Heavenly Apples

That night the agents took me back to ACC without reaching to any result. This time they took me to a new cell where a clergy named Gerami and a young student had already been there. It was Cell No. 17 that had a 1.5 meters rug on the ground. That night I slept with no talking. Before morning call for prayers, I woke up to say my prayers. That day I had to fast without any food for my morning. That morning I surprisingly saw that clergy was eating breakfast. I surprisingly asked: “Isn’t its Ramadan!?” and the clergy answered: “We are captives and should not fast until our situation is cleared.” It was so confusing to me. I did not continue that dialogue cautiously.

It was near the noon call for prayers that the agents took that young student with themselves and brought him back after minutes of beating and torturing. They repeated it in the afternoon for that student. He was an Isfahan University student and his crime was not clear. However, he was tortured and beaten savagely. That sunset when they threw him inside the cell his feet were so badly beaten and swollen in a way that he could not feel coldness or warmness. The next day they forced him to run until all the blood and pus splashed out. So, his nerves became active again and he began crying of hard pain until he fainted. They injected him some sedative drug. My feet were also badly hit and swollen but not as much as his.

Once when they returned him from interrogation, his legs were bloody up to his knees. He was almost dead when they threw him inside the cell. Because of sedative injection he slept till the next morning calmly. The next morning the paramedic came and opened his bandage. He was about to vomit several times. All his back and feet were full of infected blisters and most of his body was bruised all over. After the exchange of his bandage, they took him to go. When going out, he asked me: “How much is the cost of a man?” I said: “Trust in God. He would help you.” He moved his head and went while worries and fear were quite clear in his face. I heard the sounds of beating him along with only some painful cries; then, there was no sound. I was quite disturbed and had lost my nerves. I could not tolerate watching such a brave young man being killed this way. He has resisted very good. I wished to be tortured instead of him. I heard some other painful cries. I did not know which one was his. One was calling God and his holy Imams: “…Ya Allah… Ya Hussein…” and the other would say: “…stop it for the God’s sake. I did wrong…”

Watching these scenes was full of pain for me. I had forgotten that I was a just-married man and had to think about my freedom. The torture of this young man and others effected deeply on me and weaken my nerves more and more.

They brought him back in the afternoon. He cringed in a corner and was silent for some minutes. I sat beside him and put my hand under his head. He burst into cry. I said: “Why are you crying? You’re beaten; it wasn’t your first time. I think it was the last time. It’s over. Ok?” He said: “You don’t know what they did to me.” He did not like to say what had happened to him. However, after my appeasing he said: “When I went out, Manouchehri got my neck and hit my head to the iron bars. I fell down. Then he stood on my feet. The blood and pus in the blisters on my feet splashed out. I shouted of pain. My heart was about to stop that I fainted. When I woke up, I saw my hands tied to the irons and my body was hanging. He moved my head up… the misery began…” I said: “What misery?!” He did not dare to say. I told him they won’t hit you anymore. Don’t be upset. That student said: “This bastard Manouchehri came and held his hand to the iron bars, climbed on my shoulders, pushed down his trousers and pissed on me. He made my body from head to toe dirty…” when he reached to these words, he burst into cry. I said: “My dear brother! It’s nothing important! Not a torture! Your body is dirty now from head to toe by piss; it was dirty by blood and pus before. It’s nothing to cry for.” He said: “How should I pray?” I told him: “With all these conditions, you should make your ablution with the sand on this rug and then pray. ‘Allah does not impose upon any soul a duty but to the extent of its ability’.[1] You should be proud of being tortured and insulted because of following God. Be sure this prayer is more accepted than any other of prayers in your life…”

Few days passed. The physical status of that Muslim student got worse. The paramedic of ACC came to change his bandage. He said: “You’re still alive! You’ve 7 lives just like a dog. Couldn’t you talk and let yourself and me relax…!” I don’t know what really happened in his mind that he suddenly asked that paramedic: “Sir! Will you do me a favor?” The paramedic said: “What? Say it.” That student after resisting all those tortures and pains and creating all that bravery said: “Apple, give me an apple…!” I got surprised. The paramedic derisively answered: “Do you think here is your auntie’s house?! Where the hell can I find an apple for you…?” The young man helplessly said: “… I have 10 or 11 Tomans in my pocket. Take it from the prison guards and buy me an apple”. The paramedic, who was angry then, finished his bandage grumblingly and went out of the cell without paying attention to what the young student said.

I put the young student’s head on my lap to make him asleep. I told him calmly: “Hey boy. What kind of request was it that you made? You are a hero of resistance. You tolerated all these tortures and did not break. If it was a mountain, it would have been fall apart; but you resisted. What kind of job was it that you did?!...” He burst into cry again and said: “I want it anyway!” I had a strange feeling. I had heard the people who are dying may say something about their wishes in life which may not seem to be rational. Thinking this way, I was scared that innocent boy was going to die. I felt pity about him and I was really sad that I could not do anything for him. When his head was on my knee I felt that he was burning of fever. The clergy and I helped him to lie down in a suitable place and gave him a pill. But alas! It seemed he was burning from inside. I began giving him a sponge bath of foot and put a wet handkerchief on his head. I stayed at his bedside nursing him till the next dawn. He would squirm of pain and fever. I ate my food for dawn and after the call for prayers sat at his bedside again. I did not know what happened then; I slept right there.

About 9 o’clock in the morning, while I had fallen asleep compulsively the night before on the ground, I woke up by the sound of cell door opening. A tall man came in by a pouch of apple in hand. He opened the pouch. The fragrance of the apple filled the cell. The man moved his hand inside the pouch and took out three red big fragrant apples and offered them to the student. The young student smelling the fragrance of the apples, opened his eyes and took those apples eagerly and began smelling and kissing them and put them on his eyes. It was an unforgettable indescribable scene. He would hug the apples, kiss and touch them with his face and then smelling them …; that strange man gave each of us (I mean the clergy and me), three apples and went out without a word. The young student did not pay attention to that man and did his own job.

I did not understand what happened. The young student fundamentally changed. I told him: “Did not you want apples? Ok, eat it now.” From 10 o’clock in the morning till that day’s evening, he ate all three apples. I did not understand what happened. However, by eating those apples, he surprisingly got well and found a new living.

I was astonished how he was full living while the night before I was hopeless if he would survive. He could speak, sit relax and …

Later I narrated the story of those apples and getting well of that student for the other people in ACC. I saw that they would look at me strangely. I asked: “Didn’t they bring you apples and you didn’t eat any?” They surprisingly answered negatively. I insisted it was a big pouch full of apples; he could give apples to all of you. However, they said nobody had gone to them similar to the man that I described. The same day I asked from the ACC personnel about distributing apples among the prisoners. They humiliatingly answered: “It this auntie’s house that they bring you apples here?!” They said nobody had entered ACC! They would not give apples in ACC at all. The more I searched the less I found and reached no result. Except that clergy and student, nobody would believe what I narrated. However, it was a reality that those apples gave a new life to that young student. When the paramedic came for changing the bandage of the student again, he got astonished how he had been cured and he had nothing to say.