Read Online Between Two Worlds by Zainab Salbi - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Zainab Salbi
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“Zainab, it’s possible your mother may have to leave the country too,” he said. “The government is giving two thousand dinars [six thousand dollars] to Iraqis to divorce their spouses if they’re of Iranian origin.”
Until now, I had sat still, staring at my feet in petrified silence.
“You’re not going to divorce Mama, are you?” I said in a sharp, accusing voice. Of everything he had said, that scared me the most.
“No, no,” he said gently. “But you’re an adult now, so I thought you should understand what is happening.”
Then he opened the car door and got out. When Mama and I talked, I could usually ask questions, even if I didn’t always get answers. With Baba that was impossible. I got out and followed him with my head full of questions. Was I going to lose Mama? If Baba wasn’t going to divorce Mama, why did he say that? Would he even think of divorcing Mama? Didn’t he love her anymore? If she left, what would happen to me? Could I go with her? What about my brothers? What would happen to them?
When Aunt Najwa opened the door, I hardly recognized her. A tall, beautiful woman who ran one of Uncle Adel’s factories and always had her hair done at a salon, she looked haggard and thin. There was no makeup, no elegant business suit. The aunt I knew as almost imperious had been replaced by a frightened woman who kept running her hands through her hair. She started talking fast to Baba without even saying hello. I found my cousins in the living room looking as scared and pale and ignored as I had been feeling for weeks. They told me they hadn’t seen their father in days.
“Two Mukhabarat agents came an hour ago asking for our citizenship papers to prove we weren’t Iranian,” Dawood said. “Mama told them Baba had them and he was out of town.”
“But how can you be Iranian!” I said. “You’ve never even been to Iran! You’re Iraqi! Your parents are Iraqi!”
“The neighbors are all Iraqi too, and we woke up one day and they were gone,” said my littlest cousin, near tears. “And now we’re the very last house on our street left with people in it!”
Why was this happening? Why was the Mukhabarat coming to their house and not my house? Why were my mother and their parents in danger, but apparently not my father? What about me and my brothers? Were they trying to deport us too?
“If Mama and you guys get deported, I’m going with you,” I declared.
“I don’t know if you would be allowed,” Dawood told me.
“If anybody tries to pull us apart, I hold on and I just won’t let go,” I vowed. “They’ll have to take me too.”
We sat there for a long time, listening to bits and pieces of our parents’ conversation in the next room. This apparently wasn’t the first time the Mukhabarat had come; it was the second, and Aunt Najwa said they had told her they would be back again. I looked around at the big dining room table, the backgammon board, the wedding pictures, the baby pictures, the pictures of us on the Tigris in their boat last summer. I’m sure we were all thinking the same thing. Were the secret police going to take all this away from them? Would we ever be able to play together in this house again? I felt great, nauseating, roller coaster loops of fear in my stomach.
When Baba came over to tell me it was time to leave, Aunt Najwa was pleading with him, holding his shoulder.
“Please do something, Basil!” she said. “I don’t know how much more time I can buy. They will take us if you can’t manage to do something!”
My cousins all turned and stared at me.
Baba? What could my father do?
For the life of me I can’t remember the next few days. I can’t remember running to Mama, though I must have when I got home. All I remember is that a few days, maybe even a few weeks, later, Mama drove me to an old neighborhood in downtown Baghdad. She stopped to buy fresh fish for dinner and chatted with the fishmonger. The worry was gone,
“Zainab, it’s possible your mother may have to leave the country too,” he said. “The government is giving two thousand dinars [six thousand dollars] to Iraqis to divorce their spouses if they’re of Iranian origin.”
Until now, I had sat still, staring at my feet in petrified silence.
“You’re not going to divorce Mama, are you?” I said in a sharp, accusing voice. Of everything he had said, that scared me the most.
“No, no,” he said gently. “But you’re an adult now, so I thought you should understand what is happening.”
Then he opened the car door and got out. When Mama and I talked, I could usually ask questions, even if I didn’t always get answers. With Baba that was impossible. I got out and followed him with my head full of questions. Was I going to lose Mama? If Baba wasn’t going to divorce Mama, why did he say that? Would he even think of divorcing Mama? Didn’t he love her anymore? If she left, what would happen to me? Could I go with her? What about my brothers? What would happen to them?
When Aunt Najwa opened the door, I hardly recognized her. A tall, beautiful woman who ran one of Uncle Adel’s factories and always had her hair done at a salon, she looked haggard and thin. There was no makeup, no elegant business suit. The aunt I knew as almost imperious had been replaced by a frightened woman who kept running her hands through her hair. She started talking fast to Baba without even saying hello. I found my cousins in the living room looking as scared and pale and ignored as I had been feeling for weeks. They told me they hadn’t seen their father in days.
“Two Mukhabarat agents came an hour ago asking for our citizenship papers to prove we weren’t Iranian,” Dawood said. “Mama told them Baba had them and he was out of town.”
“But how can you be Iranian!” I said. “You’ve never even been to Iran! You’re Iraqi! Your parents are Iraqi!”
“The neighbors are all Iraqi too, and we woke up one day and they were gone,” said my littlest cousin, near tears. “And now we’re the very last house on our street left with people in it!”
Why was this happening? Why was the Mukhabarat coming to their house and not my house? Why were my mother and their parents in danger, but apparently not my father? What about me and my brothers? Were they trying to deport us too?
“If Mama and you guys get deported, I’m going with you,” I declared.
“I don’t know if you would be allowed,” Dawood told me.
“If anybody tries to pull us apart, I hold on and I just won’t let go,” I vowed. “They’ll have to take me too.”
We sat there for a long time, listening to bits and pieces of our parents’ conversation in the next room. This apparently wasn’t the first time the Mukhabarat had come; it was the second, and Aunt Najwa said they had told her they would be back again. I looked around at the big dining room table, the backgammon board, the wedding pictures, the baby pictures, the pictures of us on the Tigris in their boat last summer. I’m sure we were all thinking the same thing. Were the secret police going to take all this away from them? Would we ever be able to play together in this house again? I felt great, nauseating, roller coaster loops of fear in my stomach.
When Baba came over to tell me it was time to leave, Aunt Najwa was pleading with him, holding his shoulder.
“Please do something, Basil!” she said. “I don’t know how much more time I can buy. They will take us if you can’t manage to do something!”
My cousins all turned and stared at me.
Baba? What could my father do?
For the life of me I can’t remember the next few days. I can’t remember running to Mama, though I must have when I got home. All I remember is that a few days, maybe even a few weeks, later, Mama drove me to an old neighborhood in downtown Baghdad. She stopped to buy fresh fish for dinner and chatted with the fishmonger. The worry was gone,
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