Anama, Anamam!

I was car-sick. That's why I asked my dad to stop the car so I could get some fresh air. It was so bad that I had started to hate everything and anything, the smells, the book I was trying to read and myself. 

I did not know what time it was. The silver and orange colour of the twilight gave news of a drowsy and dreadful dawn. The shadows were deep and menacing. The air was brisk and cold and felt like thin, yet heavy paper on my skin. 

I walked away from the car, the desert land was inviting. The pebbles crunched under my shoes. The occasional tenacious plant rose from the rocks. 

And, the moon, full and judging against the sky and the stars. Oh, how much I hate the moon sometimes, judging me, violating me, harassing me, depressing. Always there. Boring and predictable. Palpable dread. Losing shape and coming undone every month, like the uterus of my mother.  

The neutral gray colour of the rocks and the yellow petals of the flowers. I remembered Mom. The colour composition, the harmony of the randomness of nature, the conundrum of the meaninglessness of life.  

I remember. The smell of oil paint and the mesmerizing sound of brushstrokes on canvas. I miss those moments. The evening nights, when she sat behind the canvas, mixing the paint on the pallet, and the distant sound of Azan echoing. I used to sit there and watch, as she put the paint on the virgin white canvas. The mixing of colours. The food simmering on the stove. The collage of smells.

And, the occasional sound of her silent tears hitting the carpet. I miss everything. Every. Single. Moment.

***

We were driving on a road that was almost too familiar, almost too wrong. I had packed my suitcase that morning, excited to leave. I was going to London to study.

We left the northern Gorgan city and headed to the capital, Tehran. It was summer and the wheat fields were waving in warmth. The sky was cloudy and the clouds moved large shadows on the fields. 

My dad was singing to Shajarian, almost too jarring and out of tune. With someone as great as the maestro, it's a big contrast, annoying. He loved to sing in the car. I loved to read. It could get distracting and my rude teenage brain asked him to stop, multiple times. 

He stopped the song. 

-What are you reading?

-A Series of Unfortunate Events. 

-I thought it was Harry Potter. 

-What?

-I said I thought it was Harry Potter. 

-I finished Harry Potter ten times. 

-What is it about?

-It’s a story of three orphans. 

-That’s sad. 

-Not really.

-What do you mean?

-You wouldn’t understand. I said, looking at him for the first time. 

I looked out the window. The crows were smarter than us. They almost mocked us by sitting on the scarecrows and poking at their eyes. 

Now, when I close my eyes, I can see the images of the scenes, clearly, against my mustard-colored eyelids. The blackish gray asphalt moving fast, the yellow granola fields, the family taking photos among the bushes, knee deep in the yellow and the green, the contrast of the black chador and the yellow, the child crying in his mom’s arms, the parked car in the dirt, the picnicking family by the road, the dad smiling, the mom putting a spoon in her open mouth.

A woman, mid-forties by the road, curved back, white scarf, long black jacket, thumb pointing at the end of the road, asking for a ride. 

My dad slowed the car and slowly pulled over. 

-What are you doing? I asked. 

He didn’t say anything. He turned back, reversing the car towards the woman. 

-Dad, what are you doing? 

-Helping a woman. 

-What?

He kept reversing. The sound of pebbles and rocks under the tires. 

-Don’t get it, do you think that’s safe, what if…

-You are always negative, so cynical. 

-Do not give her a ride. 

-What if I do?

-This is wrong, this is very wrong. 

-Shut up, it's rude. 

We were by the woman now. She smiled, her face was nice looking, and her eyes were big and black. Dad rolled down my window. 

-Where are you going?

-I’m going to Sari. 

-Yes, we are going that way. Get in. 

 She smelled nice. She told us that she lived in a village nearby where we picked her up. But, she did not look like a rural woman. She had a city accent. My hands were shaking a bit. 

-Do you often hitchhike? I asked.

-Not that often. 

-How do you trust people, isn’t it dangerous? 

-No, I trusted your Dad. He is with you. 

There was a big pit at the bottom of my stomach that was whirling, round and round like a whirlpool. Yet, her nice smell, her round face, the ring on her ring finger, the green veins protruding on the back of her hand, her smile, they all made me calm, somehow. 

***

My head rested against the window, the vibrations, the coolness. I was asleep, dreaming. My father’s laughter woke me up. I felt I was still in the dream. 

He was talking to the woman we picked up on the side of the road. She was telling him a story. Her voice was muffled by my thoughts. I was still thinking about the dream.

On the breath condensations on the window, I drew a house, with my finger, with a chimney and a woman by its side. My grandmother. 

I was lost in the garden of my ancestral house. I shouted Grandma, Grandma. She didn’t respond, she was not there. The sun was dying and the orange and yellow colors made me more anxious. Where is she? 

