The Pool

He was not hot anymore. As soon as he put his feet in the water he felt all the heat was flowing out of the tips of his toes. He both liked it and felt it was giving him goose bumps.
Slowly, he dipped his feet farther into the water; the hairs on his feet floated on the water. The hotness of the stones at the edge of the pool passed through his pants and gradually he felt the steam of the heat gathering in his body. The hot sun of the end of the Khordad was shinning on his head and troubling his eyes. He poured handful of water on his tights and soaked his pants and enjoyed it.
Every once in a while a breeze came and cooled him down and made him think about whether he should jump in the water or not. For a while he kept on pouring water on his chest and rubbing it. He poured a handful of water on his head; water came down along his spine and he felt something like the cool bill of a bird on his spine and felt as he did whenever Kazhal - his wife- caressed his back with her hands. He wanted to think on Kazhal but the weather was hotter than his imagination and the stones at the edge of the pool were burning.
He thought, " I wish Fereydun were here and we could play in the water," like the neighbors who tempted him every afternoon with their noise to go up and watch them from the balcony. " I wish Fereydun were here." Counting today, it was twenty days since Fereydun had gone and left him all alone in this big house. He had spent some of his time working. For a while he had gone to see the workers building upstairs, for a while he had gone to the co-op, and for a while he had watered the flowers, and the rest of the time he had lain down on a comfortable mattress they had found in the desert and slept on it at night, and had thought about Sanandaj, about their house and neighborhood, about unemployment and about Kazhal, and about Kazhal. . . . He had thought about Kazhal and her black eyes and her long hair that she used to braid like two thick ropes and would toss them over her shoulders and about that red headscarf with the flower design, so much that he felt she was standing in front of him. He thought about Kazhal with her face that had a yellowish tinge and her two round red cheeks, so much so that he saw her sitting in front of him. How often he had touched those strong, skillful hands whose palms were calloused from carpet- weaving. How many times he had taken her hands, which were always sweaty and wet, in his hands. How many times he had taken her on his arms and she had looked down, shyly, with eyes whose lashes in profile seemed to be blond, and had said, " Don't do that Jalal, it is not good, someone might come!"
"Fine, let them come! We are husband and wife, aren't we?"
" Well, yes, but wait for the nighttime, when everybody's asleep. It is not good, people will say we are shameless!"
"Shameless? Fine, let them say so. There is no shame in a lawful act, and by the way, I haven't done anything." When their conversation reached this point, Kazhal would pull away and Jalal would try to fight back that feeling which had started all over his body and was gathering in one place and wait for the nighttime when everybody- his mom, his dad, his brother Fereydun, and his sister- was asleep. At night, Kazhal put their mattress on the roof. She would lay the mattress open behind the bramble bush in the evening so the heat of the sun would get and the mattress would be cool at night, when wanted to sleep.
He was really hot. The heat of the sun was truly burning his body. He poured another handful of water over his back and tried to remember Kazhal's fingertips once more. He poured a handful of water over his left shoulder, like the ablution at prayer time. And ran his hand down his arm.
Then with his other hand he poured water over his right shoulder and let the water flow down. He was following the drops of water with his eyes, watching them penetrate the hairs on his hand and slow down. He felt that his feet were soaked in the water. He moved them and lifted them out and looked at his big toe and his other toes. He spread them and remembered the times his mother took him to the public bath. He remembered how hard his mother rubbed him and scrubbed the soles of his feet with pumice and it tickled, and as he laughed he would cry all the time and his tears and watery mucus from his nose would mix, and intimidated by other women who would yell at him because of his screaming, he wouldn't look up and would wipe his nose with the back of his hand and keep up sniffing. When they came out of the bath he would be like a bouquet of flowers, as his mother used to say. A bouquet of flowers, the palms of whose hand and the soles of whose feet were white and wrinkled, and whose skin was a bit puffy.
Now the skin of his feet had grown a little older.
