By Ziba Poya
Night is drawing near, and my eyes are drawn to the Pole-Sorkh from my position on the hair salon’s balcony. The sidewalks are crowded. Shops are closing one after another. I was getting ready to put on my gown and leave the hair salon when a girl entered. In spite of her attempts to appear normal, her look and behaviour reveal her anxiety and apprehension. She says her hair needs to be trimmed and dyed, and she wants this phrase tattooed on her elbow: “Wash slowly, my body is full of pain.”
That’s not a proper sentence; ask for something else, I said. She insists but I don’t agree. As I prepare the dye, I look at her. Tears slowly trickle down her cheeks.
To dye her hair, I removed her black scarf. There are white, hairless circles on her head. Under her earlobes and around her neck, her skin looks wrinkled like that of an 80-year-old woman. She is calm and obedient. I opened her buttons. Her back and stomach are severely burned.
I cut and then dyed her long curly brown hair. It’s getting late. I’m not in the mood to argue. Even though I think the sentence is absurd, I quickly prepare my tattoo machine and begin.
After the tattoo is finished, I take a closer look at her. With a narrow nose and almond-shaped eyes, she has a wheat-coloured complexion. She rubbed lipstick onto her thin lips and applied makeup to her face. She has wrinkles there, but not as much as on her chest and back. The hem of her jeans is rolled up, and she is wearing Asics shoes.
“What happened to you?” I can’t avoid asking her. In a careless way, she explains that she set herself on fire. I lean toward her and ask slowly, “Have you not taken pity on yourself?” Suddenly, she chokes up. While sniffing, she plays with the red nail polish on her fingers saying, “I was fed up with life.”
“Why?”
Without pause, she tells her story:
My mother left my father when I was two years old, taking my two siblings but leaving me behind to suffer.
I was told by my stepmother one day that my mother had tried several times to take me, but my father had refused. Whenever I asked my father why he wouldn’t let me leave, he told me, ‘You are my sweetheart. Who can allow his sweetheart to be taken away from him?
I chopped potatoes and made chips with my father from the age of four to 14, under the masculine name of Hassan Agha. We lived behind the Tiflan-e-Muslim Mosque in Pul-e-Khoshk at that time. I can’t recall a moment in my life when I was happy and played like other children.
When I was 17, I was forced to marry the butcher’s son without my consent. The butcher’s shop was across the street from our house. My stepmother advised me to marry the son because they could afford to cook meat once a week in their house. She always praised the butcher’s chivalry. Although the butcher’s son did not like me, they made an agreement. The orders of the families had to be obeyed.
At first, I didn’t understand why my stepmother insisted I marry the butcher’s son. One day, my father sent me to the butcher’s shop to buy meat. Although the shop door was closed, it was not locked. When I entered the shop, the butcher stepped out from behind a curtain. He was busy tying a brace to his pants. He called, “Samira! Come on, what do you need?” I was scared and wanted to leave, but a corner behind the curtain caught my attention. From there, my stepmother was watching me. After returning home, I told my father that the butchery was closed.
My marriage to the butcher’s son took place six weeks later. One night, I told my future husband I was planning to set myself on fire. With a big grin on his face, he said, “That’s great! I would be relieved as well.”
He brought a barrel filled with yellow liquid a few days later. He handed me the barrel and said, “It is gasoline. It makes it easy to set fires.” I hid the barrel in the kitchen for a few days.
On a very cold day, the butcher brought meat. My stepmother cooked it. My stepmother, my two stepsisters, my future husband and the butcher were eating together. I wanted to burn myself among them so they would burn with me, but Soheila, my innocent two-year-old stepsister, was there. Grabbing the barrel, I walked to the house yard feeling sorry for her. The yard was covered in snow and it was raining heavily outside. I poured gasoline on my head, but no matter what I struck, I couldn’t light the match because it was wet. As I was trying, I slipped on the stairs and the match ignited, then my clothes and I caught fire. I became more inflamed with each passing moment, but I didn’t feel any burning. My body was numb. All of them rushed to the yard when they saw that I had set myself on fire. “Idiot,” my future husband said. “Why didn’t you set yourself on fire somewhere hidden from sight?” My stepsister, Riza-Gol, who was as tall as me, screamed, “Take her away. People will tease me for being the sister of an idiot who burned herself.” The butcher rushed to the yard and when his eyes fell on me, he said, “Now you’re notorious.”
My stepmother spat on my father, saying, “Your favorite disgraced us.”
My father rubbed me in the snow, until the fire was extinguished. Then he took me to the hospital.
I spent two weeks in the hospital. I saw myself in the mirror at home after being discharged. My face was burned. I had burns all over my body, but I didn’t care and didn’t feel burned at all. No one talked to me. There was no sign of my future husband. Days passed without him visiting me. My father finally told me that, the day after I set myself on fire, he flew to Iran.
***
At this point in her story, Samira falls silent. In her tears, she takes a deep breath and continues, “I will never regret what I did. I’m 19 years old now, and my childhood was ruined. I’m very happy that it is finished.”
She takes out a cigarette case from her bag after a brief pause. She lights one and draws its smoke deep into her chest. She exhales a puff of smoke and says, “It’s been two years since my future husband left me. He hasn’t heard from me, and I haven’t heard from him, either. As I burned, I didn’t understand what burning was, but as soon as I heard of his marriage, I understood what burning was.
Ziba Poya is a pen name for a hair stylist.
