The Untold Love Story: based on true events

I must have been six or seven when I first began to actually notice that I had feelings for him--God knows when they started really. I remember this because I have this vague memory of being on our balcony one day on my little swing, writing down the names of the boys I had crushes on. There were probably about four of them, but His name really weighed more than the rest. So I made a decision then, on that day on our balcony, that he must be the One.

I wouldn't see him much though. We were distant relatives and would only see each other during occasional family gatherings, and of course, for Norouz, which was the best part because then I would see him a lot, every day for 13 days. I remember little things like being in a room with a bunch of kids playing, then he would walk in and my heart would light up, and then I could no longer think.

Whatever it was, it must have been strong because yavash yavash everyone started to notice, including my mother, who condemned it, and banned me from seeing him or his family much. Like sometimes not attending certain places if they were there, just to make sure I don't get too "goo-goo-ga-ga"...because after all, I was a little girl, nothing but a child who could not possibly know love.

Then came that one Fall day in October 1989 when everything changed forever. (Of course, my mother wasn't there to interfere with it which really helped the situation). All of a sudden, his family decided we should all go to Shomal to our villa. And we did. For three days, we spent every minute together and this time, no one opposed it. We took long walks together and talked.

I was 12, he was 15. We were in love beyond words, and we had waited all this time to be together. On the way back to Tehran, he sat in our car next to me the whole entire time and his leg touched mine for a five hour drive.

Then the next day, he called and confessed his love to me and I did mine to him, and my world changed forever. It was worth waiting all these years. Except there was one slight issue: I was soon leaving for America. So we both knew we were running out of time.

We spent the next few months making up for lost time and loving each other. He was sad that I was leaving but he couldn't do anything about it. Sometimes he complained. Sometimes he would ask me if I really wanted to go to America. I didn't know what to tell him except that I would miss him, and that maybe we would not stay there for too long.

The time finally arrived though. The week before I left, sometime in March 1990, we got together with my older cousins, who all knew about me and him by now, and we met at a coffee shop in Yousef Abaad to discuss strategy: How I could send letters to him from America so his mom and the rest of the family doesn't find out. "Noushin" was a friend of my cousin who volunteered her identity and her address: I would send my letters addressed to her name and to her address so no one would suspect anything. He could then go pick it up. Great plan, we all thought.


Then came the day we had to say good-bye. I remember bits and pieces of that evening, just going there, I think he wore a yellow sweater and looked pale. I went to his room at some point and gave him a little gift that had "I Love You" on it. I think we hugged and kissed but I don't remember because my stomach was upset with too much emotions.

One cold winter night, we left Iran forever.

The letter strategy actually worked for a while, I think maybe for a whole year even, until Noushin's mom found it and told her to cut it off. Then we had to come up with a new plan, and a new address, which we did and it worked again for another while. So we wrote and wrote for four years after I came to America.

FOUR YEARS...until one day I woke up and decided this love will never go anywhere because I wasn't going back to Iran-ever.

So I wrote him my final 8 page letter and said my good-bye. It didn't go too well with him at first. He actually telephoned and wanted to talk and hear it from me directly. And he did. I said "Man deegheh Iran bar nemeegardam heechvaght. Beekhody vaghteh khodeto talaf nakon", and I hung up the phone. And that was it.

I never talked to him again. A few years later I heard he got married.

10 years passed and I went back to visit Iran but I refused to see him. I avoided every party and every place that he could be at, on purpose. I specifically didn't want to see the wife of a man I had been in love with since the age of seven.

A few years after that, he had a baby boy. Recently his wife gave birth to a baby girl.

Sometimes I felt as though he cursed me and that's why I can't find true love anymore. He wanted revenge and that was his curse. Recently though I had this huge realization about me, him and what happened. I realized I was the one who had actually put the curse on me, that night when I hung up the phone on him, I had decided not to ever forgive myself for it, and to always ban myself from receiving love. I realized I had punished me over the years--not him.

My cousin said once that he told her he chose his wife based on my personality and character, he used to tell me I have "ghoroor", and that he liked it.

In order to let go and move on, should I also try to choose someone similar to him and his character? Except that I barely knew him, nor do I really remember how he behaved or what he was like.

I only know one thing now and forever-- he loved me, and his love was so strong that it flew over the vast oceans between us and reached me, and continued to reach me for years and years, even in my dreams...and still does. Yes, I can still feel it.

And that's my untold love story...just unfolded at 2 a.m. on a cold December night.