Then They Came for Me_ A Family's Story of Love, Captivity, and Survival - Maziar Bahari [97]
“Who is this?” she asked me loudly so the man could hear her. Then she turned to him, asking, “Do you have any children?” The man, clearly surprised by my mother’s uninhibited disgust, said he was not married.
“Why not? I thought your mothers forced you to marry early,” she said, referring to the religious families of many government supporters. I tried to change the subject.
“How are you, Moloojoon? How are you feeling?” I asked.
“I’m fine,” she answered dismissively before turning once again to the guard. She clearly wanted to shame him for his career choice. “Why is it you don’t have a family of your own?”
“Don’t worry about this gentleman’s family,” I said. “I’m sure he has good reasons for not getting married. Have you been in touch with Paola?”
“Yes, she’s called me a few times.” Paola doesn’t speak Persian, so she had asked my half-Iranian friend Lizzy to translate her calls. “Paola, mahshareh,” my mother said, calling Paola “amazing.” I understood immediately what this meant: Paola was campaigning for me and staying strong. Years of visiting political prisoners had taught my mother how to communicate her ideas in one or two words. It was all I wanted to hear, and my mother knew that.
Because we couldn’t speak about anything related to my case or the lawyer my mother had hired, we spent the fifteen minutes of our visit talking about different relatives and distant cousins. I actually began to feel sorry for the prison guard, so every now and then I explained whom we were talking about. At times, to our surprise, he would offer a comment about our family affairs.
“Are you still in solitary confinement?”
“Please, talk only of family subjects,” the guard said.
“Of course,” my mother answered. “But you keep on interrupting us.” I gave the guard a “she’s out of control” smile and tried to change the subject, asking Mohammad about the swine flu epidemic that had started a few months before my arrest. My mother interjected before Mohammad could respond.
“The real swine flu is this government that has plagued the country for the past thirty years,” she said.
“Moloojoon!” I tried to look upset, but inside I was proud of her. The guard was dumbfounded by her audacity. He sat quietly during the rest of the conversation. When we said good-bye, my mother hugged me and whispered into my ear, “Don’t worry about anything. Paola is doing all she can to get you out.” Mohammad didn’t have any special message for me. Looking at his calm and peaceful face, I was confident that all that could be done for me outside of the prison was being done.
I was hoping to return to my cell, where I could cherish the memory of my mother’s voice and face, but instead I was taken directly to an interrogation room, where Rosewater was waiting for me. He pulled a chair up next to me and whispered, “I feel sorry for you, Mazi.” It was the first time that he’d called me Mazi, and I figured he’d eavesdropped on our conversation and heard my mother address me that way. When my friends and family call me Mazi, the nickname is familiar and affectionate. When Rosewater said it, it sounded obscene. “You are the most miserable of creatures, Mazi. You’re rotting in this prison for people who are laughing at you. Haven’t you come to your senses after seeing your mother’s sad face? Don’t you want to cooperate?”
After everything that had happened that day and the last few days, I felt on the verge of a mental and physical collapse. I knew that I was never going to cooperate with Rosewater, but the pressure was becoming unbearable. I lowered my head and whispered my own mantra: “Moloojoon, Maryam joon, Paola, Moloojoon, Maryam joon, Paola.” Saying these names gave me strength.
“What are you whispering?” Rosewater said, pulling my hair. I didn’t pay attention to him and kept on repeating the names of my loved ones. “What are you whispering, I asked,” he demanded,