can we do?
Nothing. He has to rest.
Could he die?
The man wrinkled his nose.
Na ba omidi khoda
, little Hazara. Who can say? Let’s hope not, all right? I think he’s just very tired.
Can’t we call anyone, like a doctor?
They’ll see to it, said the man, pointing to the Baluchis. In the meantime I’ll go and get a cloth and wet it in cold water.
I remember I opened one eye. My eyelid was as heavy as the iron shutter of
osta sahib
’s sandal shop. Don’t go, I said to Sufi.
I’m not going anywhere, don’t worry.
The man came back with a wet cloth. He placed it gently on my forehead, and said some words I didn’t understand. A few drops of water trickled through my hair and onto my neck and cheeks and behind my ears. I heard music and I think I asked something like, Who’s playing? I remember the word
radio
. I remember I was in Nava, and it was snowing. I remember my mother’s hand in my hair. I remember my dead teacher’s kind eyes, he was reciting a poem and asking me to repeat it, but I couldn’t. Then I fell asleep.
———
One after another, in small groups, everyone left the house, except for two of the traffickers. Even the nice man with the big hands left. I got a little worse, and there were several days I don’t remember anything about: only a sensation of warmth and a fear of falling, of slipping away without being able to grab hold of anything. I felt so ill I couldn’t move. It was as if someone had poured concrete into my arm and leg muscles. Even my veins didn’t work, the blood had stopped circulating.
For a week I ate nothing but watermelon. I was very, very thirsty. If I could, I would have drunk constantly to put out the fire in my throat.
Take this.
What is it?
Open your mouth. That’s right. Now drink and swallow.
What is it?
Don’t sit up. Rest.
Rahat bash
.
Obviously the traffickers couldn’t take me to a hospital or a doctor. That’s the biggest problem about being an illegal: you’re illegal even when it comes to your health. They gave me some medicines they knew, which they had in the house, little white pills to be swallowed with water. I don’t know what drug it was—I wasn’t only a patient, but also an Afghan and in debt to these people, so I couldn’t ask any questions—but whatever it was Irecovered in the end, which was all that mattered. After a week, I felt a lot better.
One morning, our trafficker told me and Sufi to get our things together—which made me laugh, because we didn’t have anything to get together—and follow him.
We went to the station in Kerman.
It was the first time I had walked in a street in Iran by day, and I was starting to think that the world was much less various and mysterious than I had imagined when I was living in Nava.
The station, I remember, was a long, low building, with stone steps leading up to a row of columns under a wavy roof. And there was a sign over the roof, partly blue and partly transparent, with the words
Kerman Railway Station
on it in English, in yellow, and the same thing in Farsi, in red. Waiting for us there were two other Baluchi traffickers, partners of our own trafficker, and a small group of Afghans I had seen the day before in the house.
We got into the train through different doors. It was going nonstop to Qom. Qom is an important city between Isfahan and Teheran, a sacred place for Shia Muslims, because it houses the tomb of Fatima al-Masuma. I was in Shia territory now. And even though it didn’t matter that much, I felt as if I was at home, or at least hoped I was, hoped I was in a place where I would be treated well, which amounts to the same thing.
I was euphoric.
I was cured.
I was ready and willing.
It was a wonderful sunny day, and Sufi and I were together, in Iran.
You say you felt big, Enaiat. You’d got taller because of the fever. They say children grow when they have a fever, did you know that?
Yes. I did
.
How tall are you now?
One meter seventy-five, I
Nothing. He has to rest.
Could he die?
The man wrinkled his nose.
Na ba omidi khoda
, little Hazara. Who can say? Let’s hope not, all right? I think he’s just very tired.
Can’t we call anyone, like a doctor?
They’ll see to it, said the man, pointing to the Baluchis. In the meantime I’ll go and get a cloth and wet it in cold water.
I remember I opened one eye. My eyelid was as heavy as the iron shutter of
osta sahib
’s sandal shop. Don’t go, I said to Sufi.
I’m not going anywhere, don’t worry.
The man came back with a wet cloth. He placed it gently on my forehead, and said some words I didn’t understand. A few drops of water trickled through my hair and onto my neck and cheeks and behind my ears. I heard music and I think I asked something like, Who’s playing? I remember the word
radio
. I remember I was in Nava, and it was snowing. I remember my mother’s hand in my hair. I remember my dead teacher’s kind eyes, he was reciting a poem and asking me to repeat it, but I couldn’t. Then I fell asleep.
———
One after another, in small groups, everyone left the house, except for two of the traffickers. Even the nice man with the big hands left. I got a little worse, and there were several days I don’t remember anything about: only a sensation of warmth and a fear of falling, of slipping away without being able to grab hold of anything. I felt so ill I couldn’t move. It was as if someone had poured concrete into my arm and leg muscles. Even my veins didn’t work, the blood had stopped circulating.
For a week I ate nothing but watermelon. I was very, very thirsty. If I could, I would have drunk constantly to put out the fire in my throat.
Take this.
What is it?
Open your mouth. That’s right. Now drink and swallow.
What is it?
Don’t sit up. Rest.
Rahat bash
.
Obviously the traffickers couldn’t take me to a hospital or a doctor. That’s the biggest problem about being an illegal: you’re illegal even when it comes to your health. They gave me some medicines they knew, which they had in the house, little white pills to be swallowed with water. I don’t know what drug it was—I wasn’t only a patient, but also an Afghan and in debt to these people, so I couldn’t ask any questions—but whatever it was Irecovered in the end, which was all that mattered. After a week, I felt a lot better.
One morning, our trafficker told me and Sufi to get our things together—which made me laugh, because we didn’t have anything to get together—and follow him.
We went to the station in Kerman.
It was the first time I had walked in a street in Iran by day, and I was starting to think that the world was much less various and mysterious than I had imagined when I was living in Nava.
The station, I remember, was a long, low building, with stone steps leading up to a row of columns under a wavy roof. And there was a sign over the roof, partly blue and partly transparent, with the words
Kerman Railway Station
on it in English, in yellow, and the same thing in Farsi, in red. Waiting for us there were two other Baluchi traffickers, partners of our own trafficker, and a small group of Afghans I had seen the day before in the house.
We got into the train through different doors. It was going nonstop to Qom. Qom is an important city between Isfahan and Teheran, a sacred place for Shia Muslims, because it houses the tomb of Fatima al-Masuma. I was in Shia territory now. And even though it didn’t matter that much, I felt as if I was at home, or at least hoped I was, hoped I was in a place where I would be treated well, which amounts to the same thing.
I was euphoric.
I was cured.
I was ready and willing.
It was a wonderful sunny day, and Sufi and I were together, in Iran.
You say you felt big, Enaiat. You’d got taller because of the fever. They say children grow when they have a fever, did you know that?
Yes. I did
.
How tall are you now?
One meter seventy-five, I
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