Song of a Captive Bird Page 20

  * * *

  “Here we are,” said Leila as she led me into the room.

  After we left the Rezayan Clinic together, Leila drove me to her house. She’d prepared a room for me across the hall from her own bedroom. It was a small but bright room with a wooden platform bed, a chest of drawers, a small desk, and a chair. In an armoire I found a new green silk dressing gown and a pair of matching slippers; soon a row of pretty dresses, blouses, and skirts would hang there, too. From the window I could see past the walled garden and over the trellises and trees. Beyond that, there were mountains.

  That first night, Leila stayed with me until I fell asleep. When I opened my eyes again, it was completely dark. I made my way to Leila’s room, where I stayed awake long enough to hear her tell me I’d been sleeping for two full days, and then I fell asleep again.

  One afternoon, when the pills finally began to wear off and I started to feel stronger, Leila took my arm and walked me through the house, showing me all the rooms one by one, from the parlor to the kitchen, until we reached the library. I followed her inside. Books were everywhere, spilling off side tables, heaped in stacks on the couch, piled in every corner.

  I could feel her looking at me as I took in the room. “I hope you’ll be comfortable here,” she said. “The bathroom is just down the hall. My housekeeper will come down in a little while, and if you’re hungry or thirsty you can ask her to bring you something. I’ll be back at four, sooner if my appointment ends early. All right, Forugh?”

  I nodded. “This is perfect,” I said. “Thank you.”

  I sank into a leather armchair by the window, and for a long time I just listened to the quiet. The only sound was the soft breeze brushing against the windows. This was a different silence from the Rezayan Clinic. There the silence was oppressive and heavy with terror and pain. Here the silence was pleasing; it soothed me, eased my fears.

  “Hungry?” said Leila when she appeared in the doorframe later on, stretching her arms above her head with the lush movements of a cat. I wondered why a servant didn’t prepare her meals, but as soon as she struck a match to the stove it became clear how much she loved to cook. I watched her from my perch on a kitchen stool. The shelves were piled high with bowls and pitchers, jars of honey, herbs, and spices, along with jugs of wine. From time to time she looked over her shoulder to make a point or to gauge my response to some story she was telling. I felt shy in her presence, and mostly I was quiet, listening and watching her.

  Dinner was a simple meal of whitefish and a rice pilaf with fresh herbs. I devoured two plates. It was strange to be waited on, but Leila did it so offhandedly, with so little ceremony, that it seemed like a natural extension of our conversation. Afterward, we sat cross-legged beside the fire, and then, with each of us cupping a large glass of sugared tea in our hands, she told me something of her history.

  “My father was a Qajar prince,” Leila began. “One year he went south to put down an uprising on his family’s ancestral lands. When he came back, he brought my mother as his new bride.” She tucked a cube of sugar into her mouth, took a sip of tea, and continued. “He was sixty-three, husband to nine wives, father to several dozen children, and his father’s heir. She was a thirteen-year-old, black-eyed, olive-skinned Bakhtiari girl from the provinces.”

  As she spoke, I looked around the room. The brightly colored knotty wool carpets, the two thick rows of gold bangles on her wrists, her bare feet and mass of dark curls—I now understood that all this had come to her through her mother’s tribe.

  “What was she like, your mother?”

  “Sweet-tempered and quiet, but brave in her way. When the other wives snubbed her, she didn’t make a fuss. She always did as she pleased and gave me freer rein than the other girls. My brother, Rahim, and I were the only twins in the harem. I made a pet of him when we were little. He followed me everywhere, which was a problem when the time came for him to begin his studies.”

  “Why was that?”

  She smiled. “Whenever a tutor came for him, Rahim refused to leave my side, so I just went along with him. I think I learned more than he did—I definitely enjoyed the lessons more, especially the poetry lessons. There was a period of time—about a year—when I copied all of Sa’adi’s poems by hand. My father’s other wives thought it was ridiculous, educating a girl as if she were a prince, but I think it pleased my mother to shock the older pious wives.”

