Dreaming in English (35 page)

This is not a question that would occur to free people, or to people who’ve never been their victims. The police do, of course. The police and the courts and the prisons suppress the sadists. This is what happens in any normal place, in any honorable country.

The Shah was brutal, too. He sanctioned torture to keep his power, as does this newest regime, but he didn’t sanction it in the name of God. He wasn’t that indecent; he wasn’t that clever. In the span of only a few months, Iran became a government of, by, and for the sadists. Even today, it astounds me how quickly this happened, at how quickly a country can lose its way.

When I was released from prison, like a porcelain doll I could smile through everything, except my mother’s death.
Who will love me when you’re gone?
I’d whisper, holding her frail hand.
Who will love me like my mother does?

Only to her could I ask the unanswerable questions.

After her death, I was utterly alone. In spite of my husband and my children and my cousins and my dwindling group of friends, I was utterly alone. I’d look in the mirror sometimes—not as I used to as a self-absorbed girl, practicing poses and pouts for hours on end—but as a woman living a lie, as a body without a soul. I’d ask the woman in the mirror, the one with haunted eyes, the one I didn’t know,
Who or what will save me now?

Today, decades later—finally—I look at the woman in the mirror, the one with gray-black hair and a new light in her eyes. Hope is elusive; I know she still has dark moments ahead of her; and I want her to remember my admonition, and so I frown at her.

Enough
, I say sternly.
Stop asking the unanswerable questions.

You can kill yourself, asking them. And this woman, with a suitcase packed, with a new grandbaby on the way, all of a sudden has a lot to live for once again. She must go, ever forward, in search of joy.

I’ve lived lazily for so many years, but now that I’m days away from leaving, perhaps never to return, there is so much I have to do! There are the practical matters, such as arranging for one cousin to check on our home, and selling our car, and taking care of some banking needs. Those are tasks written on a list and checked off, one by one.

There are many other things to do in the few days before I leave, although they aren’t written on a paper list, but rather within my heart. Like taking a subway to my old neighborhood, where I grew up, and walking the streets I used to walk—past Shahnaz Pahlavi, the all-girls’ high school I attended, when the Shah was still in power, and going to Nonvaie, the bakery where my family always bought our bread. America doesn’t have many bakeries like this, with oven pits making the bread fresh, enveloping the street with the most delicious smell. I buy a feast of bread for myself and Hamid and we enjoy it with cheese and olives, a picnic in the park. What I have for so long taken for granted now grows precious, as I see Tehran once more, finally, with the eyes of a lover saying farewell forever.

I spend several afternoons at the Tajrish bazaar to buy gifts—a mirror with a candleholder for Tami and Ike, a gold necklace for Maryam’s baby, and a silver tea set for Maryam that I will have to fit in my suitcase somehow.

I go to Behesht-e-Zahra, Tehran’s big cemetery, to visit my parents’ graves, buying gladiolas and two bottles of rose water from the attendant. It’s windy, as it always is at the cemetery, and I pass by families gathered and by women weeping in front of gravestones. I visit my father’s grave first, at the eastern part of the cemetery. He died when I was young; I hardly remember him at all. I pay my respects by washing his gravestone with the rose water, but I don’t stay long. It’s my mother I most want to honor; it’s my mother I will miss the most.

I wash her gravestone as well, and then I find a pebble on the ground and use it to tap her gravestone three times,
tap, tap, tap
, bidding her spirit to join me. The wind stills for a lingering moment, and sharply, I sense her presence. Filled with an aching longing—how can I leave her behind, who will visit her now?—I tell her about the journey I’m soon to make, about the great-granddaughter she is soon to have, and how I hope this new baby will have my mother’s kindred smile.

Maybe one day, I whisper, life will be better here and I’ll bring her to visit you. I will show her how to wash your gravestone with rose water, and while she does, I’ll wash it with my tears.

Maybe we’ll do this, Maman. Maybe we’ll do this someday.

W
here does a woman go when she has nowhere to go?

Where does she go when no one wants her?

This is my situation. America doesn’t want me, and I don’t want Iran.

