Land of the Plane Tree Leaf by Amir Hosein Bakhshian, Translated by Farshad Torkashvand. Chapter 4: Mitra's Birthday Night

 

 

Chapter 4: Mitra's Birthday Night

The bronze bell of the brick tower of Khorramabad Municipality, located north of Saki Mayor's Square, rings several times continuously with the rotational movement of gears and the advancement of hands, announcing the new hour. Above the bronze bell chamber—which has become a dovecote and bird's nest—there is a turquoise tiled inscription bearing the emblem and logo of Khorramabad Municipality: a white eagle with emerald eyes spreading its wings between two golden wheat clusters, exactly opposite Lake Keo, which appears like a behemoth lying on its side.

A car parks behind the procession of the Center for the Intellectual Development of Children and Adolescents, which is performing an autumn festival around the lake, by turning left and right, disrupting the procession's order and system, and honking continuously and ear-piercingly—by whatever means necessary—on the lake's edge. A tall, broad-shouldered man wearing a white raincoat gets out of a metallic black car! The procession is badly disrupted, and everything becomes chaotic, as if the carnival children are playing ice-skating or performing acrobatic moves in a magnificent circus. Sam, sitting on a cold stone park bench waiting for—

He looks and sees a chessboard placed on a stone table. A man and a woman are sitting opposite each other. The man—a bold fellow with a typically Iranian face—in complete composure, walks straight past the "Eagle's Eye" and stops in front of a woman chess player with wheat-colored hair, green eyes, a rosy complexion, and wearing a dark cardigan! He tucks his hat under his arm, runs his hand through his corn-colored hair, adjusts his necktie, sits on the chair opposite her, takes an old book from that lady's hand, flips through it, and the woman carefully arranges the pieces on the chessboard. Sam, seeing this scene, gets up from the bench, stumbles, and gets as close to them as he can! So close that he can both see their facial expressions well and hear their words clearly—though he feels a bit shy, but what can he do? He's gotten terribly hooked on watching the chess game.

The woman chess player presses the button on the two-time chess timer, meaning the game has begun. They concentrate so deeply and are so quiet that it seems as if no carnival is passing by, or as if they're playing under the heavy shadow of Lake Keo's roar.

Sam is very eager to see who will win and who will lose, and with this thought, sleep leaves his eyes! Anyone who didn't know would think he'd been a champion chess player for years, so focused is he. Sam thinks: "I wish they'd let me join the game because I know the rules very well."

Both of them have one eye on the game and the other on the two-time clock recording the game time. The woman says "Doctor Bijan, pay attention to your pieces!" Doctor Bijan rests his hand under his chin, adopting a thoughtful pose, and says nothing, but the woman calmly and slowly says: "Queen, King, Bishop, Knight, Rook, and Pawns."

Doctor Bijan puts his fingers on his temple and purses his lips: "Dear Mitra, look at your pieces again—King, Vizier, Elephant, Horse, Castle, and Soldiers!"

Sam thinks to himself: aren't chess pieces the same everywhere? So why are these two saying them differently? I should have learned the terminology of modern chess too. Doctor Bijan squints at Mitra and says: "I'm just a soldier who dreams of reaching the last house just once."

Sam doesn't understand what they're saying. Ever since his eyes fell on the pieces and the board, he sees everything as houses, black and white, and the pieces leave the board faster than he imagines.

Sam thinks: "I'll never forget that stinging slap from my father that made my ear ring for a whole week—every time I remember it, my skin crawls. It was all my father's fault for not knowing the Napoleonic method. I checkmated him in four moves, and he started whining and gave me a slap that rang in my ear and said: 'You rascal, you invented your own formula, and my mother kept hovering over my head until dawn, grumbling.'"

Doctor Bijan frowns at the carnival and moves one of his soldiers forward one square. Mitra glances at the timer from under her lashes and moves her Vizier—or as she calls it, her Queen—several squares forward, tightening the circle of encirclement. Doctor Bijan's face grows redder and redder, as if someone has grabbed his throat or perhaps someone is embracing him tightly and he's embarrassed by her. Then Mitra, with her Queen, checks and then checkmates Doctor Bijan's King, and says coldly and emotionlessly: "Check and mate—I won."

Doctor Bijan immediately picks up his Horse—or his Knight—and throws it into the lake, next to the wooden cabin where the ducks are. The wooden piece floats on the water. Then he picks up the same Queen that checkmated him, squeezes it in his hand, and says in a choked voice: "You know very well that at home I always beat you, and this is the first time you've beaten me—especially outside the house, where anything can happen. I just lost track of time."

Mitra says: "No, your attention was on the crowd, not on the game!"

Sam thinks: "The only one around the lake who could distract someone is a flower-faced girl tending the garden flowers around the lake, with a small sign beside her that reads: 'Flowers are precious—consider them a gift.'"

Doctor Bijan gazes at the lake and whispers: "No, my heart is still with you. I just lost track of time, but this time I won't let time slip away, my dear—time is short."

Mitra's eyebrows knit together: "Why do you get angry? One side always wins and the other loses."

