What The Doves Said: The Saboteur (Book One)



  What The Doves Said: The Saboteur

  Book One

  By Mojdeh Marashi

  Copyright 2011 Mojdeh Marashi

  First Story In "What The Doves Said" Series

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  What The Doves Said

  The Saboteur

  Sister Jaan

  A Scorching Afternoon

  Eyebrows Mom Fell In Love With

  Heroine With Hazel Eyes

  About The Author

  The Saboteur

  I’m sitting on the dark gray wool sofa, body closed tight, tense as can be, across from the TV. I watch with eyes wide open, red from combination of no sleep and excessive staring at the bright rectangle that transports me into the streets of my birth town, Tehran. I wonder how what I am witnessing could even be possible.

  I turn to my Dad, sitting on the matching dark gray wool loveseat to my right. Once again, he has come to my aid as he always does. His shoulders, still broad, are now curved inward a bit from combination of old age and the weight of the pain he has been carrying for decades. These are the shoulders that used to carry me around the house so that I would forget the pain from my wounds whenever I fell and injured my knees or elbows, a common and almost daily occurrence as I was an active child. His perfect shaped head, not too round and not too oblong with well-groomed white hair blending so well with his bald spot, is held in the palm of his left hand now, resting against the arm of the loveseat. His eyebrows, still not completely white, are locked in a tight knot.

  These are the eyebrows my mom fell in love with. She said they resembled a pair of perfectly shaped swords. Now, the swords are engaged in a duel, frozen in horror and sadness. Unlike me, Dad is not staring at the TV. Instead, his dark eyes are fixed on the patterns of the Persian carpet under his feet - the same patterns that taught me harmony, balance, color, and most importantly anticipation.

  “What is it, Dad? Why aren’t you watching? Is this too painful for you?” I want to ask him but the words don’t leave my mouth. It’s all in my head.

  During the last couple of weeks, I have gone from cloud nine to the pit of the Earth; from being an ultimate optimist to an absolute pessimistic soul. I have felt all my dreams and wishes for my birth country secure in my hand, so accessible I could taste them, only to have them snatched away from me. Words such as absolute devastation wouldn’t even begin to describe my state of being. I am a fool, I tell myself. I should have known better. After all, this isn’t the first time I am facing such calamity.

  I look at Dad again, still no sign of him being interested in what appears on the screen. My heart drops, for him it has been at least one additional time, I remind myself. Unlike me, witnessing the events from the other side of the globe, Dad was there, not only in the streets, but there, in the thick of it all. He was an amazing man, one who stood for his principles and paid for it dearly. The world is not made for people like my dad and the ones who are being clubbed on the screen at this very moment.

  My dad entered the army when he was only twenty and rose quickly in rank. He was strict and yet reasonable. No matter how much he disagreed with you, it was possible to get him to change his mind if you could prove your point. Unlike many fathers, my dad never allowed himself to use his parental privileges, take a shortcut, and just say no to me. Instead he sat me down and we debated the issue logically. Often he won the argument, but because I was given the opportunity to debate my side of the matter, and because he was fair, I never felt powerless or forced to do what I was told. This quality, fairness and standing up for the truth regardless of the outcome, was what got him into trouble, and me later in my life. Dad never talked about it to me. My grandmother mentioned it once or twice, when she was alive, but back then I was too young to really understand. I wonder if I can ask Dad about it now that I am the same age he was back when it happened. It seems that history is toying with us once again. But asking him about it would be selfish of me and unfair to him - so much pain, so much despair, and a sea of lost hopes.