Then They Came for Me_ A Family's Story of Love, Captivity, and Survival - Maziar Bahari [81]
“You know what we do with people who think we’re stupid?” He came near me again, and then he began slapping my thighs with all of his might. Over and over again, until the skin on my legs began to sting.
“You little man, you think you’re dealing with a bunch of villagers? Do you think you’re smarter than us? You don’t know who you’re dealing with.” His blows came quicker, and my legs stung so badly it felt as if he had stuck them with needles. Finally, he left the room. I curled over my legs, wanting to protect them. I tried to ease the pain by rubbing my legs, but even the slightest touch through my uniform hurt.
Rosewater came back into the room in a rush, bounding toward me, and I sat bolt upright. “You either cooperate with us or every day will be like this,” he said. With that, I felt the crack of a belt on my legs—so hard that I cried out in pain. “Shut up, little man!” he screamed as he hit me again. “Why’ve you gone mute all of a sudden? You spouted all that nonsense in front of the television cameras. Why are you deaf and dumb now?”
“But, sir, Haj Agha instructed me to say those things,” I stammered through the pain.
“I told you to name names, didn’t I? Didn’t I?!” He began punching me on my shoulders, so hard that I could feel his wedding ring press into my skin. Rosewater was a big man with strong arms, and I braced myself for each blow. But I was glad that for a moment he had stopped slapping my legs. I had been doing push-ups on a regular basis since my teenage years, and my shoulders have always been strong. The punches to them hurt less than the slaps to my legs.
I started to moan. “Please, please, sir. That hurts,” I said. My trick worked. He punched my shoulders even harder, forgetting about my legs.
“The whole country is in a turmoil because of you,” he said. Drops of his sweat fell onto my neck. “How can you answer all of the mothers who’ve lost their children because of you? How can you answer for all the blood you’ve shed since the election?”
The pain in my shoulders began to crawl toward my neck and into my head. I’ve suffered from migraines since 1994, and they were often made worse by any physical suffering and stress. Feeling the beginnings of a migraine now and wanting to protect my shoulders, I turned my face toward him, trying to block his punches with my cheek. “Turn your face away, you little spy,” he yelled and began to slap my thighs again.
I closed my eyes under the blindfold.
“But, sir, please tell me, what have I done wrong? I said what you asked me to say.”
“I’m the one who asks the questions,” he yelled, beating my legs with the belt.
Rosewater grabbed my hair, jerking my neck violently. “Get up,” he ordered. But I couldn’t. My legs were numb and my shoulders were throbbing. He practically had to pull me from the chair by my hair. “Go back to your cell and think about what happened tonight,” Rosewater told me. He punched the back of my head, and I winced. “I haven’t even started yet. This will happen to you every day if you don’t cooperate with us.”
As a guard led me back to my cell, I tried to figure out what had happened. This wasn’t the plan. This wasn’t what we had agreed to. I had said what Haj Agha had told me to say. Why weren’t they letting me go?
“It’s time for morning prayers,” said the guard, whose shoes I did not recognize. “Do you want to use the restroom and do your ablution?”
Of course, I thought. The only reason Rosewater stopped beating me was because he had to prepare to pray. The rage I felt at his hypocrisy frightened me.
“No, I don’t,” I said. “But I need two migraine pills. I need them right away.”
The guard locked me in my cell and went to get the painkillers. I pulled down my trousers and looked at my legs. They were so bruised, they looked nearly