Reading Lolita in Tehran_ A Memoir in Books - Azar Nafisi [124]
But why? Why should they take him? He had no political affiliations, wrote no inflammatory articles. But then, he has so many friends. . . . How do I know he isn’t secretly involved in some political group, an underground guerrilla leader? The thought seemed absurd, but any explanation was better than none at all: I had to find a reason for the sudden absence of a man bound to routines, conscious of his obligations, always exactly five minutes early to his appointments, a man, I suddenly realized, who had deliberately created an image of himself out of his routines, bread crumbs for us to follow.
I went to the phone by the couch in the living room. Should I call Reza, his best friend? But then I’d worry him too—better wait for a while; maybe he’d return. And what if they come back and find me here? Shut up, shut up! Just wait, he’ll be back any minute. I glanced at my watch. He’s only forty-five minutes late. Only? I’ll wait for another half hour, then I will decide.
I went to the library and scanned the rows of books, all organized by subject and title. I picked up a novel, put it back. I picked up a book of criticism and then I noticed Eliot’s Four Quartets. Yes, not a bad idea. I opened it the way we used to open Hafez, closing our eyes, asking our question and letting our finger rest somewhere at random. It opened to the page in the middle of “Burnt Norton,” beginning with the lines “At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor/fleshless;/Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance/is.”
I closed the book, moved back to the couch and felt exhausted.
The phone rang. If it’s a friend, he’ll hang up after the third ring. And if not? What if it’s him? He left the door open, he called my home and found no one there, he’s calling me here. But then why no note? If it had been me, I probably would have forgotten to leave a note, I with my untidy mind, but not him—he’d remember. But what if he didn’t have time to write, or couldn’t write? If they had come to take him away, would he say, Wait, let me write a note to this friend, whom you can come and pick up later: Dear Azar, Sorry, couldn’t wait for you. Stay where you are; they’ll be back for you soon.
Suddenly I panicked. I have to call Reza, I thought. Better call him than die of anxiety. Two heads are better than one and all that. I called Reza and explained the situation. His voice was soothing, but did I sense a sudden panic rimmed around his soothing words? He said, Give me a half hour and I’ll be there.
As soon as I put the receiver down, I regretted having called him. If something bad is going to happen, why involve someone else, and if he is okay. . . . I went back to Four Quartets, and this time turned to the beginning, the lines I used to read aloud to myself when I first studied Eliot in college:
Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
How had I missed that point about the unredeemability of the present when I had read it so many times before? I started to read aloud, walking in circles around the room:
What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Now I came to a favorite part, and felt myself on the edge of tears:
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
Into the rose-garden. My words echo
Thus, in your mind.
But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves
I do not know.
I repeated the last two lines, feeling tears, to my dismay, running down my cheeks. His friend finally