Mother turned the television off.
“Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?
When we were your age, girls would
have had two children already, and
you spend your time watching foot-
ball.”
“I’ve done my work,” Nastaran
said and then stood and turned the
television on.
“If you have finished your home-
work, you can go into the kitchen
and see the unwashed dishes waiting
in the sink.”
Nastaran didn’t move from
where she was sitting. She was wait-
ing for her mother to move away
from the television. Father said very
loudly from the other side of the room: “Didn’t you hear
what your mother said? Is she talking to a brick wall?
Get up now.”
“I already told Mum I’ve done my homework.”
“Then go and help your mother. Come on, get a
move on. If you touch that damned television I will
break your hand, do you understand?”
Mother, too, was a girl in this house.
Father began shouting and, looking toward the
kitchen, said to the woman: “It is your damned fault for
having brought her up like this. In our family no stupid
girl dares to disrespect her father. You will eventually
drive me from this house, go away... go away.”
The sound of running water and the clatter of dishes
came from the kitchen. Mother turned off the tap and
said in a hardly audible voice, “What is the matter with
you? Destroying our reputation; the whole neighbor-
hood can hear you. Come on, get up, and let’s go to the
supermarket and do some shopping. I can’t carry every-
thing on my own; it hurts my shoulders.”
Then there was the sound of the door closing behind
them, followed by total silence.
THE ROAR OF AN AIRPLANE and the doorbell
brought Nastaran into the courtyard in her slippers. She
looked longingly up at the airplane. She wished she were
one of the passengers in that iron bird going somewhere
far, far away. Where? Anywhere.
She opened the door to the girls. She took the
bags they were carrying and together they went in.
Shahla spread herself on the sofa and said, “What is
it about choosing a color while you keep on finding
excuses about it being long or short? All you have to
do is to shave it off and it is all done and dusted; wear
a Nike T-shirt over your trousers
and nobody will ever know you are
a girl.”
“If I shave my head what can I tell
my father?”
“I don’t know. Tell him you
decided to shave your head out of
sympathy and love for these children
suffering from cancer. Like that, he
will even be proud of his daughter!”
Mitra replied.
All three of them laughed loudly.
When somebody rang the door-
bell, Nastaran was taken aback. “It’s
Vanik,” said Mitra.
“How does she know my home
address?” Nastaran asked.
Mitra ran to the door. Shahla said, “Mitra asked her
to come here. She also gave her your address. We forgot
to tell you.”
As soon as Vanik was inside the house, Mitra said,
“We don’t have boys’ wigs! Are you kidding me?”
“Well,” Shahla asked, “if a girl wants to fool people
by appearing as a man, what do you have to offer?”
“If I were you, I would put a knitted cap on my head,
wear a green pilot jacket, and get on with it. And by the
way, what do men have that you want to copy them?”
Vanik answered.
“Nothing, they don’t have anything, you stupid
idiot,” said Shahla. “All we need is to get through the
main entrance and it’s all over. Those soldiers, they are
looking for knives, machetes, fireworks, and they search
every orifice in your body; one way or the other we
m u s t .”
Vanik hid her face in her hands and suddenly burst
out laughing. Shahla continued, “Do you think I am
lying? To find these objects they put their hands here
and there and everywhere. Why do you think poor Leila
spent twenty night in detention last year? While she was
being body-searched, the soldier’s hands slipped from
under her arms onto her breasts.”
Vanik was worried about Nastaran. She and the
other girls had all escaped. Only one of them had been
lucky enough to escape inspection, and that was tall
Maryam. Despite being twenty-one, her breasts hadn’t
fully grown. She was thin and unusually tall. They said
she had some kind of strange illness; that she was both
man and woman at the same time, but the girls couldn’t
understand what it was all about. How could anybody
possibly be both a man and a woman at the same time?
“Anyway,” Vanik said, “I only have these wigs.”“Aren’t you ashamed
of yourself? When
we were your age girls
would have had two
children already, and
you spend your time
watching football.”WORLDLIT.ORG 39