Rooftops of Tehran

Stoning the Prostitute

61 Stoning the Prostitute The first and last time your father slapped you, you were ten. Angry, fed up with being a child, not heard, not seen—a girl—you threatened to run away to Shahreh-Noe, the New City, a forbidden place older girls talked about at school. That’s when your father’s large hand, like an angry tree branch left a mark on your cheek. You were banished to your room—no dinner, no friends forever, no breathing the air outside your home, no sun, no moon, nothing. You didn’t know the New City wasn’t a city. Didn’t know the ways of women ruled by men, hunger and despair. Today you saw her picture in the paper . . . a woman who looks like you. This is the way of men and large hands. You, slapped away from harm, she, slapped into it, her legs forced wide from age eight to eighteen, and now . . . Let the sinner get what she deserves. ...