A love in Iran
Short story
November 18, 2004
iranian.com
Friday afternoon, November 5th, 2003. I was late
getting to TARANEH's rehearsal, and began shooting the moment I
stepped inside the room
and saw TARANEH turn a weary eye toward me mixed with happiness,
reminding me of our first encounter in Dusseldorf so many years
ago. "We have to wait for a friend," TARANEH said to
me after we were through and had exited to the hall way of the
theater house, added, "we're doing his play - about Bam."
Iranian time. We were still waiting a good half hour later, using
the time to catch up with each other. She asked if I had talked
to Jason again, and I said I did. "Is he any better?" I
nodded negatively. "What am I going to do TARANEH?" She
evaded my question, held me by the arm and said, "let's wait
outside, my be he is lost."
Standing at the mouth of the building, it was getting dark and
a bit cold. TARANEH sympathized with Jason, reminded me how dedicated
and faithful he has been to me these years, how much he loved me
and, then, asked me a pointed question, "do you still love
him?"
"Of course I do."
"Yes, but are you in love with him, I mean to say, you
may love him because he loves you, but are you in love with him?"
"No, I'm not in love with him," I startled myself
by responding so quickly, and then amended myself, "it's just
his illness. He will be in physical therapy for his MS until January,
and we haven't been with each other since last January. What if
his illness returns six months or a year or two from now, it will
be impossible to break up then, you know what I mean." She
concurred, "yes, but then again, you can't sacrifice the rest
of your life with a crippled, can you?" Of course I couldn't. "Oh
finally," she pointed at the man approaching us.
AMIR was in his late thirties early forties with specks of gray
here and there, average height, dressed in jeans and a black leather
coat, carrying a heavy computer bag dangling from his side. Apologizing
for the delay he blamed on the traffic, oh that dreadful Tehran
traffic, we then proceeded to the main street and grabbed a taxi
to the House of Arts a few minutes away.
Sitting at the outdoor café filled with young artists,
I put on my sweather I had brought along just in case and then
engaged in a conversation with AMIR when TARANEH left us to go
and find her husband SAEED. I learnt that he was a political science
professor at Tehran University visiting for a semester from California,
and that he also worked at a couple of think tanks focusing on
foreign policy issues. He asked me how long I was staying in Iran
and I said one month, and that I was going to Tibet afterward.
"Why Tibet?" He naturally wondered and I laughed and
said, "because of its fresh air, it has lots of it." May
be I should have told him that I was just looking for a temporary
refuge, to do the soul search and return to Jason with an ultimate
answer. He wanted us to get married and have children, and I didn't
know what I wanted, except that at thirty two my body's clock was
ticking and I desperately wanted to become a mother.
"Jason are you in love with me?" I asked him on the
phone later that night, when I returned to my hotel room tired
and a little depressed, perhaps because TARANEH's pointed question
had hit a raw nerve in me. "Sweetheart you know I do." I
was afraid he was going to throw the question back at me but he
didn't, may be he was afraid of asking it.
II
I had come to Iran on a mini-project for a local television station:
to produce a short documentary on Iranian women and arts, and after
two weeks or so I was in possession of enough takes for a long
movie. Narrowing down my options to several female artists - painters,
actresses, photographers - I was beginning to form an opinion after
a half dozen interviews both on and off camera. They were all creative
and first-rate, one named Shadi had had her photographs in exhibitions
at Louvre and several other European museums, another, Maryam,
was a lead actress in a popular TV series as well as director of
plays and movies, only TARANEH, who had returned to Iran a few
months ago after a long hiatus in Germany, was still trying to
make her presence felt on the Iranian scene. TARANEH's career in
Germany had had its ups and downs, and the ups included a few minor
roles on German TV, a huge accomplishment by my standards knowing
how tough it was for foreigners to break into the German TV, but
not for TARANEH who had set her eyes much higher.
III
Through a Lufthansa stewardess I ran into accidentally at Homa
Hotel, I was able to move into the ritzy home of Afsaneh and her
husband in North Tehran nestled by the mountain with a gorgeous
panoramic view of Tehran's skyline. The couple were both in their
early twenties and Babak was an avid guitarist who had accompanied
Googoosh, the diva of Iran's pop music, to her much-anticipated
U.S. tour a year or so earlier. He was thrilled to learn that I
knew Jason and immediately wanted to know if he would listen to
his tape and in case he liked it would find a distributor for it.