You’re not going back to Iran
. Ike said this on the car ride home. It was pretty much all he said, besides,
I can’t talk about this right now.
I heard that several times; the rest of the ride passed in brittle silence. When Ike is very upset, he needs to be alone. I understand. I try not to take it personally. I only wish that I could be with him when he needs to be alone.

He drops me off at the hospital to see Maryam. He’s going to Common Grounds for what we hope is the last inspection, and after that, he’s going for a few hours to his family’s cabin on Mount Lemmon. He said we’d talk later, and he promised not to stay away all night.

I take the elevator to the seventh floor and walk down the too-familiar corridor to my sister’s private room. She’s in the recliner by the window, wearing her golden silk robe. She caresses that baby bulge of her stomach as she looks out the window and sings a song from our family’s favorite movie.
Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high. There’s a land that I heard of once in a lullaby.

She’s singing to the baby—to her baby, to our baby.

I listen from the doorway. Her voice, this song, takes me back to our childhood. For many years, Maryam and I slept in the same bed at night, and we’d sit up, cross-legged in the dark, after the lights were out, and she’d braid my hair like Judy Garland’s was in the movie as Dorothy, and she’d sing to me. This is one of the songs she sang, and when she did, she was singing about America. America was our over-the-rainbow place, where our dreams really could come true.

I’d gladly stand in the doorway listening to her sing all day rather than tell her the bad news, but she senses my presence and turns.

“Tami! How did it go?”

“We should watch
The Wizard of Oz
soon,” I say.

“We haven’t watched it together in a long time, have we?” she says. “Gosh, it must be fifteen years.”

“I really like that song,” I say.

“If I don’t sing it quietly, it’s really off-key.”

I smile. Yes, I remember this.

She smiles, too. “So, how did it go? How soon do you find out? I’m sure you did great!”

Maryam is glowing. Despite her incompetent cervix, pregnancy agrees with her. I hate to tell her. I hate to do this to her.

I cross the room, and when I get to her, I kiss her on both cheeks. “Are you comfortable? Would you like to get back in bed? How are you feeling today, anyway?”

She takes my hands to focus me on her question. I kneel in front of her. We speak first with our eyes, neither of us strangers to bad news about our family members.

“It didn’t go so well, Maryam.”

She smiles sympathetically. “You probably did better than you think.”

“No, it’s ... he already told us. He denied our application.”

“What? No!” Her brown eyes flash with surprise and anger. “You had everything you needed. You did everything right! I’m sure he was just—”

I hold tight to her hand. She’s always been my lifeline, now I must be hers. “We failed the interview, Maryam. I didn’t get my residency. I have to leave.”

Sounding like a wounded animal, she howls, “NOO-OOOOOO!”

Her room is near the nurses’ station, and within seconds, Noreen, Maryam’s favorite nurse, is in the room.

“What happened? What’s wrong?” She approaches Maryam and takes her wrist to determine her heart rate. I slip back, shaken. It’s horrible to hear a loved one wail, and more horrible yet to be the one who caused it.

“My sister has to leave the country!” Maryam cries. “She’s telling me she has to leave, but it can’t be true!”

“Oh, no,” Noreen says. “We were all sending positive thoughts your way this morning. Is there ... There’s nothing that can be done?”

“I don’t think so,” I say.

Noreen gives me a sympathetic look, probably the same sort she gives to dying patients, then lets go of Maryam’s wrist. “Don’t let your heart rate get too high,” she says. “That’ll cause stress for the baby, okay? Do some deep breathing. Center yourself.”

Maryam nods. “I think I should get back in my bed.”

Noreen stays while Maryam gets up from the recliner and climbs back into bed. I tuck close around her the peacock blue cashmere blanket she brought from home.

“This can’t be happening!” Maryam says once Noreen leaves. “Why can’t we ever get a break, just once?”

“The baby is our break,” I remind her. “The baby is our good fortune. Really, that’s the most important thing.”

“But you’re her aunt, and you have to be here! How is Baby Hope supposed to know you?”

