by Salar Abdoh
By 2004, two and a half years into their stay in the US, the stepmother was severely malnourished and had to be fed intravenously from time to time. She had multiple recurring infections that required hospital stays or twenty-four-hour care at home by a nurse. The sicker she became, the more she seemed to blame Mehdi. He filled the void by getting “more involved” with the community, but “involvement” was not cheap, and Mehdi, who had not needed to watch his spending for decades, didn’t know when to stop.
In 2005, when he had spent or donated most of their liquid assets, Kat Cohen helped him mortgage his house. In 2006, he took a second mortgage. In 2008, he sold the house and, after he had paid the bank, was left with a little under $1 million. This time, Kat Cohen found a rental condominium in the Wilshire Manning high-rise near Westwood. Golnessa was eighty years old, shrunken and stiff and unyielding as a wood carving. She stared at Mehdi with such fierce resentment, he could barely stand to be in the same room with her. He sold his expensive car and bought a Toyota, stopped writing checks and buying designer clothes and going out for meals, but he couldn’t care for Golnessa alone.
He kept paying for the nurses and the live-in help after they moved out of the Manning in 2009 and into a smaller rental behind the row of Persian restaurants on Westwood Boulevard. He paid when they moved again in 2010 to an apartment on Valley Vista in Sherman Oaks. In 2011, when all he could afford was a one-bedroom on Glenoaks, he became her sole caretaker.
Luca had thought he was going to check the main valve under the sink, or that was the pretext anyway, because he could see Mehdi was hiding something (maybe a lot of things), and the kitchen was as good a place to start searching as any. There was a heap of pipes and joints and screws and washers, every piece gutted and taken apart then thrown into a pile. Whether metal or plastic, the outside of each part looked normal, but the inside—Luca reached for the flashlight in the front corner of the cabinet, turned it on, and stared in disbelief—was the color of gold.
Behind him, he could smell the angst rising like fumes from Mehdi. Without looking at him, Luca went into the main room and through it to the only bedroom in the house. There was a king-size bed with a frayed duvet cover and a set of pillows that had once been expensive, a rocking chair on one side and a closed wheelchair on the other. Luca moved into the bathroom and tried the faucet in the sink, then the shower.
“Did you turn the water off?” he asked.
Mehdi nodded.
“Where do you wash?”
Mehdi cleared his throat. “There’s a twenty-four-hour fitness—”
“You shower at the gym?” Luca nearly screamed. “What? Is it the money?”
Mehdi didn’t look like he was going to answer.
“What’s that in the pipes under the sink?”
This time, Mehdi wasn’t reticent. He walked over to the toilet and lifted the lid, then motioned gently for Luca to come closer. There was no water in the bowl, but the porcelain was painted gold.
“Look,” Mehdi said, pointing with his chin to the floor of the shower. Here, the grout between the tiles was golden.
“Is it . . . ?” Luca could hardly gather the words.
Mehdi nodded.
“From the water?”
Mehdi nodded again.
“Like . . . in the . . . lake?”
He didn’t know how to use a computer and didn’t know enough English to search the Internet, but he had to find work because he and Golnessa needed money. A young boy who worked at the Persian grocery store in a strip mall on Glenoaks helped him out by looking on Craigslist. Mehdi hadn’t told the boy or the store’s owner that he was married, and he didn’t tell Donny and Luca either. He didn’t have neighbors because the few houses on his street were abandoned and boarded up, and he didn’t have friends. All those people who had toasted and befriended him in Beverly Hills, who had called three times a week just to see if he was free for lunch, reached across the table and put a hand on his arm, gave it a firm squeeze, and said, “You’re a good man, Mehdi, it’s a real honor,” when he wrote a check—he hadn’t heard from any of them since he sold the house on Alpine.
One day, he realized that no one who knew him in the Valley was aware that he had a wife.