Jason agreed instantly and the very next day a mailman picked up
the package at home for fast delivery to Jason's address in Berlin.
And then I met my Iranian friends again at a restaurant. AMIR joined
us, late again, and told us that his head was "going nuclear" after
a whole day of meetings on the issue of Iran-Europe talks on Iran's
nuclear program. I thought at first that he was showing off perhaps
to impress me, which was why I preempted him by invoking Jason's
name and telling them about Babak and his world music. We then
went to see an art exhibition and I got into a long conversation
with AMIR about the paintings, which I found a bit controlled and
laden with explicit messages. He thought that what I found confined
was deliberate, a message from the artist about Iran's ancient
history weighing in on the present generation.
IV
I am a Catholic and my father is a former priest who was keen
on cultivating the creed in his one and only offspring. When I
was a child and we lived in Brussels, we attended his church regularly
and I listened to so many of his sermons. His one big mistake was
to let me be present when he was reading from the Book of Revelation
one day and the scary images of beasts and dragons was a long lasting
turn off my religious key. Since my teen years, I had been unhinged
from my parents' ship of religion living a secular life. For some
reason lately I was quietly, somewhere in my head, looking forward
to revisit the issue of faith and religion on a personal level,
and coming to the Islamic Republic of Iran was a mixed blessing,
reminding me of why we in Europe had gone through Reformation and
locked the gates of politics to religion, and also re-learning
the power of faith on the community of believers.
So that day at the House of Arts, when we went to TARANEH's little
apartment in Tehran Pars and ate spaghetti and meatball and listened
to SAEED's heartfelt guitar, I was freshly surprised when AMIR
rolled out an impressive book, Islam and Ecology, published by
Harvard University Press, and pointed at his chapter contribution
on "Islamic ecotheology." Looking at the long endnotes,
I noticed that he had cited Ernst Bloch's Das Prinzip Hoffnung,
and articles by Hans Kung.
"Hans Kung! I know him. He used to come to our home and
discuss theology with my father," I thundered, and this gave
AMIR the opening to share his own caveats on meeting Kung - in
Berlin, New York, and Tokyo, at various conferences on Dialogue
Among Civilizations, an Iran-inspired theme picked up by the UN
in 2000-2001. AMIR said that he worked for the UN program for a
couple of years and that one of his inputs was to organize a world
youth festival on dialogue among civilizations in Vilnius, Lithuania. "We
brought in some 500 young kids from 66 countries for a whole week
of discussions and artistic activities, but it took four months
of my time," he elaborated. We then talked about Kung and
the idea of a "global ethics" he was espousing. "Do
you think that the West could ever come to a common denominator
with the East on a global ethics?" AMIR asked me. I reflected
on the question and then tried to quickly race back in my mind
to my past travels, to Africa and Middle East, when I worked as
a photographer in charge of Pirelli's annual calendar, and then
said, "I don't think it can be done without a serious effort
to create it." AMIR looked impressed by my answer. By their
looks, I could see that TARANEH and SAEED were noticing that AMIR
and I were starting to enjoy our conversations. Then we shared
a cab back to Niavaran; AMIR stayed at the foreign ministry's guest
house and that was barely ten minutes away from my new residence
on "Kouhestan" (i.e., Mountain) Avenue. He invited me
to go to Manzarieh and play tennis with him. How little did he
know me! I thought nothing of tennis and knew only that dumb German
kids with no prospects for higher education resorted to tennis
as an alternative. But when he insisted, I relented.
VI
The next morning I surprised AMIR by showing up ready for a tennis
lesson, this after reflecting at night on the strong grounds I
had kept so long against the game. Naturally I was a poor game
and he displayed utmost patience with my errand shots into the
net or the fence. "You have the talent for the game in your
next life," he joked afterward, "but practice is really
what makes perfect." A quick shower at the club, and then
I emerged outside with a tremendous hunger. I invited AMIR to my
place and we took a taxi home. My hosts were away for a couple
of days at their Caspian villa and we had breakfast consisting
of tea, cheese and boiled eggs on the terrace, savoring all except
the nuisance of construction from all directions. It was only then
that I suddenly noticed my extra notice in him.
