Run Bita, Run

A surprise ricochet zinged through the room and struck the ceiling. Shocked students hit the floor by instinct. No one expected conflict today. There was no special event planned for today. It was just the normal small demonstrations here and there in the city that formed and deformed as the military showed up. For the big main demonstrations, you always had prior notice, people knew where and when to gather, but today, no, it was a normal day, just normal local ongoing demonstrations, fluid, like waves of ocean, hitting the rocky beaches of military and police here and there, disbanding and forming somewhere else. Nobody was supposed to die today, nobody.

I run along the wall, below the windows, a few more bullets ricochet. We run into the big staircase, we are on the second floor of this three floor Atelier of the Fine Arts School of Tehran University. I am a 3^rd year student, The Iranian revolution has started, with all its beauty, power, color, gravity, sadness and deadly attraction. We live right in the middle of it all, Tehran University, the beating heart of the revolution. It starts here and it ends here. It is the flowing stream, the mother of revolution, when you are here, you are at the heart of it all, and yes, I am a student right at the heart of it all.

I run downstairs, Bita follows me. A quick look through the ground floor windows, everything is quiet. From a distance, we hear the crashing roar of the crowd, and near us a few more pelting bullets. Danger, man! beware. Danger everywhere. There is an open ground Between us and the crowd, perhaps two blocks away, we are protected from the military only by some trees and bushes and the fences between the university and the street.

The street is dead, only the soldiers, with standard issue American M16s. helmets on, full combat gear, military trucks along the street. Dead silent. I wave to Bita, we have to run to the crowd, join them, something is going on. We have to be there. But two blocks? Two blocks of life or death. What if a stray bullet cuts through the blocks. What if one of the soldiers sees us? that will be the end, but somehow , these days, it does not matter, the end is everywhere, in the news, in the streets, in the university, the end is looking you in the eye every moment, the end fills up the cemeteries and graveyards, the end spreads its dark wings over the city, the end comes with the military trucks and American M16s. The end sits on each bullet.

Who cares, run Bita, Run. We crouch and snake from one column to the other, and now the open ground, the killing field, runs towards us. We duck, we bend, we run, through the parking lot, towards the trees at the other side. This is the most difficult part, you have to just run and focus on the trees that beacon to you to run faster and hold their arms open to protect you. In these few seconds, that last like an eternity, you just pray, and wait, wait for the soft sound of the bullet tearing through the flesh, and then hear the bang, but the end is kinder today. I am hiding among the ancient tree trunks now, and Bita, panting, is next to me. Her beautiful face sweating, her dark black eyes smiling, from here we can see the new bullet holes just under the Atelier’s windows. Bastards, now they shoot directly at the students.

We move carefully, slowly, among the Bush. During the Shah’s time, thick bushes were planted to wall off the grounds of the University to ensure that student demonstrations and strikes against the Shah were obscured from full view of traffic. Paradoxically, the same growth is now obscuring the direct fire of the military. Lucky for us. Didn’t think of this, did you?

The crowd is shouting, thundering, moving, breaking against the fences, anger, hatred, defiance. I see the bodies. High on hands, moving from hand to hand, wrapped in white clothes already, new martyrs. Later we know they are high school students. Joining their university brethren, they were shot at the gates. The soldiers don’t come inside the university, they never come in. they just shoot from the street, right into the crowd, inside the university. By now, all the trees and walls have bullets in them, everywhere you can see bullet holes. Run Bita, run, towards the huge snake of the crowd that bangs its head on the walls, and rolls over the central playground, rolling and rolling. Run Bita, Run, and do you see the end, one step behind you? Why couldn’t I see it? Why couldn’t I protect you?

We join the crowd, fists up in the air, chanting the slogans, the crowd is alive, it is like one, you feel like a cell in a huge body, like it has its own personality, over and above each one of us, like it knows what it wants and wants to do. I hold Bita’s hand firm, don’t want to lose her here. The dragon of the crowd changes course, decides to push towards the gates, directly towards the soldiers, towards the guns, towards the “END”.

The “end” is waiting, smiling, with its empty eye sockets, moistening its lips. The end knows who is the next, it has already drawn the cards for each of us. We are pushed towards the gates, there is no way back, there is no way fore, we are now just cells inside the body of the huge dragon. The soldiers are scared, they are small, they are tin soldiers. The fury and fire of the dragon gets closer. The officer lines them up, two rows, the first one sits down, the second is standing behind them, like they are posing for a group photo, M16s look forward. I see it coming, but what can I do, I hold Bita’s hand harder, a calm comes over me, over the crowd. Now we are facing the guns, looking into the barrels, we are chanting, we are alive, we want freedom, we want bread, we want our land, our oil, our natural resources, to belong to us, not to foreigners. The officer barks something, few moments later, you see the blue smoke, you hear the thunder, you hear the screams. It is like a dream, a bad bad dream, people start to fall all around you, like autumn leaves, is it the end? But why aren’t I scared? I am calm, I see it, I feel it, I am not scared. I hold Bita’s hand hard, harder. Run Bita, run, we have to get back. But why, why the hand is so heavy. I try to drag it, it does not move, it is not grabbing anymore. I grab at it, I don’t want to look back. I know, I know already. Bita, why don’t you run? Follow me girl, like all the other times, we always escape, we are always safe, Bita! She is not answering. She is already on the ground. There is a small red rose spreading on her chest. I sit down, I hold her, I am silent, all around me people are screaming, moaning, swearing, … but I am frozen, quiet, a stone. And at that moment, I feel him, face to face, cold as ice, dark and silent, moving slowly over Bita, over many many others there, happy with the new crop, there to reap the reward and gather the souls.

I am silent. I, Bita, and the “end”. The three of us.