 Among the dijon monkeyflowers, there was a single rose branch with a red blossom. I smelt it, it had no smell. I tried to pick it up and felt a warm stream dripping from my finger. 

“Grandma, Grandma” I was shouting, crying, in pain. 

I had finished drawing a rose branch with its thorns on the window with my nails when the woman in the car started to sing. Her voice was as round as her face and as warm. She sang in Azeri Turkish, Sari Gelin, a famous old song. 

It is about a man who falls in love with a woman with a yellow soul. She is Christian and he is Muslim and despite their love, her parents won’t agree to the marriage. He stands over a cliff and he sings this song as he mourns. 

Mom was Azeri and spoke the language fluently, but when I played this song for her once she didn’t know some of the words, saying the words are very old, and not often used these days. They are precious words, passed down to us from our ancestors, she said. I don’t speak Azeri, but I understand some words. 

I don’t exactly remember why the woman started to sing in the car. I looked at Dad. He was probably thinking about something else because he had a faint smile on his lips. I looked at the reflection of the woman in my side mirror. She was looking out the window as she was singing, a freckle of tear slowly, tantalizingly, rolled down her cheek as she was singing the song. 

Once she finished, we didn’t say anything for a long while. It was mostly silence and the sound of the car engine. The sun was gone and now it was the beginning of the night. 

-Do you have kids? I asked her. 

-Yes, I do, I have one kid. 

-Boy or girl? Dad said. 

-A girl. 

-How old is she?

-Seven. 

-The perfect age, isn’t it, for girls?

-She is by the road, in ten kilometres, is it ok if we pick her up?

-Where is she?

-She is with her grandma. 

Who are you talking to? Dad asked me. 

The sky was black, and the street lights were on. I felt a heavy weight was off my shoulder and in its void there was anxiety and hollowness. Dad was looking at me with worried eyes, his face was dark. There was no one in the car, but us. 

***

I was the first one to see Mom’s body on the bathroom floor. She had locked the door. Until then, I didn’t know I was strong enough to break into doors. My right shoulder and arms were sore for weeks, but it didn’t bother me as much, not more than that pain, that unknown strange pain that started and was never gone. 

The woman and the child were playing peekaboo. They both were giggling. 

-Did you enjoy your time with grandma?

-Not really, I don’t like grandma. The child said. 

-Why? What happened?  

-She is too strict sometimes. They both said. 

-What did she do?

-She keeps asking me to walk a certain way, talk a certain way. Act a certain way. 

-Isn’t that good for you? 

-I don’t know, I guess. 

The woman reached to the little girl and touched her forearm, tracing a sickle-shaped scar with the tips of her fingers. 

-What is this? The little girl asked. 

-Oh, that, stop, it tickles. The woman giggled. It’s an old scar. 

-What happened? The girl asked. 

-i was in my dad’s car when a crazy guy came to the door. i got scared and tried to open the door, and the door handle cut my arm. 

-Be careful next time. Girl said. Do you like cats?

-Yes, I love kitties. 

-In the future, you are going to buy a cat, he is gray and you are going to love this cat very much. 

I was feeling very nauseous. I rolled down the window. There was a thick fog around us. 

-Do you see ahead? I asked

-Yeah, kind of. Dad said. 

-Just be careful. 

-Who were you talking to?

-When?

-When I asked you last time, two hours ago.

-No one. 

-You gotta tell me when It happens, OK? You have to. You promised me. 

-What happens?

There was a soft high-pitched whispering coming from the backseat. I turned back. Black fake leather seats, and my suitcase in the middle and nothing else. The whispering got louder and louder. 

يلا تنام يلا تنام

لدبحلا طير الحمام

روح يا حمام لا تصدّق

بضحك عَ ندى لتنام

I looked in the mirror, the woman was stroking the child’s long black hair, singing her a lullaby. It was in Arabic. I don’t speak Arabic, but somehow I could understand, somehow the words made sense, came together, formed sentences. 

Sleep Nada, sleep 

I'm about to strangle a pigeon 

Don't worry pigeon, I won't do it 

I'm telling her stories so that she falls asleep

-Mom?

-Yes?

-I had a bad dream. 

-What was it, sweet child? Tell me more. Her eyebrows knot a wrinkle in the middle. 

-There was this gray kitty, it was really cute and fluffy, I went after it and it ran away. 

She was silent, the woman. 

-I ran and ran and it ran faster and faster. There was a metal pipe by the wall— 

-— the drain pipe. 

-Yes. 

-What happened next?

-It went up the pipe. I ran after it and the tube hit my mouth. I lost two teeth. 

The woman started to laugh, it started with small chuckles and it got stronger and stronger. 

-Hey! That’s not funny. It hurt. 

-That happened to me too. She said, still laughing. 

-Really?

-When I was your age. Exactly your age. 

The woman stopped laughing. She started to hit the door handle with her palm. 

