My Bird

45

114 45 I write: Dear Mahin Maman is sick. Shahla is supposed to get the results of Maman’s tests tomorrow. She thinks it’s better for Maman to lose some weight. Maman quietly says, “She wants to kill me with hunger.” I bring Maman home with me for a few days. The neighbors come to visit her. Amir advises, “Don’t let those people come in the house.” Maman says, “The son of a government minister is not as stuck-up as your husband.” Maman is weeping and puts her hand on her chest. “It hurts here. It hurts a lot.” I remember Aunt Mahboub. She also used to put her hand on her heart saying it hurt. I remember well that her hand wouldn’t go down. Instead she would move her hand toward her necklace, fixing it on her cleavage. Rubbing her throat, she would ask, “Do you know how to get rid of these tiny freckles?” She had traits that Maman doesn’t. Maman is not made of the same clay. She says, “I am afraid to have a heart attack like Mahboub.” Maman is submerged in her thoughts. You can’t tell if she is thinking about Aunt Mahboub’s death or her own. “What’s the use of being alive like Qadir?” M Y B I R D | 115 The neighbors would hear Uncle Qadir’s sobbing through the night calling for Aunt Mahboub. “Or like that blessed soul.” Then she says, “Peace upon him.” Which one of the dead is she blessing, I ask? “Mahboub. My poor sister. It wasn’t her time yet.” Perhaps she will give a second blessing too. But no. Nobody is here to pretend for. It’s only me and her. Like the night that Maman and I were awake. You were not home. Shahla was asleep. In the moonlight I could see that she was awake and I could hear Father’s voice. His voice was coming from the basement. It wasn’t a cry for help, but it was the voice of someone who was begging for something and could be heard very well in the silence of the night. How long I stayed like that, I don’t know. I was wishing for the moaning to stop. I covered my head with the blanket but could still hear him moan. I waited for Maman to get up, but she kept lying there listening. It was the sound of crying. It was the sound of pleading and weeping . The sound of pain. I half rose and got closer to Maman. Her eyes were closed. But I knew she was awake. I had seen her eyes gleam. I called her. She didn’t answer. I wanted to go downstairs, but I didn’t dare. I thought it was a dream that would end, like a nightmare that would be forgotten. Everything would come to an end. It would end right then. But it didn’t. I shook Maman’s shoulders. She turned her back to me and sobbed. I was afraid of waking up Shahla. She’d be cranky for a few days if she didn’t get her sleep. I sat in my bed. You know Mahin, to make up for that night I throw the pillow off of my face every night in my dream and go to the basement by myself. I turn the lights on and sit by Father. 116 | Fariba Vafi I still haven’t been able to forgive myself for lying down in bed hiding my head under the pillow. This is one of tens of images in which I don’t like myself, and one can’t get over something like that without love. I am stuck behind these images, on the side of the shadows, and I own all of them. How can a person get anywhere bearing all this weight? Father died that same night, lonely, like a defenseless child. I can’t write any more. I fold the letter, and put it under my mattress. ...