The Book of Fate (48 page)

I asked Mansoureh's husband for help. A few days later, he told me the smugglers who had taken Siamak and Ardeshir across the border had all been arrested and severe border controls were now in force. And from others I heard about boys who had been arrested while trying to leave the country and about smugglers who had taken the money and abandoned the boys in the mountains or the desert.

‘What's all the grieving for?' Ali said maliciously. ‘Is your kid any better than other kids? Just like Gholam-Ali, they all have a duty to fight for their country.'

‘The likes of you should fight because you benefit from the blessings of this country,' I retorted. ‘We are strangers here, we have no rights. You have all the money, status and comfort, but my son, with all his talent, does not have the right to get an education and to work. He is rejected by every selection committee because of his relatives' beliefs, which he does not share. Now, tell me, in deference to which religion does he have to die for this country?'

At the time, my only logic was that of protecting my child and I was at a loss. I could not find a safe and reliable means of sending him out of the country. And Massoud would not cooperate at all and constantly argued with me.

‘Why are you so panicked?' he asked. ‘Two years of military service is not that long. Everyone has a duty to serve and I will serve, too. Afterwards, I can get a passport and leave the country legally.'

But I could not accept that.

‘The country is at war! It's not a joke. What will I do if something happens to you?'

‘Who says everyone who goes to war will be killed?' he said. ‘There are all these kids coming back healthy and in one piece. In the end, there is a risk in whatever we do. Do you think escaping the country illegally is any less dangerous?'

‘But many boys also die. Have you forgotten Gholam-Ali?'

‘Come on, Mother. Don't make things so difficult. What happened to Gholam-Ali has terrified you, but I promise to come back alive. Besides, by the time I am called to serve and have finished my training period the war may have ended. And since when have you become such a coward? You are the only woman I know who is not afraid of the sirens and the air raids. You used to say, “The chance that our house will be hit is as great as us getting into a car accident, but we don't spend every day worrying about car accidents.”'

‘When you and Shirin are with me, I am not afraid of anything,' I explained. ‘But you don't know the horror I feel when the sirens go off and I am not with you. And now, if they send me to the front with you, I will have no worries and no fears.'

‘Really! What nonsense. Do you expect me to tell them I won't go anywhere without my mother? I want my mummy?'

It was always like this. Our arguments would end with jokes and laughter and a kiss on the cheek.

Finally, the day arrived when together with thousands of other young men Massoud left for military training. I tried to remain optimistic. My days and nights were like an open prayer rug before God and my hands were raised in supplication for the war to end soon so that my son could return home.

The conflict had been a part of our lives for seven years, but I had never so profoundly felt its horror. Every day, I witnessed the funeral processions for the martyrs and I wondered whether the number of casualties and wounded soldiers had suddenly increased, or whether there had always been that many. Wherever I went I now came across mothers in the same circumstances as me. It was as if I could instinctively identify them. Having surrendered to fate, we consoled each other in choked voices and with fear in our eyes, all knowing we were terrible liars.

Massoud completed his training period, but there was no sign of a miracle and the war didn't end. My efforts to have him assigned to a less dangerous location were useless, so one day I took Shirin's small hand and we went to see him off to the front. Dressed in his uniform, Massoud looked older and his kind eyes were filled with apprehension. I could not hold back my tears.

‘Mum, please,' he said. ‘You have to control yourself, you have to take care of Shirin. See how strong Faramarz's mother is, see how calmly the rest of the parents are saying goodbye to their sons?'

I turned and looked. To my eyes, the mothers were all weeping, even though they shed no tears.

‘Don't worry, my dear,' I said. ‘I will be fine. I will calm down in an hour and in a few days I will get used to you being away.'

He kissed Shirin and tried to make her laugh. Then he whispered to me, ‘Promise me you will be as beautiful, healthy and strong by the time I come back.'

‘And you promise me that you will come back unharmed.'

I kept my eyes on his face until the last possible moment and impulsively ran alongside the train as it moved out. I wanted to etch the lines of his image in my memory.

It took a week for me to accept the fact that Massoud was gone, but I did not get used to it. I not only missed him and worried about the danger he was in, but I felt his absence daily. With him gone, I suddenly realised how much of a partner he had been and what a heavy load he had lifted from my shoulders. I thought about how after a short time we selfishly deem someone's help to be their obligation and we forget their generosity. Now that I had to do everything on my own, I appreciated everything Massoud had done for me and my heart ached each time I did a task that used to be his.

‘I was devastated when Hamid was executed,' I told Faati. ‘But the truth is that his death had no effect on my everyday life, because he had never accepted any responsibilities at home. We mourned the passing of a loved one and a few days later returned to our normal routine. The absence of a man who helps and participates in family life is far more tangible and to the same degree much harder to get used to.'

It took three months for us to learn how to live without Massoud. Shirin who had always been a cheerful girl didn't laugh as much and at least once a night she would find an excuse to sit and cry. I found my only peace in praying. I would sit at my prayer rug for hours, forgetting myself and everyone around me. I would even forget that Shirin had not had any dinner and I would not notice that she had fallen asleep on her schoolbooks or in front of the television.

Massoud called us whenever he could. Every time I talked to him my mind was at ease for twenty-four hours, but then anxiety would set in again and, like a stone rolling downhill, gain strength and speed with every minute that passed.

When two weeks had gone by with no news of him, I was beside myself with worry and I started calling the parents of his friends who had been sent to the front with him.

‘My dear lady, it is too soon to be worried,' Faramarz's mother said matter-of-factly. ‘I think the boy has spoiled you. It is not as if they are at their auntie's house and can call home whenever they want. Sometimes they are posted in areas where for weeks they don't have access to a bath, much less a telephone. Wait at least a month.'