VII
After AMIR left me an hour or so later, I opened my diary and
jotted down these lines: "It's around noon time and my new
Iranian friend just left me after we spent a couple of hours together
that included my first try, in my whole life, holding a tennis
racket and actually hitting the ball on a clay court. I must be
opening a new chapter in my life, but I am also thinking why, and
how many chapters are in one's life? My mind is now crowded with
the assignment I came here to do, to take back to Germany a vivid
sample of Iranian females' struggle for survival in a rather inhospitable
environment. The system here allows them just as much room for
maneuver and self-development as it denies them, a peculiar mix
of autonomy and constraint."
VIII
I was not prepared for the interview and it bothered me. Mrs.
Safahinejad, searching for a clue in my eyes, paused for a moment
and then said, "may be we should do it some other time" and
then without waiting for my reply stood and left me behind in her
office kind of speechless. I walked out dispirited and mad at myself.
Once again, I had let my personal issues get on the way of my job.
Mrs. Safahinejad was one of the few top government officials
in the Social Welfare Organization, who had consented to be interviewed
only two days before, solely as a favor to her niece who played
in TARANEH's theater group. And yet, having spent the whole night
crying after an emotional exchange with Jason on the telephone,
I had stepped into the interview with only half the questions pre-written,
nothing that would escape the attention of the astute female bureaucrat
who ran her organization like a fiefdom. Per her request, I had
met her at another downtown office and had accompanied her to her
headquarters on Enghelab Avenue not too far from the mighty Freedom
Square (Miydan-e Azadi) on foot, and noticed that some people in
the street and the corridors even sort of bowed before her.
"In this country, women have made a second revolution by
taking their affairs into their own hands, and a lot of our men
are unable to come to grips with that," read her last remark
in my journal. How true.
But I was mad at myself the whole afternoon, took refuge at a
café near my rendezvous with TARANEH and tried to calm myself
down and reflect on what was happening with me and Jason. He was
always so good at reading me and my emotions, one of the principal
reasons why I liked him and felt attached to him and, sometimes,
also resented him quietly because I was unable to hide anything
from him. He called past two in the morning and sounded like he
had smoked pot, although he insisted that he was not high and everything
that he said about us was based on his intuition. "I feel
like I am losing you, that you're deliberately distancing yourself,
and I don't mean just physically but more importantly emotionally," he
told me, this after letting me know how much he missed kissing
my lips and making love to me, all those long and passionate hours
we had spent in bed months after months without ever losing even
a bit of the luster until his illness set in slowly and we were
eventually forced to celibacy. For some mysterious reason unknown
to myself I chose not to reassure him about anything, and even
fueled his concerns by telling him, "look Jason, I am only
thirty two, and I have a whole life ahead of me, what do you expect
me to say? We only know each other two years, okay two and a half
years, but what is that relative to, I don't know, ten to fifteen
or even longer, if we get married and your situation doesn't get
straightened?" I then cried and he got upset that I had dared
to be so bold with words -- that he could only interpret as another
sad sign of a deteriorating relationship. "I don't think the
ship is sinking, do you?" "Of course not, and I am sorry
if I all of a sudden sounded so cruel to you, really am, please
forgive me," I wailed, but mixed with my guilt feelings and
sorrow was also a tinge of relief that at last I had articulated
what was ebbing in my chest, which is why when I hung up the phone
I felt like I was becoming the grave digger of my own love, that
I may have opened a Pandora's Box. "It is not someone else,
is it?" Jason had asked me and I had yelled at him, "what
do you take me for, how dare you ask such a question? Why are you
doubting me?" He had no answer.
