Fiction

Diaries & Jallad

In the morning, K. woke up to the warmth of pleasant sunshine; a few minutes chat with his mother (who was resting her back on the living room sofa with a book of prayer, mafatih-ol jenah, to her side and sounded ill), and then after a lonely breakfast, consisting of tea, bread and cheese, he showered for about ten minutes, far less than usual. It was a small part of his new design for life to which he had woken up: to listen to the serpent-like, discordant, shriveling voices of the anti-writing self in him for once and do something different, at least for a day or two; rejected the notion of even a small indulgence by writing a postcard to his sister in Europe; was prepared for more powerful tests in the near future, tests that would agitate his determination to restore whatever equilibrium he had lost in life. He lay down on the bed naked and stared at the ceiling, breathing deeply>>>

گرگ بیابان

از وقتی امید تصمیم گرفت مینی بوس قسطی بخرد، دل تو دل زنش، الهام نبود. احساس بدی داشت. با وجود آنکه امید هزاران بار نقشه را برایش توضیح داده و گفته بود که با کار سخت می تواند در ظرف حد اکثر 5 سال قسط ماشین را بدهد و آن وقت می شوند ارباب خودشان باز دل تو دلش نبود. اصلاً به دلش برات شده بود که این کار برایشان آمد ندارد. الهام بیشتر ترجیح میداد که امید بر روی ماشین دیگران کار کند و مزد بگیرد. اینجوری فرصت بیشتری داشتند با هم باشند و هر دو بچه از اینکه پدرشان را سرحال میدیدند خوشحال تر بودند. آنها می توانستند شب جمعه ها به منزل مادر بزرگشان بروند و خودشان را برای بزرگترها لوس کنند. امید دیگر تصمیم خود را گرفته بود و شمر هم جلودارش نبود چه برسد به الهام. همه چیز در چشم به هم زدنی انجام یافت و مینی بوس 21 نفره جدید امید خیلی سریع دم در خانه آفتابی شد.>>>

Diaries & Jallad

"Valley of Lepers," K. whispered under his lips the title of his next story before entering the living room; to his own surprise, he found little difficulty in sitting next to his sister and watching television, perhaps because the content of the program, a round table on urban problems, interested him, or perhaps because he was plain curious about the identity of the female caller, who was hammering in the importance of a rail connection from Shiraz to Isphahan over the proposed national east-west highway system to connect Shiraz not only to Ahwaz but also to Baghdad and Karachi. "This will connect with the existing railway system by the proposed extension from Qom through Yezd, to kerman, to Zahedan, as well as with the existing rail facilities to Karachi," the caller said>>>

Diaries & Jallad

اجاره ی نور از اداره ی فرصت های از دست رفته

تا ماهی ها از رودخانه به دریا خودشان را برسانند مارسیا زودتر با دوچرخه به در خانه آمد. هوا نسبتا ابری توام با نور ملس خورشید بود .جلبک های سبز رنگ در حاشیه ی مرداب هواسازی می کردند. قایق های کوچک بادبانی از آن سوی دریای مانش به طرف بندر می آمدند .تا مارسیا در خانه را بزند مرده های کف دریا خودشان را به ساحل رساندند .با چشم های بی نور به سمت آفتاب دراز کشیدند و پره های بینی شان نم ماسیده در هوا را مشتاقانه فرو کشیدند. زنگ در خراب بود. چکش در با دست مارسیا به صدا درآمد. زودتر از من گربه ی خانم میشیگان پشت در بود. با هم سلامی و بوسه ای رد کردیم. مارسیا دامن سفید - مشکی گلدارش را به تن کرده بود. باسن گردش به تمامی خودش را در دامن نشان داده بود. آقای گربه خودش را به پای مارسیا یله می داد و پوست نرمش مارسیا را به وجد می آورد. >>>

Diaries & Jallad

It was past three when K. woke up from his long nap in fright. A harsh wind was blowing a branch against the window. He felt thirsty, went to the kitchenette and poured himself a glass of milk and, after finishing it, proceeded to wash the small pile of dishes and glasses in the sink, whispered in his head, "a perfect execution, yek koshtan-e kamel?! He was thinking of a poem, shaar, he had been working on in his dream, not a word of which he could remember, and also thinking of the skeptical reaction of his affable friend Ibrahim should he ever dare to boast of a perfect poem, yek shaar-e kamel>>>

Dizin and Other Memories

Skiing in Iran had a distinctly Persian feel to it. For one thing, the slopes were treeless, so there was no danger of colliding with any protruding stumps. More importantly, there were the people who were there: beautiful women parading around in the latest ski fashions from Europe with no intention of getting on the slopes; families laying out a picnic spread with lavash bread, feta cheese and herbs; and still others out to get their fill of skiing. I quickly took a couple of runs down the intermediate slopes to work out the kinks, then headed for the more advanced trails. The sun was blazing off the snow and I was working up a sweat each time I came down>>>

The Scream (4)

There was no escape for the Screaming Man and Mona Lisa. Ruthlessly pursued by hordes of paparazzi, they desperately fled from one place to the other until they eventually had to stop. Lisa was about to give birth. Holed up at the Princess Grace Hospital in Monaco, the expecting couple clasped their fingers together and began to wait. Outside, the media was waiting too. It was a siege worthy of Troy. Instead of weapons, their enemies had cameras, microphones, and wire connections. The enigmatic Italian beauty’s belly was getting fuller by the minute. Her pains had gradually begun. Speculations abounded>>>

