My Real Life Short Story - Essay Example

MY REAL LIFE SHORT STORY What is life if full of care? I silently wondered. Was life really a bed of roses for all to enjoy unconditionally? Where were feasible solutions for all to embrace and bring about the much needed change? Who had the key to a happy life? Was life surely a product of one’s choices and decisions? Many questions traversed my mind and I had no answer for a single one. My mind went blank. It failed to comprehend the characteristic feature of idealness. As I slowly opened my wet eyes, possibly fatigued by the idea of struggling to make life better for boys and girls back home in Iran, I realized, customs, traditions and ethics, had many faces in different parts of the world. I looked into the television and a series of my favourite program “Neighbours” was on. I cursed! It was all “happy birthday to you”. Happy neighbours had a reason to celebrate! Scenes of happy people living in an ideal world of their own creation were all I could fathom. Heartily, I sang together with them. They had conquered and I had no option than to join them. “Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Saba, happy birthday to you, How old is you now, how old is you now….” Reality downed to me in pieces. My birthday was a couple of days, May 3rd and it was better if I spared my energies to bath in the birthday cakes and raw eggs jelly. The previous birthday was superb and I was looking forward to the next. My best friend Nancy, that I adore like an idol crushed four raw eggs onto my face and took a photograph as I tried to wipe the yolk off my face. My friends’ poured water all over my cloths and splashed my cloths with beef soup! It was wondrous. I dripped wet and I had abundant time to stand, stare and reflect. Life is a mystery. ‘Am I prepared to face the day and its drama?’ I looked up the wall clock. It was eight o’clock in the evening. As I glanced over my right shoulder, my brother was busy chatting on his computer. As I made to disturb his peace, my nose caught a sweet smell of the onion being fried in the kitchen. I instantly knew my mother was preparing something, to make her daughter more stronger, healthy, comfortable…She never bribed her way to win many awards in ‘cookery competitions’ and her word “onion is the way it is fried” echoed delicious moments into my life. I rose off my seat, full of virtual energy and a new self, to make a call to my friends. I wanted to invite them for my birthday celebrations. As soon as I began to dial Elizabeth’s number than I heard a knock on the door. I knew my dad had finally come. I rushed to open the door, happiness clearly written all over my face. “Saba!” dad exclaimed. “Daddy” I replied “How was your day?” He asked as I closed the door. “My day was eventful, I feel so tired as if there is a grave matter in the air” I replied. “Sorry, my daughter; If tiredness was illness we could all have died…” he laughed as he made himself comfortable. “Should I get tired to live for many days?” I asked sarcastically. “No my daughter; I took you to school in order to learn how to make work easier, to learn how to live in comfort after getting a well paying job, to develop ability to get all you want in life, to learn to serve your personal interests in life,…” he suggested. “Mmmmh” I echoed him to go further. “And also learn how to join ideas for the world to listen when you speak.” He added. “That’s right dad. I will make sure I deliver value.” I laid down my wish. I looked onto his face and realized, although he was as happy as the times of my toddler, when he used to throw me up into the air and caught me as I laughed my way to a fall, there was something that worried him. “Today you look sad dad. My ethics studies tutor told us that life is a product of happiness and we all have potential to make our lives better.” I underlined my observations. “I understand my daughter. There are challenges in life that distort happiness and predispose sad moments. Happiness is a situational phenomenon.” “Is there anything that sabotaged your strive for a happy life today? You didn’t leave in that mood this morning although I might have failed to make the right observation.” I inquired. “Yes, my daughter. That’s why I am on a forced smile. I hate the news like the day I will die, the day that I will no longer be able to greet my daughter and wish her a happy life…” he said absentmindedly. Shocked beyond words, I looked at him, expectant like a pregnant woman who knows the day her labour pains shall start. “Your cousin, your childhood playmate, was arrested by policemen.” He calmly said and swallowed hard. Bitterness was written all over his face. “In this world, arrest of a person is normal and release finally occurs. But should arrest be so great such that it can make someone so dull? Is this the real story or is it a lead to a sadder event?” I asked myself heartily. “This world is never fair. How on earth could they have arrested Shirin when she cannot even kill a housefly that momentary lands on her cloths?” I asked as tears slowly formed balls on my eyes and began to flow down my warm brown face like two rails down a slope. I remembered words of wisdom of my grandmother back home, ‘a lioness has nails to pierce the lion but when a lioness needs to conceive, she endures the claws of the lion.’ The pains of motherhood are great. The pains of a successful life are great more. “Could she have lost her virginity to the policemen? Could they have raped her and due to stigma associated with it resolved to commit suicide?” I silently evaluated possibilities. “Dad must be hiding more sad news.” I went on. Sweat began to build over my body. For many days, I never had a running nose but I had no choice. “This world is never fair. Many are days that a gate of happiness is shut and a gate of sorrow is opened. It is the way of life back home.” He said as he rose. My father was a political activist and was opposed to the Iranian regime. He was arrested for leading a demonstration. He narrowly escaped from prison to United Kingdom ten and half years ago and sought political asylum. We struggled thick and thin, with mum for four and half years and made it to United Kingdom against all odds. It was the only last option we had. It was bitter to leave loved ones impromptu, without a notice of our destination, for fear of being betrayal. It was sad, to finally find lasting peace away from home. If we had stayed on, probably my dad might have been killed or assassinated. Our family members would have faced the same fate. The customs that are a cutting edge, into the way things are done, are too traditional. A girl is not supposed to be seen in public with a boyfriend or walking alongside a boy. I wondered how they finally got married! An arranged marriage was the order of the day. Marrying a stranger that is impossible here in United Kingdom is a delicacy back at Iran! How stubborn were the elders of wisdom? Was that the only way forward? They believe love is like a growing tree, a woman learns to love by staying with a stranger who her parents recommend. Marrying a childhood close friend! That’s infidelity! For the first time since I came to United Kingdom, six years ago, I spat on the floor. God forbid! Allah Forbid! I followed my dad to the kitchen. As I leaned on the kitchen door all I heard was, “…I called my cousin today over his mobile phone and he told me that he was admitted in the hospital. He fell unconscious upon receiving news of death of her daughter, his only child, his last hope, the heir… Shirin and her boyfriend were found by policemen in a car that was parked in a garage.” My mother lost grip of the utensils that she was holding and they all broke into pieces upon falling. “They were found naked in the car. Imagine a policeman pressing the accelerator pad hard to suffocate a child of a man and a woman as if the mother of the child never had labour pains, as if it has not cost the father money to up bring the child, as if the policemen had no families, as if the policemen were impotent, as if policemen have no value for life…” In my bitterness, all I could see were my happy moments with Shirin; playing in the compound. We used to play hide and seek games together and only darkness separated us. We were catching butterflies, tying strings on the beetles and pulling them. We used to make beetles to fight and were happy when one flew away. All that fun had drowned. All that fun had lost value. All my past life had been cut, the way we cut the nips of flowers and prevented a seed from being developed. We made colourful decorations from the flowers, our mosaic and collage were the best and we won awards from our efforts. Do people win accolades for distorting the balance of nature? Should people be inspired to destroy and maim? “Shirin…” I shouted my heart out. All I could remember was her last telephone conversation. “I don’t know what I will do. I have a boyfriend of my own choice but my father has failed to give his consent citing poverty and lack of employment of my beloved boyfriend. I am recovering from my father’s ugly batter, like he was killing a python that had finally found warmth beside his treasured beautiful wife. He wants me to marry a man of his own choice but I have maintained ‘over my dead body’. Is love no longer a choice even after learning it in school? Or is theory not translating into practice anymore here? Women, have no preferences. They are only referred…” Why did Shirin’s father fall unconscious if he never loved her? If only I was there, my pursuits for friendship would have ended in an equivalent scenario. I had promised to rescue Shirin and her poor boyfriend by securing their escape to United Kingdom. My father and mother had similar dreams. Shirin’s life was cut at the nip. Where is all the grace we wish for in life? We are all losers. Read More