By the time I saw TARANEH a little while later, I had overcome
my anxious thoughts, as much as possible, and tried to put on a
cheery face. We went to an ice cream parlor and walked out with
ice cream cups in our hands and then found a quiet corner at a
nearby park and talked. TARANEH was celebrating SAEED's big bonus
at work, which had been promised him a good three months before,
and told me that they were now shopping around for a second hand
automobile. In my turn to recount the day I deliberately kept from
her the content of my argument with Jason. I told her about playing
tennis with AMIR and she raised her eye brows and said meaningfully, "that
is nice." And I exclaimed, "What do you mean by that?!" She
nodded with her shoulder and then after a quick pause replied, "he
is divorced you know and has a daughter." I said that I knew
that and didn't get the drift of her question. Was she implying
that I was somehow getting close to another man? "Listen,
I don't know what you are getting at, but let me stop you right
now. I have absolutely no interest in him, I mean to say, I find
him interesting as an Iranian intellectual and accomplished academic,
nothing more, absolutely not." Then it downed on me that we
were not having this conversation in Berlin or Dusseldorf, that
may be the cultural repertoire in this country lent itself to quick
judgments on even the slightest encounters of opposite sexes. "He
hasn't told you anything, has he?" TARANEH answered no and
then corrected me, "do you remember Marco and how you used
to say that he meant nothing to you at first, and what happened?
You dated him for how long?"
"Three years, but that was different. We were classmates
and I knew him from high school. Come on TARANEH give me a break,
I was a romantic fool back then and know what I am saying now." TARANEH
was finally convinced and we moved on to other subjects.
IV
"Sorry I am really busy these days, may be next week, but
then again I am going to Meshed next week. So I am afraid it has
to be when I come back from Meshed," I said to AMIR when he
phoned me a couple of days later and invited me to attend an international
conference at his research center. "Fine, but you will miss
real fine food, and also SAEED."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, I managed to convince my boss to have SAEED play
classical guitar at the luncheon. There are some foreign ministers
and ambassadors at this event you know," he sounded. "Really?
Any one from Germany?" I asked and AMIR said that he thought
he had seen the name of charge d'affair from the German embassy. "Okay,
I am coming then," I said, this after calculating that I may
be able to present my request, for information on Iran-German cultural
exchange program and who was involved from the Iranian side in
it, at the event. Still I was uncomfortable about being seen with
AMIR and, god forbid, cause both of us an unwanted embarrassment.
As I prepared to enter the plush compound of the research institute
on Niavaran Street the next day, I found myself asking the obvious, "he
is not interested in me, is he?" By the time the day was over,
however, my question had turned, "I am not interested in him,
am I?!"
X
I spoke with Dr. Berman and he sounded upbeat about Jason's health.
He and I had talked so much, and so regularly, over the past twelve
months that I was beginning to confuse him with my old therapist. "I
bet this has bruised your relations with him, am I right? Don't
worry you ‘re not the only one, a lot of my patients, even
those who are married, experience the same thing," he said. "Experience
what? What are you implying?" I said with a tinge of unhappiness
in my voice, following a sudden conviction that the news was already
circulating outside my inner sanctum of privacy with Jason. "Did
he say anything to you Dr.?" "Oh no, I was just referring
to the wear and tear of a long cycle of rehabilitation on relationships,
that's all." But I knew, remembered, what he had said earlier
and let it be.
XI
The phone rang at around midnight and TARANEH let me know that
AMIR had called her and told her that he was going to be on a TV
news program shortly. "It's in English and he wanted you to
see it," TARANEH said, putting a special accent on "you." "Really,
that is nice, but why didn't he call me himself?" I asked
and TARANEH said that he probably thought it was too late.
It was the opinion section of World Today: U.S. Edition, and
AMIR handled the interview, on Iran's nuclear issues, masterfully
and with a measured degree of sophistication I had come to expect
from him after observing him at the conference. Then for a moment,
as I studied his face and facial and bodily language on the small
TV in my room, I wondered if he was thinking of me, if he was wondering
whether or not I am watching him at that very moment and, if so,
was he trying to impress me, and why? Was he trying to befriend
me in order to sleep with me? Or was it something else? I fell
sleep with the TV on and woke up a while later by the parasitic
noise that had followed the end of regular programs; after turning
it off I noticed my diary at a corner of the night table peeking
at me. "What do you want? Attention? Okay I am going to give
you a little attention now, come here?" A few purposeless
lines as a substitute for the day's entry, and then I dropped it
and the pen in exhaustion and went to a badly needed sleep, only
to wake up again after a brief nightmare: I dreamt I was racing
back to Germany, rushing past the passengers in the airport looking
for Jason, and when I saw him on the wheelchair pushed by a friend,
anguish filled me heart and I wished I had stayed behind. "How
can you be so cruel in your own dreams?" I besieged myself.