  “And your father indulged her in allowing you to study?”

  “In a way. He was so old by then that he barely noticed what she was up to. And then, when we were thirteen, he died.” She hesitated, furrowing her brow. “My mother passed away a year later. She was quite young. It didn’t make sense. It still doesn’t.” She shook her head slightly, and I saw that the pain was still alive in her. She cleared her throat and continued. “Rahim was sent abroad to boarding school. It seemed cruel, sending him so far from home, but the family had decided, and there was nothing for it.”

  “What did they decide for you?”

  “Marriage,” she said. “What else?”

  “And did you marry?”

  She shook her head. “No, though I suppose I wanted to get married, or at least be courted. The trouble was that none of my father’s wives took much interest in arranging my marriage. For one thing, they had their own daughters to worry about. Anyway, a year went by, then another…”

  “How did you wind up living here?” I cleared my throat and added, “On your own?”

  “Well, I’d never felt close to my father’s other wives, and with my mother gone and Rahim in England I was truly on my own. When we turned eighteen, my brother and I came into some money. Mostly it was his money, but…well, that’s a story for another time. Anyway, he also inherited this”—she gestured to indicate the house—“and since he doesn’t have any use for it, here I am.”

  She took a last draft of tea and then explained that when she didn’t stay in the palace compound and instead chose to move away—and without first taking a husband—her family called her selfish and impudent. For a woman to live alone was a bold decision, one without precedent. Leila’s behavior galled them; her answer was to ignore them. She was so preoccupied with her translations and her literary causes that she barely registered their disapproval, which amounted to her most audacious rebellion.

  “I could live for them or I could live for myself,” she concluded. “The choice wasn’t hard.”

  I wanted to ask her more questions about her life, but for the moment I settled for asking how long she’d lived in the house.

  “Eight years.”

  “It’s a very beautiful spot.”

  “Yes. It still feels like a village in this part of Tehran, doesn’t it?”

  I nodded. The remoteness of her property had struck me the first time I’d called on her, but I saw the advantages of this more clearly now. If you wanted to live on your own and had the means to do it, this was just the sort of place you’d choose for yourself.

  She poured us each a fresh cup of tea, and I realized it was my turn to speak. I had the feeling Leila knew or could guess much of what had happened to me in the last year—there’d been so much written about me in the papers, and even if much of it was nonsense, some parts were undeniably true. But where should I start?

  “I left my husband,” I said. Then, after a moment, I added, “And my child.”

  “Yes,” she said softly. “I’d heard as much, but I didn’t know how much to put down to gossip.” She leaned toward me, placed a hand on one of mine, and closed her fingers over my hand. “Tell me how it happened.”

  For a moment I hesitated, but then I cleared my voice and began to speak. I told her everything, about my marriage and separation from Parviz, about Nasser’s betrayal and Parviz’s refusal to let me see Kami if I didn’t stop writing and return to Ahwaz. I described the Rezayan Clinic and what had happened to me there.

  She was the first person to whom I confided absolutely everything. It took a lo
ng time to tell her my story. Sometimes I hesitated. At one point, when I spoke about Kami and the pain of missing him, I had to stop. Leila quietly slipped into the kitchen, returning with a bowl of white mulberries. She listened without judgment, asking a question now and then, but mostly she just let me speak, and when I couldn’t speak she was also quiet.

  “You’re brave,” she said when I finally finished.

  “Even if what I’ve done costs me my son?”

  I watched her carefully, anxious for her answer. I think what I wanted was for her to take my hand and tell me, yes, even if it cost me my son. I could be forgiven for leaving my marriage. I wasn’t heartless or crazy. But she neither agreed nor disagreed with me. She just listened.

  In that moment, it was almost enough.

  Still, a question was nagging at me, and it seemed I now had a chance to ask it. “Ever since I got here, I’ve wanted to know something.”

  “Yes?” she asked, arching an eyebrow.