Doctor Bijan turns his head toward Mitra, runs his hand over the chessboard, and says: "But I don't want to ever be the loser, my dear..."

Before Doctor Bijan's sentence is even finished, a reckless person who had spotted the "Eagle's Eye" from a distance throws an egg at Doctor Bijan. Just as Sam is about to shout "Doctor Bijan, watch out!"—unfortunately for Doctor Bijan, the thrower's arm is faster than the Eagle's Eye's movement and Sam's tongue, and the egg "splat" hits poor Doctor Bijan square on the back of his head. Sam rushes toward him in a panic! A behemoth that would run aground if he got there too late. Hesitation could be read in Sam's eyes—a feeling that wanted to borrow two legs and run away, but something stopped him.

He rummages through his pockets, finds a tissue, stumbles over himself, and says: "Excuse me, can I help you?"

Doctor Bijan, still with his head down, gestures: "No, thank you!"

Mitra immediately gives him several tissues and starts wiping off the egg residue, because the egg white is badly dripping from his face.

The rotten egg smell fills the air. Why did this have to hit this poor soul? Interestingly, the egg yolk is still intact.

It could have been in Sam's stomach, but unfortunately his mood changed too quickly. Sam thinks: "Poor Doctor Bijan got completely humiliated in front of all these people—what a disaster. I wish it had hit the back of my head instead, since no one knows me here, but poor Doctor Bijan—what if tomorrow photos and videos of him in this state end up on Telegram and Instagram?!"

The Eagle's Eye nervously turns its pupils to see where the damned photographers and people with phones are standing—and sees that Sam quickly shields Doctor Bijan with his own body, at least forming a barrier against their camera lenses. The Eagle's Eye sees them! Fortunately, they're in the middle of the carnival commotion, taking photos of the costume characters for their own amusement, and only one camera lens is pointed at them. Seeing it, Sam feels embarrassed. The Eagle's Eye fixes its gaze on an unknown point. Sam can neither melt into the ground nor find a hole to hide in—not in Doctor Bijan's eyes, nor in Mitra's. He thinks to himself: "What must one do to catch someone's eye and settle in their heart? It's like wearing a night-cap of invisibility!" The municipal bell doesn't even ring when you strike it! Neither a ding nor a dong is heard, but Lake Keo is visible, and all the commotion and excitement of the city seems to have taken hold.

Finally, Mitra glances sideways at Sam and says: "Please clean the cake and cream from my face!"

Sam, without blinking, immediately says: "Of course!"

While he's busy cleaning and removing the cake and cream from Mitra's face, the previous Eagle's Eye loses itself completely. Whenever Sam's mother stands before a mirror, she says to herself: "God is beautiful and loves beauty." Sam's father immediately responds: "You're right, but people's eyes are envious, and it's better to hide your beauty."

Mitra has such a beautiful face that seeing it opens Sam's senses wide, and he feels as if he's just been born. But he doesn't know what he saw when he was born and opened his eyes to the beauty of—his mother used to say: "A tall, ash-blonde midwife with honey-colored eyes from our own Chenar Oil Company township was happier than me and your father that you were born."

Sam is completely mesmerized by the beauty of Mitra's face, his mouth hanging open like a fish's, and he says to himself: "Between us, Mr. Confectioner, with what delicacy and taste have you decorated the cake with a pinecone leaf!"

He picks up the remaining cake and, out of sight of Doctor Bijan and Mitra, puts it in his mouth. After swallowing the cake, he feels a bit revived, and then carefully cleans his face so it appears natural. Looking properly at Mitra's face, he sees that she doesn't look bad at all—as if her face has been made up. Finally, the rotten egg smell makes Mitra speak:

Sam, who is completely overwhelmed by the rotten egg smell, says: "Rotten egg smells like a fox!"

Doctor Bijan is cleaning the back of his head and adjusting his collar and necktie, making a face, and then gives Sam a little laugh. But Mitra says firmly: "No, it's not like that—it smells like dead fish, boy!"

She pulls back her head, reaches into her bag, and brings out a mirror and her makeup kit, along with a chic, classy cologne, with which she drenches Doctor Bijan. She also feels sorry for Sam and glances at him too: "Pss! Pss!" What a killer fragrance she's put on—it makes the Eagle's Eye see the world in color and Mitra submerged in magical, colorful brushes as she starts fixing her makeup.

This action delights Sam and makes his poetic nature blossom, and he says: "I've tied my heart to your hair's string / May the color of your lips be sacrificed—what shade suits your lipstick?"

Doctor Bijan says: "Their behavior only makes me more determined in my decision."

He places one hand on Sam's shoulder—as if Sam's shoulders are the ship's helm—and with his index finger points to Lake Keo. Sam thinks: "Thank God someone finally considers me a person, but I'm sure I'm not his intended audience."

Doctor Bijan says: "My dear, look at Lake Keo well—aren't you tired of seeing it every day and every night?"

Mitra says: "Of course not—every time I see the view of Lake Keo from my window frame, it appears to me in a new shape and color."

Doctor Bijan says: "But for me, it's become repetitive." Then Doctor Bijan starts hemming and hawing, and Mitra says: "Don't evade—say what you have to say completely!"