The sky was turning milky white and the sound of roosters soon
mixed in with the call for prayer, azan. I then felt like talking
to my old man like never before.
XII
German manners, or rationalism, versus Iranian eastern sentimentalism.
Like acid and water, do they ever mix? AMIR had accompanied President
Khatami to Berlin in 2000 and once recounted the trip to Goethe's
town and Mr. Khatami's unveiling of a bust of Iranian poet, Hafez,
apparently revered by Goethe. So I picked up an English translation
of Hafez from a bookstore recommended to me by TARANEH and began
reading it for several minutes before finding it kind of incomprehensible
in most parts and, a clue to my mood, too much to handle, given
its propensity for flowery descriptions. I would later find out
that a lot of Iranians despised that particular translation as
doing a major disservice to Hafez. But the damage had been done.
In fact, quietly, as I was entering the third week of my stay and
getting geared to go to Meshed, beginning to feel somewhat bored
and yearned to return to Germany as soon as possible.
But why was I getting bored when the exposure to the Iranian
culture, architecture, and so many nuances of life, was so fascinating?
I did a soul search and concluded that I was experiencing a mild
depression, hopefully a temporary one, but it wasn't, which was
why I had screwed up the interview with Mrs. Safahinejad in the
first place. It was that damned relationship, which had forced
me to temporarily vacate out of Germany and take a critical distance
from Jason in the guise of a TV documentary. Truth was I was losing
interest in my own project, felt like an expired tire that was
flattening out. And then I received an email from Jason that read
in parts: "I walked a lot today and it felt great, better
than ever before. The numbness is diminishing more by the day and
I really surprised the heck out of Berman. He told me you had called
him." I immediately called him and we talked a long while,
and paid a dear sum to the man at the internet café since
I had failed to terminate my session. Only when I returned to my
room and reflected on our conversation did I slightly doubt the
veracity of Jason's remarks about his health. Was he putting me
on, given the fact that Dr. Berman had not given me any major hint
of a breakthrough? Or may be it was true and Jason was using his
will power to be healthy again faster than expected? I couldn't
rule out the possibility of a major fake however. At any rate,
the whole thing was getting a bit out of control - I remembered
our conversation when I told him of my decision to go away a couple
of months, enough time to make a decision, I keep telling myself,
as if my decision is yet made.
XII
A lovely dinner party at the home of parents of my hosts, a few
kilometers outside Tehran. There were some forty or so guests,
almost all cousins and aunts and uncles of each other, and all
of them arriving in latest models Mercedes or MBW and the like,
the girls shedding their head scarves at the door and displaying
their chic outfits. One, whose name I cannot recall, was barely
twenty and spent the whole time on the phone with her boyfriend.
Another even younger and spoke fluent English in royal British
accent, a result of her boarding education in Essex. And then I
met their cream of the crop, their young author, Haleh, shy, slender
and soft-spoken, with a slight ability in German. She had authored
a best seller book dealing with run away girls in Iran and the
whole family was very proud of her. To my disappointment, Haleh
did not show any interest in being interviewed on camera by me
and I attributed that to her shyness. At one point, while I was
randomly browsing through a newspaper in their quaint library,
I noticed AMIR's photo and asked someone to translate for me. "It
says Dr. Afrasiabi's exclusive interview with Iran Diplomatic Editors." But
I hadn't heard from him I suddenly noticed, wondered why?
The question bothered me even more when another couple of days
passed by and I concluded that AMIR was probably too busy to think
of me. "Have you seen AMIR lately?" I asked TARANEH on
the phone and she said that she had not. "I called at his
office and left a message yesterday and he has not replied," TARANEH
said and then, as if sensing my feelings, inquired, "why?"
"Nothing. I just find him a bit interesting, that's all.
He is a nice conversationist." I had finally verbalized something
to TARANEH that verified her suspicion and she laughed and said, "Oh
I see." Sometimes a remark like that speaks volumes and I
chose not to rebut her then. "So you're all set to leave at
the end of the month?"
I replied, "yes, unfortunately."
"Let me see. That's nine days from now, right?"