  “When you came and took me away from…” I searched my mind for a word to describe the clinic. “That place,” I said finally, “how did you manage it?”

  She smiled slightly and shrugged. “There are always ways. Even in our country—no, especially in our country—there are always ways.”

  “Money?” I asked.

  She didn’t answer, which confirmed my guess.

  “In that case, I’m in your debt.”

  “You’re not, so please don’t speak of it. The only thing I want to know is what will you do with yourself now that you’re free?”

  When I opened my mouth, nothing came out. What would I do with myself now? I had no idea. I had no home and no family—at least none that would take me in. Even if I had the money for it, no landlord in the city would rent an apartment to a single woman. I lowered my head and buried my face in my hands.

  She took my wrists in her hands, pulled them gently away from my face, and leveled her gaze to mine. “You’ll rest, azizam,” she said, laying her hand on my shoulder. “For now you’ll stay here and you’ll do nothing but rest.”

  * * *

  —

  On the fifth day, Puran came to visit.

  “Oh, Forugh!” my sister said as soon as she saw me, and gave a cry.

  She rushed toward the chair where I was sitting, bent down, and hugged me hard. When she drew back and lifted her hand to wipe away her tears, I saw the pretty wedding ring on it, and when she pulled off her coat I noticed an unmistakable bump.

  “How are you, then?” I asked her.

  “Well, as you can see, I’m pregnant,” she said, as she took off her hat. “I’ve been tired, but it’s wonderful.”

  I smiled. “I’m so pleased for you, Puran.”

  “Thank you, Forugh joon,” she said, sitting down and arranging her coat across her lap. She tipped her head to the side and studied me. “And you? Are you…?” She hesitated, as if weighing her words. “Better?”

  “You mean less crazy?”

  Her cheeks flushed. “No, I didn’t mean that. It’s just…we were frantic when you were sent away. We didn’t know where you’d gone. I think Mother was the most worried, and she was heartbroken when we came to visit you and you didn’t say a single word to her the whole time we were there.”

  “You came to the clinic? You and Mother?”

  Her forehead wrinkled. “Don’t you remember?”

  I shook my head. “How were you able to get in?”

  “They tried to turn us away,” she said, “but Mother wouldn’t budge. I’ve never seen her so determined. She was terribly upset, you know. Sanam, too. They took it very hard when you were taken away. Anyway, when we got up to your room you were in an odd state.”

  “They gave me shock,” I said quietly.

  “Shock?”

  “Electric-shock treatment.”

  “Oh.” She gazed very sadly at me, and the room grew still. After a few moments she held a hand out to me and I took it.

  “Mother thought you were angry at her and that’s why you wouldn’t speak to her. She thought it might upset you if she came today, but you will see her, won’t you?”

  I nodded dumbly, but I still couldn’t understand what Puran was telling me. I had absolutely no memory of their visit, and it made me desperate to think she and my mother had been there, right in front of me, and I hadn’t known it.

  But Puran seemed eager to move on from the subject. “Well,” she said, “here you are now, Forugh. Miss Farmayan has been so kind and generous. When she called me to tell me you were here, my heart nearly burst.”

  “I missed you,” I said. “So much.”

  “Yes. Me, too. I thought of you all the time, every day.”

  I nodded. “Tell me more about your life now. I want to know everything that’s happened.”

  “Well, there’s the baby, as you know, and…”

  “Yes?”

  “I’ve started publishing a few articles—”

  “Publishing?” We’d both loved books growing up, but this was the first I’d heard of her writing.

  “Oh, just little things. Reviews here and there, and I’ve started working on a play….” She seemed suddenly uncomfortable, as if she regretted telling me her news. She stopped and looked at me hard. “Are you going to be all right?”

  This seemed, at that moment, an impossibly difficult question. I looked away.

  “You must…you must miss Kami?”

  I swallowed and felt my eyes well up. I’d already written Parviz three letters since leaving the Rezayan Clinic. “Please let me see Kami. You can bring him here, to Tehran. Just an hour. Please.”