A bee came buzzing to the pool to drink. Jalal's attention moved from his mother and the bath to the water and the bee. His head was hot. He thought, "I hope my nose doesn't bleed." He raised his head and looked up at the sun. What time was it? He turned toward the garden and the rosebush, where he had hung his watch. For a few moments he didn’t see anything; shadowy spots appeared in front of his eyes. He closed his eyes completely and bent over and stretched out his hand to take his watch from the bush; his hand couldn’t reach it. He pulled himself farther along the ground but the hot stones pricked his side like needles. He jumped. He brought his legs out of the water. He pulled himself closer. He reached a leaf, took it and pulled it. The leaf tore off. He tried again. He caught a thin stem near him. He pulled his bush toward him. He wanted to pick up his watch, but he changed his mind. He looked at his watch; it was four –thirty. In one or two hours the owner would come; he had only this couple of hours for swimming. They had painted the pool the day before yesterday-sky-blue. He had tried the paint yesterday to see if it had dried. It was dry.
He had washed away the dirt and turned on the water. It had taken them exactly twenty-four hours to fill the poll. The water was limpid like tears.
He put the palm of his hand in the water and scooped up the water and spread his fingers. The water spilled into the pool. He scooped up another handful and poured it over his head. The water came down through his hair, drop by drop. His hair was oily. It was one or two weeks since he had bathed. Maybe it was since before Fereydun left. He couldn’t remember. He had washed himself with just water, in the sun, but he didn’t remember taking a bath. He scooped up another handful of water and rubbed it in his hair, like soap; then another handful. He cupped both his hands and took the water and poured it over his head and did it over and over until his hair was completely wet.
His eyes fell on the surface of the water; it was rippling and the sun was playing on it.
The reflection of the clouds had fallen on the water. The clouds were moving and waves had started off as well, and it seemed that the sky was completely cloudy, but the hot sun was still shining. He poured some water under his legs. His pants were steamy and his body was itching.
“I wish Fereydun were here so we could sprinkle water on each other and keep busy. But it doesn’t matter; those days are over now. Tonight Fereydun will come and bring some news from Sanandaj. I am sure he will come with good news.” Fereydun had taken some money with him. The engineer had paid all their wages. The day before Fereydun’s departure they had gone shopping and bought everyone a gift.
Last time Kazhal had asked him for two combs with diamonds. He and Fereydun searched high and low until they found them. All that night, Jalal had secretly held those combs in his hand and kissed them and had closed his eyes and imagined Kazhal sitting in the bed and setting them in her hair, one of each side, and laughing. Then he had seen her taking the combs out of her black hair and putting them down above her head and pulling the striped Shushtari sheet over them both. The scene was so vivid that, involuntarily,he had called out to Kazhal, and Fereydun had asked, ‘ What is it ? What do you want?”
Now Fereydun was coming back; and he would bring him news from them. Surely Kazhal has asked when he was coming back. In the two years they had been married he hadn’t spent so much as three months with her.
Kazhal missed him a lot but she didn’t say anything in front of others. Last time, two or three days before he came to Tehran, she was impatient, always crying, and she wanted to come with him. She was asking for all kinds of things; she wanted a child, and she wouldn’t be satisfied with just a scarf anymore. He had sent Kazhal a gold picture frame for the photograph taken of them together last time.
He wished he was in Sanandaj. He wished he was in Sanandaj and looking at that photograph on the mantelpiece between those two vases full of plastic flowers. Certainly it would go well with the gold edging of the cheminee. He remembered the fans on the cheminee with their wool tassels.
The memory of the coolness of their one room saddened him. He was very hot. He jumped into water.
The water reached to the middle of his chest. He felt cold. He jumped up and down. He enjoyed the touch of the cold water on his body, a kind of pleasure accompanied by pain. His legs, which had been dangling for a while, had gone to sleep and couldn’t bear the weight of his body, and the agitation of the water was upsetting his equilibrium. His legs were emptying under his body. He tried to control his body by using his hands. Little by little he felt his legs; now he could stand in the water. He grabbed the metal railing around the pool and bent his legs a bit and the water reached his shoulders. A lazy pleasure began moving from his shoulders toward his waist.
