Free City of Lies by Ramita Navai Page B

was whether marriage with him would lead to happiness. She needed some guidance. There was only one person she trusted to give it: Mullah Ahmad. Moments like this called for Islamic divination and Mullah Ahmad was Fatemeh’s go-to mullah for
estekhareh,
Koranic divination. All personal conundrums were resolved, usually via telephone and in under four minutes. She would simply ask her question, Mullah Ahmad would consult the Koran and then shoot back a decisive ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer. Job done. Problem solved. He never got it wrong. There were cowboys out there, as there were in any business. Turbaned charlatans riding on the wings of people’s misery and pain. These were the clerics who charged a fortune for their divination services. Some even offered magic spells at premium rates. Fatemeh had once visited a mullah in Qom, a holy city south-west of Tehran. The mullah was famed for the accuracy of his predictions. He was surrounded by a small crowd of cross-legged men, hands raised, waiting to ask their questions. Two assistants manned telephones, answering a non-stop stream of calls. The mullah worked the floor faster than a stock-market trader. Using a long, thin shard of camel bone (so as to not pollute the Koran with the touch of his unwashed hands), he would randomly whip open the Koran, speed-read the verse in front of him and shoot out a reply. All matters, from property to inheritance to love and adultery, were solved with the flick of a page. Fatemeh had been watching the mullah from behind a diaphanous green curtain that separated the sexes. An assistant pressed a receiver to the mullah’s ear.
    ‘Yes to the first, no to the second.’ Click.
    A man handed the mullah his mobile.
    ‘Bad, danger involved.’
    A young boy whispered in his ear.
    ‘Terrible. Lots of hardship.’
    The women shouted out their questions once the men were done. ‘Should I borrow money from my sister?’ Fatemeh had asked.
    ‘Excellent. The outcome will be excellent.’ Fatemeh never went back to that mullah again.
    Mullah Ahmad was different. He was a cleric of repute. Fatemeh had deduced this partly from his clientele, which included a growing coterie of upper-class devotees whom Fatemeh considered better educated and less gullible than herself; and partly from the fact that he was descended from a long line of mullahs. Mullah Ahmad was a kind man, and only occasionally accepted payment for divination; he got paid handsomely enough as it was. He could rake in up to 500,000 tomans for a one-hour sermon, which was nearly what a teacher earned in a whole month, and he was hired for funerals, prayer services and festivals. But he never refused gifts. Fatemeh had thrust a large envelope stuffed with money into his hands after their first appointment and ever since then Mullah Ahmad had given Fatemeh his mobile hotline number; she could call it any time of the day or night and he would answer.
    When he saw Fatemeh’s number flash up, Mullah Ahmad picked up immediately. She rushed through the rigmarole of polite enquiries about his family and his health and then fired her question at him.
    ‘Somayeh has a
khastegar
coming round tonight, it’s my sister’s son. Would this be a good union?’ Pause. Mullah Ahmad was opening his book.
    ‘Neither good nor bad, it depends on the purity of their hearts. If they want the union to go ahead, so it must, but only time will tell.’
    This was not the answer she was looking for, but as it was not an outright negative, the tension in her body was released anyway. She parroted Mullah Ahmad’s prophetic words to Haj Agha, who was equally relieved. Now it was up to the kids.
    That night the yearning that throbbed between Somayeh’s legs was stronger than it had ever been. She always fought the feeling, squeezing her eyes tight and willing it to leave her body alone. She no longer dried herself with a towel, scared that her own touch might ignite forbidden desire. At these moments she would