  When I told her about the letters, Puran pressed her lips together and peered at me. “You’re sure you don’t want to go back?”

  I looked at her, her pink cheeks and round belly. She no longer looked like a pretty girl; she looked like a lady. She had permed her hair, her eyebrows were thin and arched, and her face was made up. Her skirt-suit had brass buttons and a wide lapel. It looked new and expensive. But that wasn’t the real change. I’d gotten stuck—I was still stuck—but she’d been living her life and it had changed her. She wasn’t timid anymore, and she had an air of wisdom and authority now. Also, she was writing and I was not.

  I winced. “What do you mean, go back?”

  “To Parviz. Was he so awful that you won’t consider it? Not even for Kami’s sake? A child needs his mother, Forugh.”

  Her hand was still in mine, and I shook her from me.

  “You don’t understand anything that’s happened to me. Nothing.”

  “What’s happened to you, Forugh? Tell me. Please.”

  But I couldn’t. I was smarting from what she’d said, but what struck me the hardest was the distance between us. She seemed very far away just then, and I’m sure she felt the same. We sat there in silence until finally she gathered her things and rose from her chair.

  “You’ll come visit me as soon as you’re feeling better?” she said as she buttoned up her coat and placed her hat onto her head. Her expression was pleasant, her tone bright. “I’d like you to see my house, and the baby, when it’s born.”

  “Yes,” I started to say, and felt my throat catch.

  After my sister left, I was tired. I had a headache and I felt nauseated—more so than when I had first left the clinic. I stayed up all night, my head throbbing and the night mocking me with its stillness. What would it all be for in the end, my rebellion? What would it be like for Kami, growing up without me? Could I continue to live without him? And even if I chose to return to Ahwaz, would Parviz take me back after all this time?

  * * *

  Every morning after breakfast, Leila retreated to a small cottage in one corner of the property, where she worked during the day. At Leila’s, I had everything I needed. Soon the rooms of the house began to feel familiar, and I had, if not yet a feeling of being at home, a feeling of being safe. Leila had given me refuge in her beautiful house. She had given me time. I wasn’t
writing yet, but my hours were given over to reading and thinking. I slept late and took long walks. She had a camera, a small silver Leica, which she sometimes used to take photographs when we went out walking in the countryside, and when she saw how much I admired it she spent several afternoons teaching me how to take pictures. Soon I was spending entire afternoons poking around the lanes and meadows beyond the house, snapping photographs. I began to take the solitude and freedom for granted. To think of them as mine.

  Sometimes I heard voices in another part of the house and knew she was entertaining a guest there, and I thought maybe it was a lover. I didn’t disturb her, nor did she impose on me. Many people came calling. There was, for example, the publisher of the Algerian novel she was translating, as well as poets, writers, and playwrights she supported in various ways. They brought her books and gossip, took tea or drank a glass of wine. Leila let me know I was welcome to join them, but most often I politely declined the invitation. There were times, though, that Leila and I passed an evening discussing poetry or talking over her literary projects, the progress of her translations, as well as the work of other writers she’d pledged to support. We’d stay up chatting against the backdrop of music from her record collection. Ella Fitzgerald. Miles Davis. Billie Holiday.

  When Leila drove us into the city, I’d marvel at all the changes in the capital. If you stood on the corner of the Avenue of the Tulip Fields, you’d go dizzy watching all the taxis and buses riding up and down the streets. Electricity had arrived in Iran, and at night whole sections of the city shimmered and glowed with it. Leila took me to parts of Tehran where I hadn’t been before, neighborhoods where women walked breezily with their beaus and everything felt new. Together we went to Café Naderi where writers and philosophers nursed coffees and argued late into the night. We went to dance halls that played rock and roll. Few people understood this new American music, with its strange twang and foreign words, but they didn’t need to. It was the spirit that mattered, its promise of freedom and of elsewhere.