"Right," I said with a visible tone of sadness, "and
I ‘ve decided to cancel Tibet. I think I should be near Jason."
XIII
Jason was elated that I was returning earlier than scheduled
and that things were looking bright again. He also sounded positive
about his situation and I chose not to double check with Dr. Berman,
focusing instead on the last remaining interviews and the finishing
touches for my documentary. Several days passed and one day I took
time off to do my gift shopping and found a nice a portrait on
camel skin that was bound to bring joy on my mother's face. For
my father I got a couple of small Persian rugs right outside Tajrish
square. At night I joined TARANEH and SAEED and Maryam and a few
other friends from the theater group, but there was no sign of
AMIR. "We haven't heard from him," said Maryam. "May
be he is out of the country or in another part of Iran," I
said and Maryam immediately corrected me, "no I don't think
so because one of my friends is his student at Tehran University
and just the other day was telling me what a fabulous teacher he
is, although a little absent minded."
IX
My departure was now three days away and I had to go to the main
office of Lufthansa near Ferdowsi Square in order to re-confirm
my ticket. The lady I spoke there gave me a hard time initially
by insisting that it was three days prior to the departure day,
which in effect makes it four days, and that the flight was overbooked
and I needed to postpone for another four days. But she finally
relented after I put my foot down and insisted that my TV program
would be jeopardized if I did not leave on time.
On my way home suddenly an idea downed on me and I asked the
taxi driver to take me to Tehran University. I was stopped at the
main entrance by the campus guards and only after a couple of students
assisted with translation - I told them I was going to meet with
a professor there - did they let me in. A few minutes wandering
around in the drab campus fenced in from all sides, and then I
was inside the law and political science building buzzing with
students. With help by a kind secretary, I knocked on AMIR's office
after noticing his voice from the inside, this after a long pause
that nearly caused me to turn around and leave.
"Befarmaid."
I totally startled him and he half raised himself on his chair,
looking a bit grubby, and with a faint voice said, "hallo,
what a surprise."
"Well, I was in the neighborhood and since I am leaving
in a couple of days and hadn't seen you, I thought I should stop
by to say good bye."
AMIR reflected on my statement for a moment and then as if still
in a minor shock, swallowed and said, "so nice of you. Please
come in and close the door behind you."
I sat in front of him, for a moment thinking of myself as one
of his students. His desk was cluttered with papers and he was
obviously working on a project feverishly. "Looks like you're
very busy," I said and he threw his hands in the air and replied, "what
can you do? It's the nature of the beast."
"Right," I said nervously, and then asked, "what
beast?"
"I am sorry?"
"You said beast and I was wondering what you meant by that?
Do you mean teaching?"
"Well," he paused, to my surprise, and then looking
down from my eyes, said, "not quite."
"No?! What then?"
"You don't want to know, trust me," he said, looking
at me again. His phone rang and he picked up and spoke in Farsi
for a couple of minutes and stood in a rush and said, "I am
sorry, but there is problem with a fax I wanted to send. Apparently
the Department's chair has to approve every fax and since he is
not here today they refuse to send it, so if you don't mind I ‘ll
just go and straighten this and be back in a few minutes."
I got up and gestured to leave, "that's okay. I didn't mean
to interrupt your work. As I said I just came to say good bye."
"Nonesense. You just got here. Please sit and make yourself
comfortable. I will have the janitor bring you some tea if you
like, okay?"
"Okay then," I sat. Before he left he gathered the
papers tucked them underneath a folder on his desk, told me to
dial one first for dial up in case I wanted to use the phone. I
waited, asking myself why I was there really? After a couple of
minutes, I got up and stood behind his desk and dialed a number
- my host's to see if I could get them anything on the way over
- and after leaving a message with the nanny who barely spoke a
foreign word, I was about to return to my spot when my eyes caught
the sight of the papers and I removed the folder and was shocked
to see my name on top.
It was all letters that he had jotted down without bothering
to give me, and one read in the bottom lines: "So it is a
dictate of my mind over my heart that I suppress my feelings and
refuse to be another helpless victim of an impossible love." Hearing
a noise, I looked up and saw, to my relief, a male student and
told him to come back later. I then quickly sat on a chair and
then got up and repositioned the papers in their original place
and, after a couple of minutes, he walked in.