I sit on the edge of her bed and reclaim her hand. “There’s an appeals process, but the interviewer told us not to bother, that there’s no way we’d win. He knew everything, Maryam. He had a copy of that stupid Internet ad Eva ran. He had the contract Masoud tried to make me sign. I couldn’t believe it—Haroun called the fraud hotline! Haroun did this! Plus, he was in touch with Masoud!”

“The interviewer?”

“No, Haroun! Can you believe it? Doesn’t he have better things to do than try to ruin my life?”

“I’m going to
kill
him,” Maryam says. “That stupid, nutty, fruit-cakey man. I will kill him.”

“I’ll help you,” I say. “How should we do it? Should we let a poisonous spider loose in his house so it crawls up his leg at night? That would be real justice!”

“I’d rather shoot him through the heart,” she says. “This way, we’d see him die.”

“Good point,” I say. “Only he doesn’t have a heart.”

“This isn’t
fair
!” Maryam says. “It’s not right! You were lost to me for so many years. I can’t lose you again!”

Her sobs are quiet, but her whole body shakes. This can’t be good for the baby.

“I know, I know.” I soothe her. “But you’ll be so busy with Hope that you won’t even have time to miss me.”

“Don’t say that,” she sniffs. “Of course I will!”

“But it’ll be different this time, with me gone. It won’t be so bad, because you won’t be alone.”

“It’s going to be a million times worse!” she says. “I can’t lose my sister again!”

“Well—maybe I don’t have to go so far away,” I say. “I think I have an idea. I can’t stay, but that doesn’t mean I have to go back to Iran. I just have to leave America. And if I leave on my own—voluntarily, no challenging the decision—I can come back in ten years.”

“Ten years is forever, Tami!”

“Not really,” I say. “Hope would just be turning ten. That’s ... not so bad.”

“But you could win in court, yes? Maybe the judge would let you stay?”

“How would I ever win?” I ask. “Is all that evidence against me going to magically disappear? They could have Haroun testify, for all I know. Maybe they’d even have Masoud fly in from Chicago. He’s gay, Maryam! He has a longtime boyfriend. There’s no way he was marrying me for love. The judge would just laugh in my face.”

“He’s gay?” Maryam’s eyes widen. “You never told me that.”

“I was embarrassed, that’s why! I was ashamed of myself for even considering marrying someone who’s gay just to get my residency. That’s ... It was
stupid.
The whole thing was so stupid, Maryam, and if I go to court and lose, Ike could go to jail.”

“They’re not going to send Ike to jail.”

“They could,” I say. “The interviewer told us it was possible, and I’d never forgive myself if that happened. And also if we lose, I’d never be able to come back to the U.S.—
never.
Is that a risk we want to take? I sure don’t. This way, at least there’s still hope for someday.”

“Still hope for Hope.” Maryam continues to sniffle but she seems to come to terms with the situation. “So where would you go? Canada?”

I nod. “That’s what I’m thinking. I haven’t talked to Ike about it yet, but there’s a way to immigrate to Canada pretty easily—and legally—as an entrepreneur. You just have to take a certain amount of money in and use it to start a business.” I cringe because I hate to ask for anything, but ... “I know you and Ardishir have already been so generous ...”

“This is not a bad idea,” she says. “Many Iranians go to Canada. In fact, there are so many in one part of Toronto they call it Tehranto. And it’s a
beautiful
city! Ardishir and I went there for a conference once. It’s
beautiful.
And so much more fun than Tucson! A much bigger, more cosmopolitan city. This is a good idea, Tami! We could even buy a town-house there, and I can spend summers there with the baby! And would you sell the coffee shop here, or would Ike fly back and forth, or what? You should keep them both, and be international entrepreneurs and have an international marriage! It’ll help you come back in ten years, too, if you already have a business here. Tami, this could work! It could really work!”

My heart is pounding so hard. It so badly wants to have hope again. “I don’t know if that’s something Ike would want to do,” I say. “He loves Tucson.”

“Are you crazy?” Maryam says. “Of course he’ll do it. He loves
you
a lot more than he loves Tucson!”