I was raised in Tehran.
My father owned a BB gun— a Diana 5.5. Back then, there were two versions: the 5.5, which we had, and the 4.5, which required a license. Ours was the less lethal version, though we still put it to lethal use.
On summer weekends, my father would take me, my cousins—children and teenagers alike—to the outskirts of town for target practice. I remember those small, heavy green boxes filled with lead BBs, like tiny caviar tins. Somewhere along the river, where one side was too wide to cross and the other had gentle hills rather than mountains, we would walk and hunt pigeons.
Not just for fun—we only hunted pigeons we could retrieve once they fell to the ground. It was a classic hunting exercise, a sport still practiced in some parts of the world by the aristocracy or hunting enthusiasts.
The other part of these excursions was fire.
Since childhood, I had a fascination with fire. All I needed was a box of matches, and I would set little fires everywhere—bushes, papers, anything that would burn. To this day, whenever we stay in a chalet with a fireplace, I am the first to light it and the last to leave.
When we returned home, the dead pigeons were handed over to the women in the family. They plucked and cleaned them, turning them into a delicious meal. Pigeon meat is much like duck—less refined but rich in flavor.
Among my cousins, I was closest to one—a truly extraordinary person.
One day, I visited him in the city. My father was there, likely for a weekend gathering, spending hours playing chess with my cousin’s father. He had brought the Diana along, and we decided to go hunting.
We wandered around the block a few times until we reached an undeveloped lot—an urban wasteland filled with old tires and scattered rubbish. If there were no pigeons in sight, we used cans and plastic bottles for target practice.
I don’t remember if this was our first time hunting alone. Like a dream, the memory is fragmented—I don’t recall how it started or ended. But I do remember this:
We wounded a pigeon.
Pigeon hunting is rarely a clean kill. A shot rarely delivers a fatal blow; instead, it injures the bird, preventing it from flying away. Then, you catch it by hand. Out of both mercy and tradition, you finish the job quickly—twisting the head off in one swift motion.
My cousin held the small pigeon in his fist, its tiny body obscured, its head protruding. He twisted, but not hard enough. The head spun back, springing into its original position. At first, we laughed.
Then, on the third attempt, the horror set in.
In that brief hesitation—where the satisfaction of success clashes with the brutality of the act—we paused.
And in that moment, as if the bird itself knew, it looked at us.
Or did it? Did it truly look at us? Or was it merely the construct of our childish, terrified imaginations?
Regardless, we both felt it—a sharp pang of pity deep in our stomachs.
I don’t remember what happened next. Logically, my cousin must have dropped the bird. But what I do remember is this: He swore he would never kill an animal again.
And in that moment, so did I.
That wounded pigeon severed a small streak of inherited cruelty—passed down through generations.
But those eyes—they remained with me.
Buried deep in my subconscious, always there, always waiting.
I remember reading Oliver Twist, and near the end of the book, there’s a scene where a murderer hallucinates the eyes of his victim. He screams in horror— Those eyes! Those eyes!
That scene haunted me.
And perhaps, it was not the book that disturbed me, but rather the memory of the pigeon, its unsevered head rising from the depths of my mind.
To Be Continued…
Part II: The Dream
There are parallels between that moment and something that happened much later in my life—when I was in my late forties.
It begins like all dreams do—suddenly, without explanation. But this time, it ends in a nightmare.
It was a party.
My younger son was there, along with his best friend, Colin—a handsome, talented, mischievous boy. Colin’s grandmother, a lovely woman from Argentina, was also there. It was one of those incredible parties hosted by Elbert and Romina.
Then, I became aware of something—some mischief, something involving Colin’s grandmother.
And shame washed over me.
Not just ordinary shame—shame so immense that I felt disgusted with myself, with my very existence. Shame so heavy I could hardly breathe.
There had been a time when I was in pain, when I had taken out that pain on my children. Even thinking about it—without remembering a specific moment—crushed me.
It felt like my shoulders were being clamped by metal claws.
And in my dream, with that same suffocating severity, I turned to my son and berated him.
“Didn’t I tell you not to do it?”
“How many times must I tell you?”
I don’t remember what he had supposedly done.
But then, something shifted.
A strange, deceptive air filled the room—like the presence of Loki, the god of mischief.
And suddenly, I knew.
It wasn’t my son.
It had been Colin all along.
Even before this realization, my son had been trying to tell me. He had been telling me.
But I hadn’t listened.
Now, I saw him—standing small, looking up at me. His face, so innocent, framed by the towering figure of his father.
To my left, I noticed a chrome refrigerator—the exact one from my own kitchen. The wooden corner beside it, just like home.
Somehow, we were no longer at Romina’s house.
And then it hit me.
I had done it again.
Not for the first time—but as if, in that moment, every mistake I had ever made as a father came crashing down upon me.
And those eyes.
