The Alley of Love and Yellow Jasmines (27 page)

We went to her neighbor’s house across the street and asked if we could watch the news with him. We watched in horror. We saw the people of New York running, shouting, and crying. Bewildered, they searched for their loved ones who worked in the area. I’ll never forget the image of mothers screaming and racing to their children’s schools.

I wept and felt deeply sad and sorry to have witnessed the massacre of thousands of innocent people by Muslim terrorists and the effect it might have on our children.

Our host did not let us leave until long after lunch. I was overwhelmed by his graciousness. After all, his country had been attacked by people who looked like us and were of the same religion. But he wanted us to know that he was aware of the difference and that we were always welcome at his house. Perhaps his attitude is a general one in the U.S.A. I have never been discriminated against after 9/11 for being a Middle Easterner. Still, perhaps I am just one of the lucky ones, as I know others have faced unfair searches and other injustices because of their names and the traditional Muslim garments that they wear.

Shahla left a few days later to start her Mother Miracle School in India. Today it has more than five hundred students, whose families are also cared for with the help of Shahla’s family and friends who sponsor the kids. Houshang and I are sponsoring seven of them.

A VACATION WITH
Tara was long overdue. We needed some quality time together, so the two of us took a trip to London to spend New Year’s with my brother Shahram and his family.

Tara asked me if we could go to Westminster Abbey’s Midnight Mass. I always wanted to go to one when I lived in London but never had the opportunity. My friend Pari came along with us.

Westminster Abbey’s Gothic architecture, magnificent statues, stained-glass work, and grand paintings looked even more heavenly when the church choir began singing “Ave Maria” and the spirit of Christmas took over the ceremony. We left after one o’clock in the morning, having had a divine experience. We soon discovered there was no transportation available. Pari and I had lived in London long enough to know that there is no public transportation running at that hour and that we should have reserved a car to pick us up. We had no choice but to walk all the way home. Snow covered the ground, and the trees and Christmas lights were now turned off, except for the ones shining off of Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament.

We walked down Victoria Street at Parliament Square, and kept going till we reached the queen’s palace. There was not a soul in the square when the three of us got there. We danced and whirled in the snow on ice in front of the palace and waved our hands to say hello to the queen.

We crossed through St. James Park to take a shortcut to our apartment. The park was dark, cold, and eerie. Five minutes into our walk, I knew I had made a mistake and should have taken us through the streets, but I did not say a word. Instead I tried to be funny and kept singing and encouraged them to sing along with me. Pari was dead tired and was quiet. Tara said the park reminded her of the movie
Sleepy Hollow
. She then reminded me of what I had told her had happened in the same park when I was residing in London—a man had killed a couple of people with an ax in the middle of the night.

The three of us started running. We reached Piccadilly Street and soon were close to our place. We were starving and bought a couple of sandwiches from a store that was open all night. Just seeing the cashier made me feel safe.

It was now almost four o’clock in the morning. I wanted Tara to see where I lived in London when I was a bachelorette and took a detour past number 40 on the corner of Warwick Avenue facing the canal. There was not a soul on the street when we got there.

Tara was so excited, but Pari was begging us to go home. We were about to cross the street when two thuggish-looking young guys appeared out of nowhere. One of them stopped us, and the other one stood behind us, next to the Warwick Underground station. The station was deep below the street, and they could have dragged us there if they attacked us.

Tara was standing next to me, frightened. I held her hand, with the plastic bag packed with sandwiches hanging from my right arm, and took a good hold of my umbrella with my left hand. I looked straight into the guy’s eyes and held his gaze. He was not more than sixteen or seventeen years old, but was well built.

He said he wanted sex. Calmly letting go of Tara’s hand, and not taking my eyes off of his, I showed him the plastic bag and asked him if he would like a sandwich. He laughed sadistically and shouted to the other boy.

“Did you hear sandwiches?” He laughed. He looked at me and said it again. “I need sex.”

I took a deep breath and asked, “Do I look like someone who is interested in sex, young man?” And he laughed again.

His hand was reaching for his pocket when I shouted at the other one who was keeping an eye on the street. I said, “For God’s sake, ask him to stop it. Have some dignity.”

To my relief he ordered the menacing guy to step off. We started walking away slowly and then faster. I could hear Pari’s teeth clattering and told her she should not act like a mouse when in the presence of cats. We were home within a few minutes.

I had averted a disaster by staying composed, but it was a shame that such a peaceful residential area that I used to live in not long ago had changed so drastically. I felt sad for what once was. And to think it was Christmas!

39

Sand and Fog

A
t the age of fourteen, Tara was looking more and more like a young woman. She was a teenager now. I was beginning to understand why my father was so worried when I was Tara’s age. She was an only child. Although she had many friends, I really felt guilty for not giving her a brother or a sister. Houshang and I had made the decision to have only one child in order to give her the best education and life possible. Still, it hurt me to see her sitting alone in her room surfing the Internet.

Tara was in ninth grade at LILA when she told me she wanted to go to an American school.

“Mom, I am an American. I need to go to an American school and learn the system.” She was right. As much as I loved LILA, I had to look for a new school, somewhere safe, with a good reputation, caring teachers, and large, clean, sunny classrooms.

I fell in love with Calabasas High School after a thorough search and was told that we had to live in the area for Tara to be able to attend the school. Houshang and I both knew that Tara’s education was far more important than the house we both loved.

