THAT EVENING THE OWNER of the restaurant rushed into the kitchen. He called me over and sent me to make sure the bathroom was clean and that there was an empty bottle of water above the sink. Between his and his daughter’s flamboyant demands I was kept busy running around. The cook was carving a lamb thigh with his large kitchen knife. The dishwasher was carrying plates. The waiter was standing at the door. Then the door opened and the bodyguard from the other night stepped inside, followed by the bald, short man. Shaheed took off his coat and the owner whisked it away from him and snapped his fingers, and I ran over and hung it in the back closet. The coat was wet and heavy, and from this I knew it was still raining in the outside world.
LATER THAT NIGHT, after my shift was over, I went to Shohreh’s place and told her that the man had been at the restaurant again that night. She became agitated and asked me why I had not called her right away.
I told her that the phone was behind the bar and protected. And besides, I told her, the time was not right yet. But soon, I said. You will face him soon.
Couldn’t you go outside and call me?
Next time, when we are all ready, I will do that, but the owner and his daughter are demanding.
She paced and smoked and went to her bedroom and closed the door. I could hear that she had picked up the phone and was talking loudly in Farsi. I decided to leave, but before I had put my jacket on, she called me back and made me some tea in the kitchen. She held my hand and asked me again about the bald man and the owner. She made me repeat every detail of the evening. What did the owner ask you to do? What kind of car did the man arrive in? What did he order?
I told her that the owner had asked me to make sure the bathroom was clean. And to make sure there was an empty bottle above the sink.
Yes! Shohreh snapped, to clean himself, that religious hypocrite, after he takes a piss. He never cleaned himself before he made me spread my legs. It was lucky I did not get pregnant. The women who did get pregnant were killed.
She took a sip of tea. Then she said: Can I see the gun? Who did it belong to?
The industrialist’s son.
Which one was he?
The one with the flowery shirt.
They are all so artificial and flowery. Where did you meet those buffoons? And Reza was kissing their asses all evening.
Have you handled a gun before? I asked.
The guards in the jail used to walk with guns hanging off their belts. I did not know how gunfire sounded until one night we heard trucks coming and going, and for a week every night we heard shots coming from the backyard. They brought people every night and shot them against the wall. They must have killed thousands of men and women. How quiet they were. None of those prisoners complained, none of them objected or said anything. They must have known that they were about to die. Maybe they were too scared, too tortured, too weak, or maybe they were just happy to die. At times I wanted to be there, I wanted to be against that wall, I thought they were the lucky ones. One night, just before the shooting, I heard one man scream: For Iran! And the rest of the prisoners started to shout, For Iran! And then there were many shots and a long silence. Can I see it?
What?
The gun!
I do not have it on me.
Can you teach me how to use it? Shohreh asked.
Yes.
When?
Wednesday. We will go far north and into the woods.
Good. I will rent a car. It will be only the two of us. We can go far and away from this city.
AT ELEVEN IN THE MORNING on Wednesday, Shohreh knocked at my door.
I opened it, and saw that she was wearing sunglasses and had a backpack over her shoulder. She entered. I slipped under the bed, crawled over to the middle of the mattress, and pulled out the gun.
We took Highway 15 north. At the beginning of our drive we passed many cars, houses, gas stations, and generic restaurants with large signs that stood like faux totems. The farther north we went, the fewer cars we encountered and the more hills appeared, the more curved roads, more trees, more wind, more sky, and more horizon.
In September, Shohreh said, the leaves are orange and gold. It is so beautiful. Just beautiful. Everything turns to gold here.
We stopped at a diner. The waitress, who was old and talked in a jolly tone, who smiled in spite of the absence of teeth, handed us menus. We both had eggs, toast, and coffee. Then Shohreh disappeared into the bathroom. The waitress smoked at the counter. A couple of truckers watched TV, hunched over white oval plates. I could hear noise coming from the kitchen, sizzling sounds and drumming on pots. The cook, a Native Indian, came out of the kitchen, went downstairs, and reappeared with a cart in his hands. He stopped and looked me in the eyes, and before I had the chance to bow my head, to thank him for the food, for the trees, the mountains, and the rivers, he disappeared again.
I followed him to the kitchen entrance. I stood there and asked if he had seen any cockroaches. Before he could be alarmed, I said: I am interested in these creatures and their history.
Come. Follow me, he said. I will tell you all about them.
We stood outside the kitchen’s back door and smoked peacefully. Listen, he said. After the Creator made the mountains and the sea and everything, he left behind a huge drum made from a white buffalo skin. He had used the drum when he was creating the world, but he warned all the creatures not to play the drum, or the sun would come closer to listen, and never go back to sleep, and melt all the snow. At this time the birds had never flown and they ate bugs from the ground.
Cockroaches, too, I asked?
Yes, those too. The birds didn’t need wings, because everything was available — fish in the sea and bugs on the land. The bugs were kept in good numbers, because the birds ate them every day for a long time. Then, one day, the coyote came to this land on a large ship. The coyote was curious and hungry from his lengthy travel. He was looking for food and anything that he could steal and take back with him to the other side of the sea. When he saw the large drum made from the white buffalo skin, he wanted to steal it. But the bugs were always crawling around the drum, protecting it. So the coyote trotted over to the birds and told them that the bugs around the drum were sweeter and tasted better than any other bugs. The birds were excited by this news, and they rushed over and ate all the bugs around the drum. The coyote stole the drum and took it onto his ship and sailed away with it. On his ship he played the drum, and this woke up the sun and made it shine. When the birds saw the sun they grew wings and flew towards it and left the earth. There was no one left to eat the bugs anymore. And the land was covered with bugs, and the bugs grew more and more numerous. They covered the land and ate everything.
I thanked the cook for his story, and when Shohreh came back, we paid and left. We drove for hours, and the farther north we drove the colder it got. The snow still covered the landscape in patches that were reluctant to melt into streams and slip under the rocks and the trees to form pools and lakes and sweeten the seas. The trees were bare. The sky looked bigger, endless, and Shohreh had a smile on her face. She was filled with joy, she was so happy to be behind the wheel. She gazed through the windshield at the flying-by landscape of trees, wolves, hills, and deer. After a while she flipped through the radio stations. She asked me what kind of music I liked, and before I answered she found a song that she liked. She told me how much she loved that song. It was a French song and she sang it in her heavy French accent. Suddenly she turned right and took an exit. She stopped the car on a little deserted and unpaved road, unbuckled her seatbelt, moved her palm to my hair, pulled my head towards her, and kissed me. We kissed for a long time. When I touched her breast, she pulled back and put her seatbelt back on and we drove north again.