carried on the shoulders of men. They are decorated with peacock feathers and other types of ornaments and religious symbols. A woman covered in a black chador is standing next to a large and highly ornate banner. She is trying to tie a piece of fabric to it as a memento and an expression of her devotion. I listen intently as she whispers to the pole that upholds the banner. I can't hear a word.

The street reverberates to the roar of the crowd, chanting as prompted by the man with the bullhorn.

“Righteous!”

“Hussein!”

“Oppressed!”

“Hussein!”

“Martyr!”

“Hussein!”

A thin man, pulling a young calf with a rope around its neck, appears on the edge of the crowd and works his way to the middle of the street. The animal, eyes bulging, resists the move. A woman carrying a child emerges from the cabin of a pick-up truck parked at the curb.

“People,” she screams, trying to raise her voice above the din. “I had vowed the sacrifice of a calf every year on this sacred day if God gave me a son.”

She raises the baby for all to see and waves at the calf, as it is pulled laboriously to the middle of the crowd by the scrawny man. The animal looks around and stares for a moment at the carcasses of slaughtered sheep in front of the banner. After a moment's hesitation, it bolts. The thin man is dragged on the ground before letting go of the rope.

Some men run after the calf, which jumps wildly and frantically into the crowd, disappearing from sight.

A middle-aged man tries to draw away the attention of the crowd from the incident. He begins to flog himself rhythmically on his back with some lengths
of chain attached to a wooden handle. In a booming voice he recites fragments from the Shi'ite book of common prayer.

“Thou art the beginning; thou art the end; thou art the hidden; thou art the apparent.”

The words, glorifying God, are in Arabic, but they are familiar to the throngs of pious mourners.

They respond thunderously, fervently, and in unison,
“Ya man huwa!”
⁵

“Thou art the hidden; thou art the apparent. Thou art the first; thou art the last”

“Ya man huwa! Ya man huwa!”

The sound level reverberates through my body and makes my head ache. I squat down next to a tree, pressing my head in my hands.

I REMEMBER
the time when I was in love. Sixteen years after the end of the war
⁶
they found his body, wrapped it in the national flag and shipped it to a holy site for burial. I read about it in the obituary section of the paper. I could not show up for the memorial service. How could I explain my presence there? I could not even see him when he was alive. I only knew he was there, and that gave me a warm feeling.

I AM NOW
past my prime, you might say. The skin on my face is sagging and shows signs of aging. I am getting old, slowly and inexorably. My children look so grown-up. I can see them in the crowds of mourners. Nima is in the circle of men, beating himself on the back with the chains. Bita and Behnaz, their eyes brimming with wonder, are in the women's section.

“Mother,” Bita calls from a distance, “We've got you some cinnamon rice pudding.”
⁷

I push my way through the crowd, reach out, and hold the rice dish in my hands. A woman standing next to me exclaims in amazement, “Look, all the names of the Holy Five
⁸
appear on it!”

On the cracked surface of the pudding I see something like “Allah” traced in cinnamon.

“Say a prayer,” a woman whispers in my ear.

Several other women stare at the pudding in amazement.

“Why don't you have some, Mom?” Bita asks. “You love the stuff.”

“What a great man was Imam Hussein!” Behnaz proclaims. “He will still be great in several thousand years.”

“Why don't you eat?” Bita asks again.

By now the procession has started moving. The walls and storefronts along the street are covered with lengths of black fabric. I follow the procession and walk along with the crowds, trying to keep track of my children. I don't see Nima. The girls are indistinguishable among the women as they all look the same from behind: long black overcoats, black headscarves, black shoes, black pants.

A white sedan passes me by slowly. A small flag is attached to its side-view mirror. On it in red ink is inscribed “O, Fatima Zahra.”
⁹

“Nima!” I shout at the top of my voice to get the attention of my son, to no avail.

THE BLOODSTAINED
carcasses of the sheep are dragged into a stately home with its front door wide open to a spacious courtyard where a large cauldron on a makeshift fireplace is bubbling over with boiling water.

“Marjan,” my husband calls me from where he is standing near the doorway of a store.

I drop the bowl of rice pudding.

He calls to the children. Nima comes over. He points to a small cot in a corner of the yard. “That is Ali Asghar's
¹⁰
crib,” he announces excitedly.

I break out in a sweat. Bita points to a quaint-looking
old man with very long hair. “Look Mom,” she say, “that is a dervish.”

Bite-size wraps of grilled minced meat and herbs are now being passed around among those in the procession.