We did not have much time before school started. I was watching TV on a Sunday, wondering how on earth we were were going to find a place in less than a month. Flipping through the channels I found a real estate channel, and there it was. I could not believe my eyes. The house for sale on TV was in Calabasas and looked exactly like what we wanted. I called our agent, and later that day we went to see the house with the rain pouring down on us. The owner was not happy to be disturbed. I took only a quick peek before telling our agent on the spot that we would buy it. It was a spacious Spanish-style four-bedroom home, with four bathrooms, a pool, and Jacuzzi out back overlooking a golf course and the mountains of the Valley. It had a huge kitchen where I would cook traditional Persian meals. The house felt immediately like home.

Tara moved in and started her freshman year at Calabasas High.

HOUSHANG HAD WRITTEN
a new play,
Our Sweet Life by the Pacific Ocean
, and wanted us to start rehearsals. I was happy to get back to work. A portrait of an Iranian family with a goth son and his girlfriend, the play was staged in 2002 and ran through 2003.

We were on our way to perform the play at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco when our caravan stopped for refreshments at a roadside café. I got out of the car, hypnotized by a book Jaleh had given me. Oprah Winfrey had recommended
House of Sand and Fog
, by Andre Dubus III, for her book club back in 2000. She told her audience that, because it was so good, they ought to buy two copies and give one to a friend, which is how I received mine.

At the café I shared with Houshang what seemed like an impossible dream. I told him that I would be perfect to portray Nadi, the wife of Colonel Behrani, if the novel I was reading were turned into a film. “If Hollywood decides to make a film out of this book one day, it would be unfair of them not to give me the role. It will prove there is no democracy in this country,” I added.

Houshang laughed and said, “You are such a political animal. What has this have to do with democracy? Who are
they
?”

Time went by, and I was chatting with Jaleh in my home office on a lazy afternoon in the heat of the Indian summer. I had recently come back from Europe and was telling her about the success of the tour and the unusual heat in Paris. The phone rang and I picked it up.

“May I talk to Soryia Abidaslooea?” the caller said.

“Wow, that sounds like my name, but it is not my name,” I said.

The caller replied in a gentler voice, “Whatever your name is, would you like to come down and sort it out?”

“Come down to where?” I asked. “And what must I sort out?”

“Come to our casting office.”

“Regarding . . . ?”

“Regarding the film that DreamWorks is about to shoot in L.A.
House of Sand and Fog
.”

A sudden rush of blood in my heart brought back the memory of the panic attacks I had suffered when I began living in Los Angeles. All I could manage to say was, “When?”

The caller said, “As soon as possible,” and asked me to audition at 10:00
A.M.
on the following day. I must have looked really bad when I hung up the phone.

“What happened to you? Are you OK? You look like you have seen a ghost. Who was it?” Jaleh asked.

I told her who it was and then we both fell dead silent.

I did not have much time to prepare for the audition. One thing I was sure about was Nadi’s rich and elegant look, the way I had imagined her when I read the book. I decided that perhaps her classic style compensated for all the sadness in her eyes.

While preparing dinner, I started working on the four scenes I would need to perform in the audition. Although I had been advised by so-called acting experts not to memorize the lines, I did what I always had. I made the lines my own by studying each and every word, and even throwing away words.

The character of Nadi was from a fairly reserved, well-off family. She was married to Colonel Behrani and had left Iran at the time of the revolution. On paper she and I were supposed to have a lot in common. But in reality we were two entirely different people. Unlike me, Nadi was quiet and shy. She was raised to get married, obey her husband, and give birth to as many beautiful, intelligent, and healthy children—preferably boys—as possible.

The writer Andre Dubus III had written enough of her background in the book for me to imagine the rest of her story, her childhood and teen years, for example. I wrote a one-page biography, as I always do when portraying a character. Then I started cutting out pictures from fashion magazines that would best represent her taste in clothing and her seemingly lavish lifestyle and placed them all in a scrapbook.

I woke up early the next day and reviewed the scenes several times until Jaleh came by to pick me up. She had said that she would take me there, so I could go through the lines with her in the car and not have to drive.

We arrived at the casting director’s office. Debora Aquila taped my audition and said she would call me. She phoned the next day and asked me to audition for the director of the film, Vadim Perelman.

My first reaction to the second call was to think of a dress or a suit that Nadi would wear for a simple lunch. Jaleh and I went to Nordstrom’s and purchased a straight saffron-colored skirt, complemented by lighter-color stitches on the sides. I also picked up a beige silk ruffled chemise and a pair of three-inch beige pumps.

Again I woke up early and went through the lines while putting on my makeup. I usually do not wear makeup during the day except for lipstick, but I was sure that Nadi would not leave the house unless she was perfectly coiffed.

Jaleh and I got to DreamWorks’s studio at 11:00
A.M
. We went through what seemed like endless, winding corridors, and finally found the room. I knocked on the door and opened it. All I saw was Debora telling me, “Oh no, you’ve got to wait for me.”

I immediately closed the door. She came out within a few minutes and took me inside. I was then formally introduced to Vadim Perelman, the Russian-American director. This would be his first English-speaking feature film. After going through a couple of complimentary words, Vadim said, “I am planning to shoot this film with no makeup on. Do you mind coming back tomorrow not wearing any?”

He said he knew why I had dressed up as exquisitely as I imagined my character Nadi would. But he had to see me in much simpler attire. When I turned around to leave, I heard him say, “And see if you can make me cry!”