piece of paper at the Black and White editor’s office, I’ll stick with literature only. That’s where I belong. He sent Dr. Afshar a poem a day, too many to publish in the weekly journal.
“The good thing is,” Dr. Afshar said, pulling his reading glasses down over the tip of his nose and looking above them at Ahmad, “I’ll have enough for the next century.”
When Ahmad told him he wanted to start his own magazine, Dr. Afshar took his glasses off and shook his head. “Publishing is the most dangerous job in this country,” he said tapping his hand on his desk to accentuate his point. “Do anything you want, anything else, but not that.” I’m not here to ask for help or advice, Ahmad wrote, I’m just telling a friend. When Dr. Afshar saw he could not make Ahmad change his mind, he said, “At least wait a little longer until we see what happens with this government. Until things are more stable.” But instability was nothing to discourage Ahmad. The next day, he went to the Ministry of Publications and Information to apply for a permit. The bank rejected his loan application, but he decided to be optimistic and believe that the money problem would somehow solve itself. At the Ferdowsi Bookstore in front of the University of Tehran, a meeting place of writers and poets, he broached the idea and found the interested writers. The money came one night when Lalah knocked and came in hiding something behind her back. Ahmad squinted expectedly, a faint smile on his lips as his daughter, in loose sweatpants and a T-shirt, walked across the room. When Lalah put the passbook on his desk, a questioning frown knotted Ahmad’s eyebrows.
“I’m sure you’ll be successful.” The passbook belonged to the account they had opened years before to set aside money for her dowry. “Go get it all. It’s not like I need it now.”
Ahmad stood up and hugged her. He borrowed the other half that he needed and in two months he started to put together his first issue.
* * *
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THE CANCELATION OF THE SHIRAZ Art Festival did not placate the shroud-bearers. Three days after their departure, so many people joined them in the streets that the shrouds were barely visible. That Wednesday a number of government buildings were set on fire, telephone booth panes smashed and street signs were uprooted. Bloody and warm, thirty-seven bodies were carried away in people’s hands. Lalah was one of the carriers.
After two shots toppled two men, she sprinted from behind a car to help take the bodies back. She held the wrist of a boy who could not be more than twenty. There was no blood on his chest, only a small hole in his overcoat breast pocket. Panting, she carried the boy with two other men back to where more people huddled. Someone stopped a passing car. They jammed the boy into the back seat and someone else slammed the door closed. The image of the boy’s head, hanging loose as she carried him, was too much for Lalah to bear. She had touched a dead person for the first time and that was enough fighting for her on a day that was later hailed as Blood Wednesday. Without trying to find Shireen, she detached herself from the crowd and walked away from the center of the conflict. Hands in her jacket pockets and head down, she went home.
Early the next morning, a curfew was announced for the first time. Six p.m., until further notice. She did not mind, at least that day. Going out was not on her mind. She picked up her nephew and held him in her arms. Since he was born, he had brought peace and happiness to the house. His plump cheeks jutted out of his rosy face like two small tomatoes. His eyes had taken after Ahmad’s and Khan’s. His eyebrows were from his father’s side, high up on his forehead. With the way he looked into everyone’s eyes and smiled, Behrooz had become everybody’s favorite in the house. Together with Zeeba, Lalah took care of him almost all the time, until the day Leyla left with her husband. Lalah had heard the couple argue in Leyla’s room, the second room on the roof and the largest of the four. That was where they were when Mr. Zia was first permitted to come see her. Lalah had not been able to make out most of the words, but