The eyes of the future.
I woke up, gasping.
I opened my eyes, and he was still there.
His face lingered in the darkness of our bedroom. I got out of bed, shut my eyes, then opened them again. But the eyes were still there.
I fell to my knees, pressing my forehead to the carpet, shaking, sobbing.
I remembered a scene from X-Men, where Stryker’s son implants visions into his mother’s mind until she drills into her own skull to escape them.
That’s what I wanted—to reach into my own mind and rip those memories out.
My wife found me on the floor.
I was just… there.
And in moments like that, I don’t want to live anymore.
I don’t know how much my children remember. Do they recall things the same way I do? God, I hope not.
The way we learn from our parents—through love, through pain.
And the way we pass down suffering in the name of discipline, of strength.
For years, I feared my children becoming me—weak, scared, vulnerable.
And in that fear, I failed them.
I am a better father now.
Some damage is done, but I hope—I pray—that I live long enough, love them deeply enough, that one day…
They will forget.
I have always prided myself on my capacity to love.
But love, for most of my life, was reserved for the women in my life.
I love my children more than anything.
But fear—fear got in the way.
And I cannot forgive myself.
___
It was summer and hot, the air dry as bone. His father owned a Diana 5.5, a plain instrument of wood and steel and killing. They’d take it out beyond the edge of Tehran, where the city frayed into dust and scrub and rusted iron, shooting pigeons from the sky as boys do. Not so much for food as the thrill of watching something fall, something alive suddenly broken.
He remembered clearly the small green tins of lead pellets, cold and dense, like promises of death. He and his cousins would walk the slow rise of hills, the river indifferent beside them, the sound of wings startling upwards as if the birds knew their fate.
But memory held another truth, darker and heavier, tucked into some shadowed lot within the city limits, abandoned and strewn with tires and glass. Alone with his cousin that afternoon, carrying the Diana as if it were something sacred. They shot at cans, bottles, objects that wouldn’t bleed, until they saw the pigeon, solitary and unguarded.
When they hit it, it fell but did not die.
His cousin picked it up, feathers trembling between fingers grown suddenly uncertain. The bird’s eyes black as oil, calm as an accusation. He twisted its neck once, quick and cruel. The head snapped back into place. Again he twisted, again it sprang back, defiant against death. First, laughter came easy as breathing, boys mocking the absurdity of life clinging desperately. On the third attempt, laughter fled.
The pigeon turned its gaze upward, fixing them in its sight. Eyes wide and full of something beyond fear—perhaps pity, perhaps judgment. In that moment, laughter became shame, became dread. His cousin’s hands shook and released the creature, as if it had suddenly burst into flame. It hit the earth, twitching, eyes still open, seeing.
Neither boy spoke. Neither ever forgot those eyes.
Years passed, stretching memories thin. He became a father himself, life moving in cycles of love and cruelty, tenderness and regret. And then one night, when the world was quiet but his mind troubled, he dreamed.
It was a party, full of familiar faces and good intentions. His young son and the boy’s friend Colin stood near, children laughing quietly. But something unseen twisted beneath the pleasant veneer. Some mischief, some secret shame.
And anger rose in him, sudden and fierce as a desert storm, directed unjustly toward his boy. Accusations he couldn’t recall clearly, only the sensation of words like blows landing heavy and sharp. His son’s eyes wide and confused, pleading silently for understanding.
Then, clarity struck him brutal as lightning. It had never been his boy. It had always been Colin, the handsome friend, standing quiet and unnoticed behind a child’s innocence.
His own son had been telling him, had always been telling him. But he hadn’t listened.
He saw those eyes again, dark and liquid, reflecting something deeper than disappointment—something older, sadder, something accusing him across years.
He woke choking, heart hammering like fists against a locked door. The darkness of his room no comfort, the weight of his own failings heavy as iron chains. He sat up trembling, every cruelty he’d ever inflicted on his children echoing through his bones.
And there, again, the eyes. Not those of a pigeon nor his son’s, but his own reflected in the black mirror of night, staring back at him unforgiving.
He remembered a scene from a film: visions forced into a woman’s mind, horrors she tried to drill out of her skull. And he wished, fiercely, for such an escape—for the capacity to tear free from memories embedded like shards of glass in flesh.
His wife found him on the floor, curled and silent. He said nothing because nothing could explain the wound inside him.
He knew then, in that moment on the cold floor, he’d carried forward the cruelty he’d once promised to abandon, passed down like a poisoned heirloom. Fear masquerading as strength. Discipline hiding violence.
Now he is older, gentler, regret shaping him softly into something closer to kindness. But forgiveness remains impossible. He carries the weight of the bird’s eyes, of his son’s eyes, of every harsh word ever spoken.
And some nights he wakes again, those eyes staring back from the dark, an endless judgment.
Haunted by what he was, fearful still of what he might yet become.