The job with the Goldberg-Ferraros was just a few hours a week at first, when all he had to do was drive Donny to his physical therapist in Encino and back. Mehdi would feed and change Golnessa before he left, and rushed home as soon as he was done with work. But then Donny raised his hourly pay and gave him more work, and Luca had him run errands for the studio, so that Golnessa was sometimes alone all day. She now had bedsores and infections that no amount of antibiotics would clear, but since there was no money for doctors, all he could do was take her to the emergency room at Tarzana hospital every few days.
She had no death wish; Mehdi was sure of this. She refused to eat because she wanted to punish him, and that’s why she was determined not to die either.
She did this—not die—until the morning of March 20, 2012. At 5:41, that day, Mehdi got out of bed, washed his face, brushed his teeth, then went back into the bedroom and put a pillow on Golnessa’s face. He waited, but her chest rose and fell at the same pace as before. He pressed the pillow down and held it, but her breath was as steady as a metronome. He bore down, put one knee on the spot where the pillow rose and fell ever so slightly. His knuckles had turned white and his back ached, but she still kept breathing.
He left the pillow on her face and pulled the bedsheets off the mattress, folded them onto her like a shroud, and wrapped her with electrical tape. He had steel bars left over from the time they first moved into the house and had to fortify the windows. He taped two of them to Golnessa.
He had driven past the lake every day for months. He arrived at the park a little before seven. There were a few joggers on the track, a couple of older women walking their dog. He lifted Golnessa out of the trunk and carried her in his arms, like a mannequin encased in paper, to the lake, dropped her in the water, and watched her sink to the bottom. Then he walked back to his car, and waited for the police.
The running track circled the lake. One by one, the joggers finished their exercise, stretched, and drove away. The dog walkers went home. None of them even looked in Mehdi’s direction.
He hadn’t thought about this—what he would do after he had killed Golnessa. He assumed it would be planned for him. The arrest and interrogation, jail and prison and whatever came after. It didn’t occur to him that he would go unnoticed, that he could drop a body into the lake in daylight and not be seen.
Maybe the cops were late, held up by some major event—Obama flying in to LA to raise money and creating a traffic jam. He turned on the radio to 670 AM, the Persian-language channel. A woman with a clear, fluid voice was singing: “Dar in haal-eh mass-tee safaa kardaam . . .”
It was an old recording of the Iranian classical singer Elaheh, with poor sound quality, and it spooked him so much he got out of the car and walked back a few steps. It was eight thirty, almost time to go to Donny and Luca’s, and there was still no sign of the police.
That night, he decided it may be some time before they caught up with him, so he started to put his affairs in order. He cleaned the house, covered the furniture with sheets, cleared the pantry and refrigerator. He washed the windows, the shower, the toilet. He cleaned and waited, cleaned and waited. The neighborhood had become more blighted every year after the recession, so he sealed the front door shut and installed the metal barrier in the back. Then he installed locks. Installed more locks.
He noticed the water running yellow, and tried to pretend it was rust from old pipes. His hair felt sticky after he took a shower, his skin itched, and he felt nauseated every time he poured a drink of water from the sink. One Sunday he decided to check the main valve.
* * *
“It’s my wife, you see,” he confessed to Luca in all seriousness. “She had a gold tooth that couldn’t be extracted.”
It was th
e tooth that had polluted the water and settled into the pipes while Golnessa was living in the house. And it was the tooth that polluted the water in Lake Balboa after she was buried in it.
“We had a pact, you see,” he told Luca, “that I would not abandon her. She harnessed me with love at first, then with fear, and now, you see, she harnesses me with this gold.”
This story was originally written in English.
PERSIAN GLOSSARY
Aash: A dish similar to soup. There are several varieties of aash in Iran.
Agha: Means Mr. or sir. The word is often used as a courtesy before a man’s name to show respect.
Arrack: An alcoholic drink almost always made from raisins. In other countries such as Turkey and throughout the Arab world, it is made from anise and tastes entirely different.