-Bad pipe. Bad pipe. 

The little girl laughed and giggled and twisted on the chair. 

-Dad? I said. 

-What?

-It’s happening again. 

-What’s happening?

-The things, the ones you said I have to tell you about. 

-Right now?

-Yes, right now. 

Dad pulled the car over to the dirt road, abruptly. The moon was large and by the horizon. It was red, like a blood orange. 

***

We used to buy a bucket full of blood oranges. I sat next to Mom, on the carpet, a knife in hand and a plate next to me. On the side of the plate, there was some dried-up yellow marjoram powder. 

We never peeled the oranges. We cut them into four wedges. Then, we would put some marjoram on it, pull at the two edges and eat it. Sometimes I cut them wrong, on the opposite side. It would make it difficult to eat the wedges that way. 

I watched her as she ate the sour oranges. Her face, scrunched, the familiar comforting contours, the essence of my life and everything that I was. I wanted to contain it, preserve it forever. In a container. Bottle up. I wanted to share the feeling with the world. The face, that youth, only existing in my memory now. No one else shares my feelings. I am an only child. I felt like I was dropped from a high-rise building. 

-Are they gone? Dad said. 

-You dropped them off, remember?

-True.

-Can you stop by a kebab stand?

A cloud of dust swayed in the headlights. We pulled over. I got out of the car, it was cold, we were in a mountainous region, high altitude, where breaths were deep and empty. 

A teenage girl approached us. She was my age. 

-Hello? Is it possible if you to give me a ride? She asked.

-Dad?

-What?

-She wants a ride.

-Who?

-She is asking you, right in front of you, don’t you see?

His eyes looked around, then back at me. I could see the light in his eyes slowly dim and then vanish. 

***

We got the kebab and then went back to the car. She got in the backseat. 

-I really love this boy, he is in my mind all the time. She said. 

-What’s his name? I asked. 

-I’m not telling you, it’s a secret, and by the way, we just met. 

-How old are you?

-Fifteen. 

-Same. 

-Cool. 

The moon was white now, and higher up in the sky. The stars next to it are like salt freckles on a dark blue table.  

-Where are you going? She asked. 

-The capital, you?

-Same. She sighed. Oh, look, there is a campfire over there

-Where?

-Look, by the restaurant, silly. 

-Oh. 

-Can we stop over, I wanna jump over it. 

-Why?

-For good fortune of course.

-Dad, stop the car.

-Why? What happened?

-By the fire, we want to jump over it. 

We stopped the car by the campfire. There were some people gathered around it clapping and dancing and cheering. An old lady with a cane and white scarf was in a wheelchair by the fire. She was looking straight at me. 

People cheered when someone jumped over the fire. A lo lo lo sound made with their mouths. Primitive and ancestral. It made my hair rise.

 The women brought silver pots and started hitting the backs of the pots like drums, the harmony of sounds, the smell of fire. 

She raised her hand toward me. 

-Come, let’s dance. 

-What? I don’t know how. 

-Come, I’ll teach you. 

  A group of young women in traditional northern clothes started to dance by the fire. They had long skirts with circular black, orange, yellow, and pink ribbons. They started to twirl and turned into colourful paper windmills. 

-Come, what are you afraid of? Easy. Let go. 

I held her hands. They were soft and warm and calming. We went round and round the fire, like moths and butterflies. She was laughing. People were cheering, around us, surrounding us, engulfed. 

An olive-skinned man with a thick black moustache, a young woman with long straight black hair and a large black spot on her right shin. A woman with golden hair and a beautiful round face. Two young tall men, smiling, side by side, brothers. A teenage girl making funny faces. The sounds stopped, silent, muffled by my heartbeats, faster, faster, faster. 

I saw the same sickle-shaped scar on her right arm. 

-Anamam?Mom? I whispered. 

***

I was sitting in the back seat when I saw Dad cry. He probably thought I was asleep because I was pretending to sleep, resting my head against the car seat. 

I saw him in the rearview mirror. I wanted to yank the mirror, pull it, smash it on the ground, step on it and turn it into small shattered pieces. How dare it show me such a sacred thing, such a forbidden reflection? 

That night was the first time I saw Dad cry. Not even when Mom died. Maybe he is very good at hiding it. 

I felt an enormous guilt take form and get larger. I was not supposed to see him. It was my fault. How dare I?

-Dad, I am feeling car sick. 

He didn’t say anything he just pulled over next to a deserted barren land. I got out of the car, my legs were numb, I stumbled over some rocks. It was very hard to maintain my balance. 

I walked and walked, deep into the void of the desert. It felt as if time had stopped. I walked and walked until my legs were sore, painful. And, in the midst of the rocks and sand there it was, next to a big rock, awkward. 

The sun was up and its joyous light was calm and warm on my face. It was time to go back to the car.