Doctor Bijan takes a deep breath and then says: "Honestly, my application for residency in Canada has been approved, but it seems your application has been rejected. It doesn't matter—we'll apply again for you so you can come there as soon as possible. I very much want to spend our retirement there. I'll go first since my affairs are in order, and within a year, you'll be able to come easily—thank God Toran has rented a house for us there. If our living conditions are good and we like it there, we'll sell our house here and buy one there. On weekends we'll go see Niagara Falls and enjoy ourselves greatly..."

Then Doctor Bijan gets up and gazes at the horizon, and the Eagle's Eye zooms in on the horizon line—closer, closer, closer—when Mitra stands up and says to Doctor Bijan: "Consult your heart! Look at how you got your child, wife, life, language, job position, and social standing, your house and facilities—maybe the facilities are better there, but you have everything from here."

Doctor Bijan says nothing, and Sam remains silent, not knowing what to say, as he knows nothing of their past—they're a married couple, and as the old saying goes: when a husband and wife argue, fools believe them.

Then Doctor Bijan turns around and says: "Yes, I know you're right. Leaving behind my collection of Persian carpets, stamps, coins, postcards of Iran's landscapes and ancient monuments, bronzes, Warsaw ware, enamelwork, khatam, marquetry, miniatures, begging bowls, and battle-axes is hard—but what can I do?"

He continues: "You're right—I have many things from you, especially from your father, who introduced me to Khayyam, Attar, Rumi, and Sa'di so I wouldn't be ignorant of my homeland's culture and art. All of this is true, but dear Mitra, be logical—I truly want both of us to have a better life. I'm sure we'll have wonderful memories there. My dear, please let me go..."

Doctor Bijan gently presses Mitra's shoulders in his hands, and Sam thinks: "How tired I am—I crave a good massage. I wish someone would find me and massage my shoulders too."

Lost in these thoughts, Doctor Bijan says: "I'll try to stay in touch with you frequently—be patient, my dear!"

Sam falls into thought: "Patience has made a clay pot of my head, but the fruit of patience is sweet—and truly, the grass beneath my feet has turned green." Mitra, like Sam, has run out of patience and says: "Don't you ask yourself what I'll do with myself during that year? I'm sure you're so focused on yourself that you don't even know about Toran!"

Doctor Bijan says: "Be assured—she has a good, happy life, and during this year, I'll be with her too, and you..."

It seems the "you" gets stuck in his throat, and that same "you" chokes him. Doctor Bijan starts coughing repeatedly—and surely he coughs so he won't cry.

Mitra says: "Arguing with you is pointless—it's like talking to you through concrete walls. Have you thought about what I'll do if you go?!"

Doctor Bijan says in a choked voice: "Well, you're not going to stay here forever—be a little patient, my dear!" Mitra falls silent and says nothing.

The Eagle's Eye reads different things from both their eyes! One radiates waves of love, the other a boundless sea—truly, how romantic they are.

Sam stares intensely at their green, almond-shaped eyes and is afraid to interrupt their conversation and make things worse. Sam thinks: "The stew pot is open—where has the modest catfish gone?"

Doctor Bijan takes a beautiful, luxurious reddish-brown box from his pocket and offers it to Mitra, but Mitra shrugs and pulls her hand back. When Doctor Bijan opens the box, a pearl shines inside, caressing the Eagle's Eye, and Doctor Bijan hums this poem:

*"Wisdom is a precious pearl not given to everyone / The peacock's tail is beautiful—not given to the vulture."*

Doctor Bijan takes Mitra's hand and places the pearl in her palm: "My dear, this is a birthday gift for you—please accept it from me."

Mitra rolls the pearl in her fingers, places it back in its box, and the hesitation in her eyes is easily readable. Doctor Bijan closes the box and presses it into Mitra's hands.

Mitra says: "Before you go, I must tell you something—it's been almost a year since Toran has been on the verge of separating from Cambiz. Once their separation is finalized, she's supposed to return to Iran any day now, but I don't know the exact date."

The roar of an airplane is heard, and Doctor Bijan, without batting an eye, glances at the sky, gets into his car, and drives along the lake and the coastal street to reach the airport.

Tears well in Sam's eyes, and the Eagle's Eye watches Doctor Bijan depart, walking as if on water.

Mitra's sobs break on Sam's shoulder, and Sam wipes Mitra's tears with his hand. Then she throws the chessboard and pieces into Lake Keo and gives the pearl box to Sam, saying: "This box is safer with you."

And then she distances herself from the crowd and disappears into the crowded street leading to the boutiques—as if a mallet has struck Sam's brain, leaving him completely confused and dazed by what he's witnessed. Frustrated that he's so weak, helpless, and clumsy that he couldn't even do anything, he scratches his head and says to himself: "Now where am I supposed to find her to return this pearl box?"

He's terribly troubled with guilt, his head aches, his legs tremble, and he rushes to catch up with the procession before it's too late. He returns to his original spot and stands at attention like a proper person, not moving from his place from then on—because the adventure is over.