Ashura: Ashura is commemorated by Shia Muslims as a day of mourning for the martyrdom of Imam Hossein, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammed.
Azan: The Islamic call to prayer, recited at prescribed times of the day from a mosque.
Azeri: Refers to the Turkic ethnic group of either the Republic of Azerbaijan or Iranian Azerbaijan.
Baba: Father.
Baha’i: The Baha’i faith, a syncretic religion founded in nineteenth-century Iran (where to this day it suffers persecution), is now spread worldwide with several million followers and a governing body in Haifa, Israel. Its three core principles are the belief in the unity of God, religion, and humanity.
Basij: A paramilitary volunteer militia established after the Islamic Revolution. The basij receive their orders from and are subordinate to the Sepah (Revolutionary Guards).
Bazaar: As a sprawling marketplace, the bazaar is similar to a souq in the Arab world.
Behesht e Zahra: The largest cemetery in Iran, located in the southern part of metropolitan Tehran.
Bismillah: Means, “In the name of God.” Often said aloud when beginning something.
Burqa: An outer garment covering the entire body and face that is worn by women in some Islamic countries, most notably in Afghanistan.
Chador: : An outer garment or open cloak worn by more traditional Iranian women.
Chafiye: A traditional Middle Eastern headdress worn by men, and often nowadays worn as a scarf.
Chaharshanbe Suri: A celebration, which literally means the “Wednesday feast.” It is held on the last Wednesday of the Persian calendar year in March. It is a Zoroastrian fire festival dating back to pre-Islamic Iran, and people often light bonfires in the street.
Daash: An abridged, more colloquial form of the word dadash, which can mean brother or friend.
Diyye: In Islamic law it is the financial compensation paid to the heirs of a victim.
Eid: Usually refers to Eid e Nowruz, the New Year, which in Iran begins with the first day of spring and is celebrated over a period of thirteen days.
Eid e Ghadeer: A festive day observed by Shia Muslims to commemorate the appointment of Imam Ali by the Prophet Muhammad as his immediate successor. Ali was the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet.
Enshallah: A hopeful expression that means “God willing” or “God’s will.”
Etelaa’at: The primary intelligence agency of Iran. Its full name: Vezarat-e Etelaa’at Jomhuri-ye Eslami-ye Iran.
Ferdowsi: A highly revered Persian poet (940–1020 CE). He is the author of the Shahnameh, the national epic of Iran and the Persian-speaking world.
Haft-seen: Haft-seen (or the seven Ss) is a traditional table setting for the celebration of spring and the Persian New Year. The haft-seen spread includes seven items all starting with the letter S (seen) in the Persian alphabet.
Haj agha: A haji is a Muslim who has successfully completed the pilgrimage (haj) to Mecca and is therefore given this honorific title. The expression haj agha combines the title of haji with that of agha to convey respect to the person—often a cleric, or someone in a position of authority, or more commonly simply a man who is older. (Men are often called haj agha out of respect without having ever actually made the pilgrimage.)
Qajar: The Qajar dynasty ruled Iran from 1785 to 1925.
Imam: An Islamic leadership position, most commonly referring to the prayer leader of a mosque. However, in Shia Islam the title carries far more weight, and often specifically refers to the twelve spiritual and political successors of the Prophet who descended from his family.
Imam Hossein: The grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, and the son of Imam Ali, Hossein is one of the most important figures of Shia Islam. The annual commemoration of his martyrdom is a significant event.
Imam Reza: The eighth imam of Shia Islam; his shrine is in the city of Mashhad in northeastern Iran.
Jaan: A term of endearment used ubiquitously in Persian. Literally, it means life, but it is usually said along with someone’s name to indicate intimacy and friendship with that person, and it can be variously interpreted as dear, beloved, brother, or friend.
Joon: A variation of jaan that suggests even more intimacy with the other person.
