City of Lies: Love, Sex, Death, and the Search for Truth in Tehran

Jomhouri Street, Tehran, November 2013

As Bahar disappeared through airport security, Amir wished he had told her about Ghassem. No one knew about the old man; with Bahar gone, Amir’s history went back to being a shameful secret.
At first, Amir spoke to Bahar every few days, but as her life changed, they
began to grow apart and the phone calls became more infrequent. A few months after her departure, he had saved enough money to travel to Turkey to apply for a US visa. His application was rejected. He promised himself that he would tell Bahar about the old man when he saw her next.
Amir felt an isolation he had not experienced since his parents’ deaths. After the old man’s warning, the group stopped contacting each other. There were more arrests. Bita was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment, on charges of membership of the Committee of Human Rights Reporters, acts against national security and disseminating misinformation about the system. The Filternet, as everyone now called it, was slowed right down. Presidential elections came around again; the Voters and the Boycotters argued the same arguments they had four years earlier.
A new cycle of life began when, in June 2013, Rouhani was voted in. People were jubilant at the prospect of a President who was pushing for relations with the West. Amir and his friends emerged as emboldened and as hopeful as they had been under Khatami. The atmosphere felt freer than before, ordinary people on the streets seemed less depressed. Even those who had given up activism during Ahmadinejad’s years came back out. Now they were angling for small changes; none of them wanted an Arab Spring-style revolution, the very thought of it terrified them; they were afraid of Iran going the same way as Libya, Syria and Egypt – too fearful after the protests of 2009. They were also still too bruised and jaded by their parents’ experience to think that a revolution could work. Yavaash yavaas, slowly slowly, is what they said.
The old man had turned up at the flat shortly after Bahar’s departure. Amir was too broken to argue and let him in without resistance. The old man sat on the sofa and began to cry; Amir did not know what to do, so offered him a glass of black tea. The old man tried to talk, but Amir shut him up.
The old man’s visits became one of the constants in Amir’s life. They were always the same: sitting in silence, opposite each other, drinking tea. Amir and the old man who killed his parents. And every time, just before he got up to leave, the old man would ask the same question: ‘Will you forgive me?’
And every time Amir would give the same reply: ‘No.’
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