The Alley of Love and Yellow Jasmines (22 page)

Our next performance was in a theater in Frankfurt, with five hundred red velvet seats before us. Our new local sponsor was a proud man and was truly glad to have us. This time we signed a contract. We performed two nights in a row, and hundreds of Iranians came to see
Café Nostalgia
. Our audiences encouraged us to return soon, with their standing ovations after each performance.

I should have been pleased to have achieved so much in such little time, but I was not. It was not just the panic attacks and my mind tormenting me with snapshots of the past. It was physical, too. My body ached. I felt bloated, sleepy, and tired most of the time. Suddenly I had become too sensitive and too emotional. Was it the bittersweet sense of nostalgia in the play that I lived with every night? Or was it the strong, magnetic force of love that I was receiving from the Iranian audience? I had missed being surrounded by them, and perhaps I was overwhelmed when I experienced it again.

We arrived in Cologne after seven and a half hours crushed in a small car with three others. Between the terrible roads and traffic, the ride was agony. But our last performance was as successful as all the other ones.

We had finished our tour of Germany. I had been on the road for almost two months now and was truly exhausted. All I wanted to do was go home to America. But we had promised our friends in London we would do the play there, too. There were a handful of good Iranian actors in London, and they were excited to help us stage the play.

We flew to London the next day and were greeted by our actor friends. They were enthusiastic and ready to start the rehearsals. My brother Shahram had graduated from Oxford University and married a beautiful, fine young lady named Sita. They invited us to stay with them, and we gladly accepted their offer. All I could think about was sleep.

29

Mood Swings

M
y brother and I were so happy to be together again. We played backgammon all evening and talked about our childhood days, wishing the whole family could be together again.

The rehearsals started soon, and I kept searching for an apartment to rent for a few weeks. I didn’t want to overstay our welcome with my brother, who was so kind he probably would have let us stay there forever. I was still not feeling well, although the number of panic attacks had declined. I decided to see my gynecologist, Dr. Love, in London. It had been over a year since I had left the city.

She was happy to see me, and much happier to hear that I was married as she examined me and asked me questions regarding my health. Then she took off her disposable gloves, threw them in the trash can, and asked me, if it was “planned.”

“If what was planned?” I asked.

“The baby,” she replied.

I felt paralyzed, my mind traveling faster than light.

Suddenly it dawned on me that I had not had my period for a while. How careless of me not to pay any attention to my body! What on earth was happening to me? Then I started hearing the doctor’s voice, echoing in my head:
a baby . . . a baby . . . a baby . . .

Now I knew why I had become so vulnerable and emotional. I was carrying a baby! A seed of love that was surely sown on our final night of shooting
Guests of Hotel Astoria
in New York when Houshang and I affectionately made love in our hotel room before the panoramic view of the Chrysler Building.

I was suddenly filled with such affection. I wished immediately that it would be a girl. Ever since I had seen
Gone With the Wind
, I had promised myself that I would name my daughter Tara, after Scarlett’s home. Soon after, I had read
Pride and Prejudice
, by Jane Austen, my favorite female novelist. I wanted her name to be the middle name for my future imaginary daughter, Tara-Jane.

Now that I was actually pregnant, I got to speculate about the other 50 percent chance that I would give birth to a boy, and what I would like to name him. I could name him Rhett, after the charming Mr. Butler, or perhaps Mr. Darcy, from
Pride and Prejudice.

I did not walk to the nearby Underground station after I left the doctor’s office. I floated. I could not wait to share the news with Houshang and the family. Shahram’s flat was on the fourth floor of an old apartment building with no elevator. I stormed through the door and flew up the stairs like I was Mary Poppins, taking two and three steps at a time, shouting from the top of my lungs, “I’m having a baby!”

My brother heard my voice and met me at the top of the stairs.

“Did you say you are having a baby?” he asked.

I nodded because I was breathless.

“Why are you running then? You should be careful, come in.”

I loved his caution and calmness at all times.

I wish you could have seen Houshang’s face when I gave him the news. He was motionless, in a state of disbelief, just as I had been when I heard the good news. We immediately started talking about our future plans. I was eight weeks pregnant, and the play was set to go on the stage in two weeks, at the Polish Center. After that was a tour of the United Kingdom.

I knew I could manage to work for a while, at least as long as I could hide my swollen belly. But I could not fly home to the U.S.A. if we waited too long. Many airlines had restrictions regarding pregnant passengers in their third trimester. In the end, we decided to skip the tour in the U.K. and go home once we finished the performances in London.

I could not go to sleep that first night, dreaming of the child that was growing inside of me. I wanted the best for her, or him. I wanted it to live in a safe world, where no child is hurt, stranded, molested, or abused. I hoped my baby would live in a world in which children are all treated equally, regardless of the color of their skin or their gender. I wanted my child, if she was a girl, to live in a place where she would not be counted as half of a man legally and one quarter of a man socially in a marriage, like in the Islamic Republic of Iran, nor looked upon as only a sex object to satisfy men.