Signs of life

The room went dark. She was still in there. It was the last incident. Unnoticeable and ordinary. Most of the similar incidents that had taken place before were as insignificant as this last one; the elevator didn’t move as she pressed the 26th floor button. The automatic doors didn’t open. The janitor, singing a song didn’t say hi to her as expected. And the night before, the driver of the black BMW didn’t see her crossing the road. The toddler at the grocery store threw a tantrum and bit her hand, but the mother never apologized. The vendor of the vacuum never tried to sell her the latest model. The phone didn’t ring in the morning. The colleagues didn’t tease her cheap sunglasses and fake Rolex. Her Boss ignored the note she sent him.>>>

Diaries & Jallad

I was bleeding, dying, living the nightmare of death stretching over me like a venomous, heavy fog, drawn deeper by every second into the dark, mercury well of nothingness. The soldier, the one who had just pulled the trigger, wanted to excel in the art of cruelty by not finishing me off immediately, just as he had Ali, whose wasted body lay next to me, both of us covered by a thin layer of snow. "Troublemaking little dogs, ha?" His words, before shooting us in cold blood, echoed in my head a thousand times. "Please, not him," I should have pleaded with my tormentor, if only my tongue had not frozen beneath my teetering teeth and a strange conviction of my immorality had not suddenly, out of nowhere, attacked my immense fears right then and there>>>

غریبه ای با ما آشنا

در کنار دریای خزر نشسته بودیم با چند تن از دوستان ،یک جائی را پیدا کرده بودیم که دور از دست پاسدارهای نسل خمینی بود. کنار ساحل دراز کشیده بودیم و به صدای شیرین دریا گوش میدادیم که ناگهان سایه شخصی را در کنار مان احساس کردیم ،من با واهمه برگشتم ببینم کیه که یکهو پیداش شد.توی دلم میگفتم نگاه کن جلادای رژیم اسلامی همه جا کمین کردن که ما را بگیرن و بندازن توی زندان. اما وقتی برگشتم ،متوجه شدم که طرف پاسدار نیست،خیلی خوشحال شدم و یک نفس راحتی کشیدم. اما خوشحالی من بیشتر به این خاطر بود که این شخص لباسی بر تن داشت قرمز با موهای بلند و ریشه های بلند که خیلی قشنگ فر داشت و فر خیلی زیبائی هم داشت.یک پارچه قرمزی هم دور سرش بسته بود .کاملا شبیه سربازهای ایران باستان >>>

Fifty Ways To Kill Your Lover

In the beginning was the word, says the Book, but which word and did a sentence follow, and was it funny or all too serious, like Him? You see, this is the question that sort of attacked me one day out of nowhere and, yet, He kept evading my question, so after a while, when I was starting to think vacation and how I should busy myself, being the most workaholic soul in the entire universe, I said to myself: I can be an author! He laughed at me of course and mocked me and eventually we made the bet -- that I would prove my literary skills by getting published by a respectable publisher and, searching the directory, we settled on you, that is why I am here>>>

سوژه ساعت هشت و چهل

یک روز یک مردعکاس که برای یافتن سوژه ای به باغ ملی رفته بود. دختری را دید که از در اصلی باغ داشت می آمد با قد متوسط و موهایی مشکی و شلوارکی سیاه با پیراهنی صورتی پر رنگ و کفش پاشنه بلندی به پا و کیف کوچکی به دست. مرد عکاس از دختر شروع به عکس گرفتن کرد و از زوایای مختلف در دوربین اش از او کادر ساخت. مرد از همه زنها متنفر بود و هیچ وقت دوست نداشت عاشق بشود ولی صورت این سوژه با همه صورت هایی که دیده بود خیلی فرق داشت. به خانه برگشت و در استودیو عکاسی اش شروع به ظاهر کردن همه عکس هایش کرد. وقتی اولین نما از صورت دختر را که دید یک لحظه ایستاد و در آینه به خودش نگاه کرد رنگش پریده بود، عکس ها را در کادر بزرگ چاپ کرد و همه را به رخت آویخت از اتاق بیرون رفت. >>>

The Scream (3)

Sure enough, David was gone from his pedestal. Soon to follow were the Venus of Milo and the Nike of Samothrace both skipping town the same day. The Thinker no longer thought. Oslo’s Vigeland Sculpture Park, once like a fully functioning city within a city, was but a ghost town. The Vatican was the hardest-hit, losing Jesus Christ from their famous Pieta. The Virgin Mary now cradled just a bunch of air where her slain son had once laid, expiring. Like their painted brothers and sisters, the marble and terra cotta and stone creatures dreamed up by geniuses from the Far East to the Wild Wild West had inexplicably disappeared>>>

In the comfort of New York strangers

The guy was Arnold Schwarzeneger look-alike, all muscles and towering over me, obviously a red neck who wasn’t used to dealing with a Spanish detective before. “Sit down, will you?” I ordered and he obeyed, casting a half-inquisitive, half-demeaning stare at me. I pulled a chair and sat across the table in the interrogation room staring back at him until he buckled. “So what’s your question?” ”Why did you have to kill him?” I asked. He laughed and said, “what the hell was I supposed to do, invite him to dinner, Mr. burglar?” >>>