Read Online My Father's Rifle by Hiner Saleem - Free Book Online Page B

After about a half mile, the truck pulled over and we were ordered to get out with our hands on our heads. We had to jump from the high floor of the truck; my mother fell to the ground and a soldier yelled at her to stand up at once. Then, surrounded by military personnel, the men and women were separated. We were taken to a building where we were ordered to undress. We were embarrassed, but under threat of the soldiers, we had no choice. I ended up next to my father, naked, with my hands on my head. I didn’t dare look at him. While the soldiers were searching every fold of our garments, my father, humiliated, was hiding his genitals with his hands, his legs trembling with shame. A soldier forced him to put his hands on his head; then, using his bayonet, he made him spread his legs apart and, jabbing him with his weapon, made him pivot. When the search was over, we were allowed to put our clothes back on. Filled with shame, I thought about my mother, my sisters, my sisters-in-law, and what they were being subjected to, and I began to think it might have been better to die in the Iranian camps than be reduced to this. In the next building, an officer waited for us with our papers, which he seemed to ignore. We had to state our names, and our dates and places of birth. When it came to “profession,” I was curious to see what my father would say. For the first time, he didn’t give his usual proud answer, “I’m the general’s personal operator.” He said, “Baker.” Then it was our turn to state our occupations: student for Rostam and me, teacher for Dilovan, my older brother. Full of contempt, the officer called us asses for having believed in America and for having challenged Baathist Iraq.
    And for our crazy dreams of Kurdistan.
    We went into another room for identity photos. We were
all together again, men and women, and I saw my mother in front of the camera, her face under the lights. She sat in profile, presenting her right side. The military photographer ordered her to face the camera, but she didn’t move. He repeated his command, in vain: she didn’t understand Arabic. He went up to her and turned her head: she was blind in her left eye, which had a spot in the shape of a white cloud. Her face was pale and expressionless. When the photo session was over, we returned to the first officer. He took fingerprints of each of us, on the bottom of a blank sheet, and we were ordered to wait outside.
    We sat on the ground, under the triumphant gazes of the Iraqi soldiers. In my mind’s eye I saw the barbed wire at the frontier, behind the hill, and another family crossing it, as we had a short while ago. My father, turning unobtrusively to my mother, whispered in her ear, “And what if we escaped to the United States?” My mother didn’t even bother responding. Rostam, glancing at the soldiers around us, asked, “How?” “It’s still possible; the border is right in front of us,” said my father. “Once we get there, we go to Tehran, straight to the American embassy.” My older brother Dilovan, who was sketching in the earth with a twig, head down, said only, “It’s over, Papa, we’ve lost everything.” My father took out his tobacco pouch and rolled himself a cigarette.
    A soldier arrived and ordered us to follow him. He led us to an office where a man in civvies was waiting for us, a pistol lying on his desk. He was holding a stack of papers. He counted us, called out our names, then handed the papers to my father. “Here are your new papers, you can leave.” My father took the papers and, incredulous, asked, “We can leave?” “Yes, go home.” And we left his office. We retrieved our belongings and a soldier pointed to some waiting taxis. After a last check, we piled into a taxi and set off for Aqra.
    During the trip, my father looked at our new papers:
photo, name, place of birth, and one