"Did you send it?"
"Yes," he said laughing, "unbelievable. It's
a mad bureaucracy here that would make Max Weber cry in his grave.
Imagine. The department's chief must review and approve every single
fax from this damn place."
I got up and using the excuse of the airline rushed out after
a hasty exchange of good byes. Quickening my steps to get out of
there, I suddenly stopped myself and went right back into the building
and his office, opened it without a knock and found him holding
his face in his hands totally depressed. As he raised his head
in disbelief, I pointed at the papers still tucked under the folder
and said, "I read them."
 It was a most unsettling moment of scrutiny. With his right hand's
middle finger between his lips he just stared at me without uttering
a word. I closed the door behind me and took a step toward him
and said, "you were never going to let me read them, were
you?" He shook his head negatively, and I said, "may
I sit?" He gestured me to sit and then pulled his fingers
into his forehead for a moment that bespoke of immense difficulty
for him to articulate his thoughts into words. And then I said, "I
wondered what happened to you and why all of a sudden didn't hear
from you."
"Now you know."
"Now I know."
He turned his face toward the window and in a barely audible
voice uttered, "now your curiosity has been satisfied, you
can go."
"Oh I see." There was a knock on the door and a girl
stepped inside and handed AMIR a couple of pages of paper, apparently
his faxes, and then left. On the way out, she gave us a puzzled
look. I got up and looked out through the side window.
"Don't you think I was entitled to know?"
"I don't know what to think. As you can see, it hasn't
been easy." His hands pointed at his unshaved face and his
overall shabby appearance of a man badly sleep deprived. "I
haven't had a good sleep in a while."
"Why?"
"Because of you."
I was unsure what to say or do next, decided to simply pick up
my purse and leave and, yet, a couple of steps shy of the door
turned around and asked, "what about me?"
"I don't know. I mean I don't know how to explain it. It's
been a lightning, quickening, of wells of emotions that somehow
popped open when I first saw you," AMIR almost whispered, "and
then knowing your situation I decided to keep it to myself and
suffer it alone. It's me only any ways so why should you be inflicted
by this -- nonsense."
"You can call it whatever you want, but not nonsense," I
retorted, "besides, why do you think I am here - if you're
so sure that it's just you -- professor?"
AMIR was unprepared for my last statement that came out of my
mouth without thinking, without a self-censor, without qualification,
like words that speak not the feelings inside but also pave the
way for them. "I like to read them if you don't mind, do you?"
He shrugged indifferently and handed the papers to me still sitting.
I sat down and read one of them loud:
"It's four in the morning and I haven't slept a wink thinking
of you, just as I have been every moment of this past couple of
weeks driving myself to insanity. I wish I had the power to come
to your door and Romeo-like confess my love to the attentive ears
of the whole world, and see your face emerge through the window
and simply smile. What preposterous thought, what madness, when
I know without a shred of doubt that you are in love with someone
else and your brief trip will be over soon, no time to leave an
ever-lasting imprint except the ashes of my soul that has been
burning uncontrollably like a forest fire engulfing my entire being.
I am lost without you and don't know why, how it happened, and
so quickly, and without any direct input from you, except the input
of your natural beauty and your inner loveliness, or purity, the
very purity of your sentiments so vividly reflected in your photos
from Africa, the unique ability to get through your lenses the
depth of human soul intermingled with brute nature. That you are
my dream woman I have no doubt, that I am the wrong man for you
I also have no doubt, and there lies the utter futility of this
mad endeavor of the heart that has enslaved me for days now, turning
my stomach upside down whenever I think of you."
 I put down the papers on the table and broke into tears, he came
near me and first touched my hair and caressed it and then raised
my chin and with his searching brown eyes glared into my tearful
eyes and wiped my tears away and then kissed me above my lips and
then my lips.
Author
Kaveh Afrasiabi has a Ph.D. in political science. He has
authored a number of books, fiction and non-fiction, and numerous
articles -- including the Harvard Theological Review, Middle
East Journal, UN Chronicle, and The New York Times. He
is the author of: After
Khomeini: New Directions in Iran's Foreign Policy (Westview Press,
1994).
.................... Spam?! Khalaas!
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