The noon of the seventh day in hospital, The entire family of Jalal, both wives, the three children, and Maryam gathered there. Even Mina, his fourteen years old daughter from Sima was there. Neda was more upset for her than anyone else. She was a little younger than her when her father, threw her under his feet in order to have a peaceful marriage with Sima. The doctor let them to use a privet room to talk about this painful issue, the killing or the letting go of the old man. They all sat around. They all looked at Neda, who had spontaneously taken over. They all knew what was about to happen.
Neda, as if giving a lecture, said with eyes that were red and burning of not sleeping and not being able to cry, began talking. Her voice sounded like someone who was suffering from sour throat; but in fact it was because of smoking too many cigarette, and not being able to shed tears for so many suffering:
"You all know what the doctor had told me!" She stopped, looked at all one by one with her intense look. The only one, who was crying was her little sister, Mina. She was the same age as Neda when she had had the days of her extreme wonderment with her father, unaware that in a very short order, all would be gone. She pointed to Mina:
"Come on Mina, come and sit next to me. I know you'll suffer more than anyone else."
Mina automatically obeyed her older sister and went and sat next to her. Neda for the first time noticed how much she looked like her when she was fourteen.
"The doctor wants us to end dad's misery, to disconnect all these machines. He says that he would never recover or come out of coma; even though he thinks he is aware and knows what is going on around him. That is why he thinks dad is suffering. He says that without those machines he won't be able to breathe on his own, too many scar tissue, too much damage down to his lung. He says if he had come much, much earlier to the hospital..." Neda stopped at this point and looked first at Sima and then at her mother. " He suggested that we need to end his suffering, misery. The man knows what is going on and he wants to end it. I, myself saw it in his eyes. The doctor says it's the right thing; it's the Godly thing. Sohrab and I agree with him!"
A long silence ensued. No one knew what the others thought or felt. No one talked. There was a horrific hush in the room, the only sound was Mina's calm crying. Then it was Sima, who broke the silence:
"Don't you think that is for me to decide Miss loose poetess ..."
Suddenly Sohrab's eyes blazed. He answered Sima's uncouth remark with his fiery eyes and bitter tongue:
"How dare you to talk to my sister like this; call her loose. You're the reason that her life is ruined. In my opinion you are the loose one, being an old mate, selling your body to our father only because he was bored..."
"Stop it Sohrab!" Neda cut in and stopped her brother from going on with his outrage.
"It is not time to fight. We have plenty of time for that. I don't care what she calls me. I know who I am and that's all it matters. All I care now is to save our dad from suffering." She hugged her little sister, Mina, who was crying real hard at this moment, and made her to sit on her lap. Then she turned to Sima and said:
"I wouldn't act the way you do in front of my child! Actually it is not up to any of us. Sohrab is the one that needs to make that decision; and he's already told me that he agrees with the doctor. Now, one by one, you can go and say your good byes to him!"
This was like the last thing she would say that day; but no, she said something else:
"After we all say our good byes, everybody will go home, and only Sohrab, me and Mina, oh not Mina, will stay. Even Maryam will go home. She needs to be with Aria!"
The order of father's death sentence was suggested by the doctor, was given by Neda, and was carried by Sohrab. Late that night, Father was no more! They pronounced him dead at two in the morning; a man, who had just turned sixty nine.
Sohrab insisted to take Neda home. She stayed in her brother's bosom a long time and after seven days of torture was finally able to shed real tears! The both were in the room with the body of a man, who was a good father, a bad father, a vicious father, a fair father; but he was their father nevertheless. They said many farewells to their father. Sohrab would not leave Neda alone even for a minute.
Outside in the lobby, after the old doctor finally left them while even he was crying, Neda begged Sohrab to leave her, to let her stay a few more hours. This was a place that her story had begun. She did not want to finish it with a hurry and go home right away. She was still looking for her lost daughter, and many unanswered questions. When Sohrab finally left her at four in the morning, Neda returned to the privet room that they had had a family meeting the evening before; and wrote while watching the pouring rain through the window.
✎
"Here I am sitting where the old man died,
Looking at the pouring rain,
Hearing the siren
Of an ambulance, which just came in
The siren of some one's misery!
How do I feel?
I feel black as my heart.
Today the color of my heart is the color of my feeling.
Today my heat is black.
Hang on to the cruel life
Because there are unfinished businesses.
I tried to sooth the old man's helplessness;
To sooth his hopelessness,
His disappointment.
But rage had made me a fool.
And I was too late!
We were all too late!"
To Be Continued
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