I was yearning to go back to America, but one thing that made me think twice was our health care situation. The U.K.’s health care system covered every living soul in England, including foreigners like me. Neither Houshang nor I had health insurance in the U.S.A. And now even if we did manage to get insurance, it would not have covered a “preexisting condition.” Giving birth in a fairly good hospital in Los Angeles would cost at least $20,000. Giving birth in London would leave our small savings intact for our American Dream, for leasing a nice apartment, a car, and working in L.A. while raising our child. I shared my thoughts with Houshang in the morning, and once again he was speechless. He knew I was right about the health care situation. But he wanted his child to be born in America and have American citizenship. He suggested he go back to Los Angeles and see what he could do.

WE MANAGED TO
find a nice studio flat close to my brother’s house and kept rehearsing the play. It was successfully staged and appreciated by the Iranian audience in London, too. It received great reviews from the Iranian media in the U.K. Houshang left for the United States right after the play was over.

I did not leave my bed for two solid days. I was extremely depressed and felt weak. My sister-in-law, Sita, came to see me and asked why I did not pick up the phone. I burst into tears. She said Houshang had called them and had cried on the phone. He insisted that he wanted his child to be born in America.

I could understand his feelings but could not agree with him, at least not until I was sure that I would not have to give birth at home, because of poverty or legal issues.

I talked to Houshang on the phone, and he promised me he would do anything to bring me back to the United States. He had decided to stay with his friend Farhad for a while until he could find a nice place for us. I needed to keep myself busy. I had to or I would have gone crazy otherwise, worrying what the future might have in store for our family.

A FRIEND OF
mine had purchased a nice flat in a hip area in London and was having trouble with its interior decor. Remembering my work in Mr. K’s apartment, she asked me to help her. I appreciated the offer, most of all because it forced me to get out of bed and walk around town. I visited antiques shops on Church Street off of High Street in Kensington and good old Kings Road, where my favorite crêpe shop, Astorix, was located.

I scouted out items during the week while my friend was at work then took her to purchase them on weekends. In three weeks the apartment was nearly ready. I was making plans to visit the Portobello antiques market the following weekend when Houshang called and gave me good news. He had talked to the Screen Actors Guild’s health-plan department and was told that for a reasonable amount of money he could reinstate his previous health coverage, which included preexisting conditions, like a pregnant wife.

I was so happy that I started dancing all by myself. I still dance when I’m happy, but I had not done it for a while. I had missed Houshang and wanted to go home to Los Angeles. I was on my way to America before I knew it.

30

Sunny California

H
oushang was still staying at his friend Farhad’s place in the San Fernando Valley, a suburb of Los Angeles. It was 1988. He did not want to rent a place without me but had seen a couple of promising apartments, one of which was next door to Farhad’s and was available in three weeks. The rent was a little higher than our budget allowed. But our biggest problem was that the landlord was asking for three months’ rent in advance. We weren’t working, and it was going to take a while for us to get back on the stage. Paying the rent with a portion of our savings was not a good idea without a Plan B.

I have always been cautious with spending my money ever since I left Iran, a practice that comes from displacement and fear of being thrown out on the street if I ever ran out. Houshang decided to take a job with a town-car service in Orange County and write his next play,
Lost in the Wind
, while awaiting passengers. The play portrays a newly immigrated young Iranian man who is desperately searching for his grandfather in Los Angeles. It was a two-act play with twenty characters in it. Mounting such a grand play seemed far-fetched without sufficient funds. But Houshang was determined to do it.

On the other hand, I was quite dysfunctional during this time. I would sleep in and then make the fifteen-minute walk to Farhad’s printing shop with the help of two cans of Coca-Cola. My grandmother used to call Coca-Cola the juice of dates, her favorite fruit. She believed the soda gave her extra energy, and so do I.

Farhad tended the shop during the day and painted abstract views of nature in the evenings at home. I would sit in the shop for an hour or two and chat with Farhad while listening to the repetitive, mind-numbing noise of the printing machines. Then I would return home and wait for Houshang and Farhad to return for dinner. Houshang was working nearly twenty-hour days, still squeezing in time to write his play while waiting for his passengers.

One night I was watching television while Houshang and Farhad were discussing the rehearsal of the play. Suddenly a mild panic attack took hold of me. I was able to calm myself, but I felt a tiny stream of hot water rushing down from my belly, and spilling onto the couch. I was embarrassed and shocked. Then a sharp pain shot through my spine.

I told Houshang I thought it was time, although we were not expecting the baby for another several weeks. He paused for a second, and then grabbed the small suitcase I had already prepared for the hospital. Farhad helped me into the car, and soon I was in a room at Cedars-Sinai Hospital.

Jaleh got there in no time, and poor Houshang was torn between work and fatherhood. There was not much time left before the premiere of his play, and a lot of work was still ahead. He told me he wished to stay with me but had to leave and get on with his responsibilities as a director. He promised he would be back soon.