Khakham: Rabbi.
Khanum: Depending on the context, it can mean either Mrs. or lady, and often serves as a title of respect alongside an adult woman’s first or last name.
Long: A sheet of cloth worn by men.
Lur: An Iranian ethnic group living mainly in southwestern Iran.
Maman: Mother.
Manteau: Derived from French, it is an outer garment or cloak worn by less traditional Iranian women.
Mujahideen: Loosely aligned resistance groups to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. After the Soviet withdrawal they fought amongst themselves and later, under the charismatic leadership of Ahmad Shah Massoud, who was the commander of the Northern Alliance, they fought the fundamentalist Taliban fighters backed by Pakistan.
Mujahedin: Refers to the People’s Mujahedin of Iran. An Islamic/Marxist movement that at first fought against the Iranian monarchy and later against the Islamic Republic of Iran. During the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s, the group was given refuge by Saddam Hussein and mounted attacks on Iran from within Iraqi territory. While some of its leadership has continued to reside in exile in Paris, the group’s core members were confined for many years to a camp in Iraq and were disarmed after the American invasion of Iraq.
NAJA: The uniformed police force of Iran.
Nim e Shaban: The day Shia Muslims celebrate the birth of the twelfth and last imam, who is also known as the mehdi or messiah.
Noha: Shia lamentation and mourning.
Paykan: A mass-produced car in Iran since the 1960s that is based on the design of the British-made Hillman Hunter.
Qalyan: Better known in the West as a hookah, it is a water pipe for smoking flavored tobacco.
Qesas: An Islamic term meaning “equal retaliation,” which follows the principle of “an eye for an eye.” In the case of murder, it means the right of the relatives of a murder victim to demand execution of the murderer.
Qeble: The direction toward the Kaaba in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, that a Muslim should face when praying.
Salam alaykum: One of the most common forms of greeting in the Muslim world. Literally means, “Peace be upon you,” but is understood as a greeting. Salam is the shortened version which is used more commonly in Iran.
Salevat: The practice of formal worship in Islam. In Shia Islam, and particularly Iran, to utter a salevat is to salute the Prophet and his kin in one simple, often repeated sentence.
Sepah : Full name: Sepah e Pasdaran. Known in the West as the Revolutionary Guards, it is an important and powerful branch of Iran’s military founded after the Islamic Revolution.
Sharia: The moral code and religious law of Islam.
Shah-kosh: Refers to handguns sold on the streets in Iran, but often more associated with smaller miniautomatics. The term shah-kosh, or “king-killer,” is derived from shah, meaning “king,” and kosh, which is the verb “to kill.”
Shia: The second largest sect of Islam after Sunni Islam. The majority of the popula
tion of Iran is Shia, although there is a significant Sunni population as well.
Taliban: A Sunni Islamic fundamentalist movement that at times has fought as an insurgency group in Afghanistan and at other times has ruled major swaths of the country with the iron fist of religious law. The Taliban were displaced from their position of power after the American invasion of Afghanistan but have continued to fight.
Yallah: An expression meaning, “Hurry up!”
Yarsan: Yarsan, or ahl-e-haqq (People of the Truth), is a syncretic religion common among the Kurds of western Iran and Iraq, though there are smaller groups of Persian, Lur, Azeri, and Arab adherents among them.
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS
Salar Abdoh divides his time between Tehran and New York City, where he is codirector of the MFA program in creative writing at the City College of New York. He is the author of The Poet Game, Opium, and, most recently, Tehran at Twilight, which is also published by Akashic Books.
Hossein Abkenar was born in 1966 in Tehran. A veteran of the Iran-Iraq War, he has published two collections of short stories and the war novel A Scorpion on the Steps of Andimeshk Railroad Station, which won several of Iran’s top literary prizes and has been translated into French, German, and Kurdish. His screenplay for the film No One Knows about Persian Cats won the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival.