He bent his knees more and while holding on tight to the railing went under the water. For two years he had been working in this building. The day he had come here with Fereydun, they had begun working on this pool and he had always thought about the time when this pool would be finished. Now after having waited for two years he was the first one to set foot in this water. The pool belonged to him; he had a right to it. For two full years he had thought about the time when this pool would be full of water. Especially when he could hear the sound of the neighbor’s kids from their pool. Whenever the Colonel dived in the water and taught his son how to dive, this wish would clutch more strongly his heart. He wished the Colonel were there and would teach him how to swim. “How delightful it is to go into the water. ”He went down into the water again and opened his eyes. The water was so pure, so transparent, and he saw his legs, but they were kind of distorted, and very white. He had never seen his body so white. He saw the hair on his legs waving like river grass. The coldness of the water made his body stiff and the front of his pants was billowing out. The hair on his chest was floating in the water. He couldn’t breathe. He stuck his head out. Water came out of his eyes. Water went through his nose and into his throat. He began coughing. He jumped up a little and spat. His spat fell on the brown slippers he had left near the pool. His slippers seemed to be looking at him. They seemed to be walking, toward the pool. His towel- his white towel- was farther away on the stones. He returned and pressed his back to the wall of the pool and opened his hands; his forearm and arm rested on the railing. The weeping willow, right on the other side of the pool, had bent its branches toward the pool and was waving slowly in the wind. The rosebushes seemed withered under the sun. Jalal’s eye fell on his watch, and he remembered that the owner might arrive at any time. What time is it? He set out for the other side of the pool. He pushed the sole of his foot against the wall of the pool and threw himself onto the water. He went forward a little and moved his hands one at a time and tried to move his legs like a swimmer. Water was surging under his body. He was halfway across when he remembered he didn’t know how to swim and he had reached the deep part of the pool. He stopped and all of a sudden the ground under his feet was not there. He went down under the water. He was afraid .He couldn’t breathe. He went to the bottom. It seemed that the floor of the pool was going down. He tried to put his feet somewhere. He moved his shoulders. He moved his whole body. Water was going into his stomach. He closed his mouth and tried not to breathe. The pool had stretched and grown bigger now. He tried to reach the railing around the pool but the walls were moving away. He could see the walls but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t reach them.
He taught, “ Oh, darn, I am drowning. Am I dying?” No, how could he die, just from having gone to the pool? Just because he was bored and didn’t know what to do? Because he was hot? Of course it wasn’t really the heat; he was bored. The memory of Kazhal had penetrated his skin and his body has grown hot. In fact, he had not been feeling well since morning. Wherever he went he saw Kazhal. When he was having lunch, Kazhal was sitting on the other side of the newspaper they used for a tablecloth and looking at him. When he wanted to prepare tea, it was as if Kazhal had taken the kettle from him and had poured the tea for him. Kazhal had put the dishes away; Kazhal had picked up the newspaper and folded it and kept it for the night. Kazhal had brought him the sugar. Kazhal had come to his arms, Kazhal had hugged him and told him,” Jalal, I want to have a child.” Kazhal had embraced him firmly. Kazhal’s scent was still in his mouth. Kazhal’s lips were firm and a little chopped, because she used to suck them. Kazhal herself sucked her lips all the time but wouldn’t let Jalal do that.She said it hurt her. Now Jalal was in pain too. So much so that he had shut his lips tight. Water was coming into his head through his ears. In his head was the sound of the rushing of water. Little by little he felt sleepy and heavy. His stomach had become full of water. It was then that he saw the waves were growing calm and the water was not moving anymore. His eyes opened slowly. The water was quiet and motionless and there was no rushing in his head. His mouth was open but water was not going into his throat, but his rib cage was still hurting. He saw that he was coming to the surface. On the surface the sun was shining. The tips of the weeping willow branches touched his nose. Sparrows were flying in the sky and wisps of clouds were moving. Jalal was sleeping on the water. He remembered his mother who, whenever he got into mischief, would tell him, “I hope to God you sleep on the water! “ What a nice mother! How much she had suffered for him and Fereydun, and always grumbling, “Don’t go near the river, you will drown!” He and Fereydun, afraid of drowning, played on the beach and never went to the water like others, so their clothes were always muddy. Mother washed the clothes and used to grumble, “I hope to God you sleep on the water! “ Now Jalal was sleeping on the water. So, Mother was not really angry when she was washing the clothes. Sleeping on the water is not bad, it is fun.
He had gone to the pool just in time, before the return of the engineer and his wife. What time was it? Jalal rolled in the water and slept on the water, on his stomach. He didn’t hear or understand anything anymore. He lay on the floor of the pool and put his hands under his head and drew his legs up to his heart. Exactly like those nights when, away from Kazhal, he had curled up and had tried to feel, even for one moment, the firmness of Kazhal’s body and to take her in his arms. Now he had to sleep; he was not hot anymore.

.................................................................