Friends Always Win in the End!
by Ruwen Rouhs
Chapter 3
Red Flag Warning to Arash
Next morning during the second break Severin looked for Arash in the schoolyard. As the goal getter was nowhere to be seen he asked Sarya, his sister. First, she was fidgeting, then however she informed him, that her brother suddenly went sick. "Sorry Sev, Arash didn't turn up at breakfast. Mom found him still in bed, pale as chalk and weak. Papa checked his health and decided he had to stay at home!"
"It's not flu time, is his stomach upset?"
"Probably not! I guess it's something about daddy's homeland." Severin knew Arash's family had the roots in a country of the Middle East, his guess was Iran. Until now, he had never been interested in where Arash's family came from.
Arash spoke pure High German. The language of his essays and papers were even better than that of many of his classmates. And his looks? A bit exotic! Short, wiry, with thick black hair and thick eyebrows. "That's what makes him so interesting, makes him cute as…. ," Severin dreamed. He couldn't think of the right term. However, he was sure to like him for that very reason.
At home, Severin looked up Arash's messenger address in the soccer team directory: "Hi, Arash! Are you sick? Have you got a cold??? Sarya told me."
When an answer didn't arrive during the next half hour, he got worried. He messaged again, "Hi, Arash? What's up? You need some help?"
When this message didn't result in an answer, he decided to go to Arash's house by bike. He looked up the address in the soccer team's directory and set off.
Severin never had been at Arash's home before. The address belonged to a small, old house in a backstreet close to a famous hospital. Its garden bordered directly on the garden of the hospital. The yard in front was overgrown with flowering hibiscus, hydrangeas and yellow flowers. The wooden garden fence was rotten. It wobbled dangerously when he leaned his bike against it.
He couldn't hear the sounding of the doorbell. However, after a while the front door opened a crack, the door chain still locked. In the dark hallway he saw a woman who looked like an older version of Sarya. "What do you want? You must have got the wrong address!" she stated with a heavy accent and immediately tried to pull the door shut. He just managed to address her, "Doesn't Arash live here? I am Severin. We are teammates." When she still tried to close the door, he tried again, "Sarya told me her brother is ill."
She studied him up from head to toe, "Wait a minute!" and closed the door. Just as Severin was about to leave, the door opened again and Sarya came out. "Mom doesn't know you. She's scared. But come in, Arash is upstairs in his room."
The garret was dusky. The curtains of the skylights were closed. Severin discerned a narrow bed under the low sloping ceiling. Arash's body looked like mummy, because he had covered himself with a blanket from head to toe. He seemed to be in a deep sleep. Severin looked for a chair to sit down beside the bed. As there was none, he decided to sit down on its edge. When Arash didn't move, he bent over him and slowly pulled away the blanket. Dark eyes looked up to him. Arash had been awake after all. Slowly he turned his head towards him, "You? Sev?"
Arash tried to sit up, but then sank back onto the mattress. "Hi Arash. what happened? Sarya told me you are sick!" He looked at Arash as closely as he could in the dusky room. "You look terrible! You didn't get that black eye in the game yesterday, did you? Tell me, what happened?" First Arash shook his head in denial, because he didn't want to tell Severin the reason. But then decided to answer, "I got beaten up!" "You?" Severin asked surprised. "Who? The opposing team's players? I can't believe that." Arash shrugged, "No, not as you think!"
Then as he had been waiting for someone to tell Arash words rushed out, "Four guys! I didn't know them, I never had seen them before. But I know who they belong to. They are messengers of the Iranian secret service, MOIS people, VAJA members."
"Who? Iranian intelligence in our town? I can't believe it? How do you know this?"
"They came with a big car with darkened windows. The car stopped, when I just left the discount store. Three men jumped out and surrounded me. One of them hissed, ' Tell your father we'll get him!' and the others started to beat me up." Arash swallowed, "Luckily a passer-by started filming. They hadn't expected that, jumped back into the car and sped off."
Now Severin no longer understood Arash at all. Iran's secret service? Because of his father??? What do they have to do with each other? "Your father is a medical doctor! Isn't he?"
"Yes, a doctor, but also a political activist. He fights the Mullah regime with publications! His last leaflet is about Jin, Jiyan, Azadî ! You sure have heard about the murder of Masha Amini." When Severin shook his head, he went on "Masha was taken in custody by the Iranian sharia police for improper clothing. They tortured her. They murdered her!" Arash stopped speaking because he was too drawn out. After a pause, he added, " Jin, Jiyan, Azadî is Kurdish, its known all around the world as " Woman, Freedom, Life ", the universal rallying cry." Then Arash fell silent, "They want my father dead, Sev!"
"But why did they attack you? Beat you up like that and not him?"
"My father is careful and he has friends. When they hit me, it's a message to him! Today we'll get your son, tomorrow we will get you. Stop writing or we'll get you !"
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