John's room was filled with toys. Walls were decorated with his pictures. A hidden desire grabbed Anna's heart and she yearned having a baby. She thought to herself: "What is Jan thinking about us, our lives?" Walking to the window, she pondered: "If she was Persian, perhaps she wouldn't like a former candidate to marry her husband to stay with them. She pulled the drapes aside and stayed by the window, gazing into the dark of sky. A bone chilling cold was forced through the Cracks of window. She shivered, but stubbornly stood there and waited for dawn which was not very far from showing its face. She remembered the painful process of getting ready and getting her visa. She wanted to enroll in school in fall, but by the time everything went through, it was to late. Her seventeenth birthday, just a week ago, First of January, was a painful experience. For the first time she realized that there was a subliminal strength beneath her mother's submission. She did not understand then why her mother was crying; but now she knew that perhaps her mother wished to have her daughter's vigor.
Suddenly another thought, like a poisonous knot tormented her. "I'm going to miss a week of school." She was frightened by that thought not knowing anything about American system of eduction. "Is that going to make me fall behind?" She noticed that she was talking aloud to herself. The pain of trespass outshone her anguish. "In less than two days!" She said to herself. "I'll be with Aria." The thought of seeing her brother brought a faded smile to her face. She reflected stupefied, as she sat on the bed, in the core of this tempestuous tumbling of night. "When will the day come?" She said to herself. Loud, distressing, and endless thoughts, like little waves of an ocean, gushed to her soul and broke her dull emotions. Suddenly she noticed a dim light far in horizon. "Is dawn finally here?" She thought. Yes, it was dawn of a new day, new beginning. She walked to the window again to observe the birth of the dawn in this land. "Is it different than Tehran?" She asked herself. The dim light was gradually losing its obscurity and becoming brighter. She intensely looked at the night evaporating from the sky and leaving behind the perpetual formation of the day. Soon the sun would enlighten the earth of ecstasy.
John's crying in the living room alarmed Anna of the morning. She joined Jan.
"Did you sleep?" Jan asked her.
Anna looked amiably at her and nodded her head for no.
"I am so sorry."
Anna wondered why Jan apologized for her sleeplessness. "I need to give her a reason."
"I'm just too nervous and anxious. You understand that, don't you?"
Jan liked her husband's cousin. She was strange, but by knowing enough about their life style, she could understand her strangeness.
Anna offered to play with John while Jan prepared the breakfast. The baby first was scared and did not want to give in to his cousin's kindness, but gradually he calmed down and allowed Anna to hold him and play with him.
Around seven in the morning Shahzdeh called. The ring awakened Fro, who was enjoying his Sunday morning sleep. Anna assured her father that she was fine and rested and her cousin and his wife were very hospitable.
When Jan was leaving home to go to market, Anna offered to go with her. Fro and baby stayed home. In the market, Jan bought many can foods, frozen vegetables, meat, chicken, and bread. She could not believe when Anna told her that she had never been to a market.
"How come? Didn't you ever go with your mother to market?"
Anna felt embarrassed to tell jan that even her mother had never been to a market, but she said it anyway: "Women in my family are not allowed to go to market. We have maids for that."
"Fro had told me that; but I thought he was exaggerating. From what I hear, and what I see now, I give you a lot of credit being here by yourself. That takes a lot of guts."
"Life of women in my family is no exaggeration, Jan. Believe me, many time I wanted to go to the city but my father never allowed that; and thank you for your comment about my bravery, because it was only my courage that made my father to agree of sending me out of country.
Jan went to a deep thought for a moment and then said: "Fro must love me a lot to give up that luxury and live like this and work very hard."
Anna smiled: "I have no doubt that he loves you very much. He was devastated when he was in Tehran. I was the only one knew about you. He trusted me. About our lives, it may seem intriguing to you but I rather your life style.I want to be in charge of my own destiny. I want to make decision for my own life. If I ever marry, I want to marry a man that I choose and love and have children with him, like you. Believe me that life is so stifling."
"Are you going to live with your brother?"
"Yes, for now; but he lives with his girlfriend and they want to marry. In fact, they delayed their marriage so I can be there. My parents don't know anything about it. There was no way they they let me go if they knew it. We kept it it secret. When Aria and Rosy marry, I don't know, may be I get my own place."
Jan put the groceries in the trunk of her car and they drove back home. In the car, Jan said:
"Anna, I don't think I like to live like that. It seems like a mystery, like a book; but now that I had a chance to glance at it from point of view of a woman, like reading a chapter of a book, it doesn't look like a mystery anymore?"
"I never thought about it that way." Anna said: "You said it very eloquently. Where did you and Fro meet?"
"At school. We both graduated at the same year. I was working and going to school; but now because of the baby I don't work anymore. It is hard with one income but we have no choice. We both decided that we can't trust anyone with John."
"I don't blame you, Jan."
It was a cold, soundless morning, when everything out there shone in brightness; but away from the radiance, among walls, there was only dark color and indifference to Anxious Anna. The tumult of life surprisingly suppressed Anna's heart. In the small flat with all the noises in it, she heard for a moment a deadly silence. She closed her eyes and ignored John, who was playing with her. Her ignorance brought the baby to a loud cry and Jan and Fro to the living room from the kitchen. She suddenly came to her senses and looked at them frightened. The baby's cry made her aware that something was wrong.
"What happened, Anna? What is it?" Fro asked nervous.
Jan picked up the baby and soon he was quiet. Anna was ashamed and learned a lesson not to hallucinate around a baby.
"I must have fallen asleep." She said.
"Jan said that you didn't sleep last night, is that right?" Fro asked. "Why don't you take a little nap before lunch."
Anna did not argue. On John's bed, she fell asleep right away.
*
Sitting in light, staring to the dark of night, Anna felt that there was a special grandeur in her journey. This journey was more like a flight, a fleeting from all her childhood, background, and everything else she knew. The thought hurt her with its adamant persistence and she sighed in despair. She conjured up Fro's home and his family; but they all looked faded. "What is wrong with me?" She sighed again. Soon, she would be reunited with her brother. "I miss him so much."
The seven hours flight began in the late evening and ended in Washington. When the airplane was taxiing to the gate, she looked at her watch. It was three in the morning London time, eight in the morning Tehran time. She pictured Fro and his family in their home sound asleep. Her father was probably smoking in his office with his graying hair after his breakfast and estimating her arrival to U.S.
Outside in the parking lot, Anna looked at the sky. The sophisticated moon was striding through superficial of white clouds. She hugged Aria gain and got into her car.
To Be Continued
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