A month with no news from a loved one who is under a shower of bullets and shells is difficult, but I waited. I tried to fill my days with work, but my mind would not cooperate and I could not concentrate.

Two months went by and I finally decided to make inquiries at the military department responsible. I should have done it sooner, but I was afraid of the answer I might have received. With trembling legs, I stood in front of the building. I had no choice; I had to walk in. I was directed to a large, crowded room. Men and women with pale faces and bloodshot eyes were standing in line for their turn to be told where and how their children had perished.

When I sat in front of the administrator's desk, my knees were shaking and the sound of my heart pounding was echoing so loudly in my ears that I could hardly hear anything else. For what seemed like an eternity, he leafed through his notebooks and then asked, ‘What is your relationship with Private Massoud Soltani?' My mouth opened and closed several times before I was able to tell him I was his mother. He didn't seem to like my answer. He frowned, looked down and again leafed through his notebooks. Then, with feigned kindness and reverence, he asked, ‘Are you alone? Is his father not with you?'

My heart was about to leap out of my throat. I swallowed hard, tried to hold back my tears and in a voice that sounded unfamiliar to me, I said, ‘No! He has no father. Whatever it is, tell me!' And I half screamed, ‘What is it? Tell me what has happened!'

‘Nothing, ma'am, don't worry. Stay calm.'

‘Where is my son? Why haven't I heard from him?'

‘I don't know.'

‘You don't know?' I cried. ‘What does that mean? You sent him there and now you tell me you don't know where he is?'

‘Look, dear mother, the truth is that there has been heavy military action in the region and parts of the border have exchanged hands. We still don't have accurate information about our troops, but we are investigating.'

‘I don't understand. If you have taken back the territory, then you have found things there.'

I could not bring myself to say ‘bodies', but he understood what I meant.

‘No, dear mother, so far no body has been found with your son's identification tags. I have no further information.'

‘When will you know more?'

‘I don't know. They are inspecting the area. It is too soon to comment.'

A few people helped me get up from the chair, men and women who were waiting to hear similar news. A woman asked the person ahead of her to keep her place in the line and helped me as far as the door. The queue was just like the ones people stood in for subsidised food and supplies.

I don't know how I made my way back home. Shirin had still not returned from school. I paced the empty rooms and called out my sons' names. My voice reverberated through the apartment. Siamak! Massoud! And I repeated their names louder and louder as if they were hiding somewhere and calling them would make them answer me. I opened their closet. I smelled their old clothes and clutched them to my chest. I don't remember much else.

Shirin found me and called her aunts. They brought a doctor who gave me an injection of sedatives. Restless sleep and dark nightmares followed.

Sadegh Khan and Bahman continued to investigate. A week later, they said Massoud's name was on the list of soldiers missing in action. I couldn't understand what it meant. Had he turned to smoke and disappeared? Had my brave son perished in such a way that nothing remained of him? As if he never existed? No, it was not logical. I had to do something.

I remembered one of my colleagues saying that one month after his nephew disappeared in the war they found him in a hospital. I couldn't sit and wait for the bureaucrats. I wrangled with my thoughts all night long and in the morning I got out of bed having made a decision. I stood under the shower for half an hour to get rid of the effects of the sedatives and sleeping pills, got dressed and looked at myself in the mirror. So much of my hair had turned white. Mrs Parvin, who had stayed with me during those dark days, looked at me with surprise and said, ‘What is going on? Where are you going?'

‘I am going to search for Massoud.'

‘You can't go alone! They will not let a lone woman go to a war zone.'

‘But I can search the nearby hospitals.'

‘Wait!' she said. ‘Let me call Faati. Perhaps Sadegh Agha can arrange his work and go with you.'

‘No. Why should that poor man neglect his life and work just because he is my brother-in-law?'

‘Then ask Ali, or even Mahmoud,' she insisted. ‘No matter what, they are your brothers. They won't leave you all alone.'

I laughed bitterly and said, ‘You know that is rubbish. In the most difficult moments of my life they abandoned me more than any stranger would have done. Besides, I need to go alone. This way, I can take my time and search for my innocent child. If there is someone with me, I will end up having to come home, leaving my search unfinished.'

 

I took a train to Ahvaz. Most of the passengers were soldiers. I shared a compartment with a couple who were also searching for their son. The difference was that they knew he had been wounded and was in a hospital in Ahvaz.

Spring in Ahvaz was more like a scorching summer and it was there that after almost eight years I finally grasped the true meaning of war. The tragedy, the suffering, the devastation, the chaos. I saw no smiling face. There was commotion everywhere with people bustling about, but just like gravediggers and mourners at a burial, their movements and expressions were devoid of any joy or spirit, and a constant fear and veiled anxiety hovered deep in their eyes. Everyone I talked to was somehow bereaved.

I went from one hospital to another with Mr and Mrs Farahani whom I had met on the train. They found their son. He had been wounded in the face. The scene of the father and mother reuniting with their son was heart wrenching. I told myself, If Massoud has lost his face, I will recognise him by his little toenail. It wasn't important if I found him crippled and missing an arm or a leg. I just wanted him to be alive so that I could hold him in my arms again.

Seeing so many wounded, disabled and maimed young men shouting in pain drove me mad. My heart broke for their mothers and I wondered, Who is accountable? How could we have been so unaware, thinking that those air raids alone constituted the war? We had never understood the depth of the calamity.

I searched everywhere, going to different military offices and departments until I finally found a soldier who had seen Massoud on the night of the military operation. The young man's wounds were healing and he was about to be transferred to Tehran. Trying to smile reassuringly, he said, ‘I could see Massoud, we were advancing together. He was a few steps in front of me when the explosions started. I was knocked unconscious. I don't know what happened to the others, but I have heard that most of the casualties and martyrs from our squadron have already been found and identified.'