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Alone on a balcony overlooking a garden of wonders, vibrant vegetation and pools of water sparkling like gems in the golden sunlight, Anis lay staring at the cat.
Earlier she had gotten clawed trying to pick her up. Her cheek still bore the mark, three stripes of red where the skin had been torn. She was in a daze, her gaze trained on the cat but her attention elsewhere, floating. Maafe would reproach her if she found her like this.
“There you go again, wandering off in your own world!”
The cat was licking her body with languor and method, like a beautiful woman brushing her hair. Her tongue ran over the blossom-white fur smoothing out every kink as it went like the teeth of a comb.
Anis looked, transfixed.
At length she asked:
“Why won’t you let me pet you?”
There was no answer. Only another question dimly forming in Anis’s mind, a vague notion of petting Shirin that only materialized in her dreams. She called her sister then and the woman came immediately, or she didn’t call her and was the one called instead. They came together as easily as spring and flower.
Only then could she let her hands follow the path of her eyes along every strand of Shirin’s silky hair, from scalp to end and back again. There was a purr in the dream and Anis wasn’t sure who it came from. They were both naked. It seemed like there was a rumble deep in Shirin’s chest. Anis’s eyes lingered as her fingers failed. Could she touch it? This soft thing. She approached in trembling excitement.
And opened her eyes.
Had it all been a dream? She had met Shirin bathing like the Sasanian king of old, but unlike him she had recognized her. Could such things happen in this world? Her mind wandered and wandered as she luxuriated in the softness of carpet and cushions and the lullaby of birdsong and wind in the trees. She thought of her husband’s sublime poetry voice and was struck with the simple truth that if such fine things could exist, then it wasn’t odd at all that sisters should recognize one another at first sight.
Anis was happy, now. She already had everything before Shirin, but there was a kind of mist before her eyes, a mist that the woman had dispelled with lustrous hair and appetite, with nothing but blunt affection, watermelon juice and an earring.
Ah. Maybe Anis dreamed too much. Shirin’s hand in her hair dragged her away from her daze.
“You’re spacing out again!”
“You’re right. I hadn’t even noticed.”
It was so easy to drift off, curled up against Shirin’s shoulder with the pitter-patter of the rain and sounds she plucked from…
“Did you stop playing?”
Shirin’s brow furrowed. She was pretty then. She was pretty all the time.
“You couldn’t tell? Am I so bad that you won’t even hear my songs?”
“No, it’s the opposite. It was so good I was… blown away.”
A sigh and a smile. Anis could always drag them out of Shirin.
“You’re like a kid sometimes.”
“Our husband’s told me that too.”
“He’s right.”
“And Maafe. And some women at the baths.”
“Hmm.”
Now that Shirin’s lap was free, Anis took the opportunity to move in, relishing the caresses in her hair.
“You’re also a bit like a cat.”
“No, that’s you.”
Anis said that, but she was purring. Shirin felt suddenly mischievous.
“Meoooow,” she said, drawing it out. Anis’s body tensed up all at once.
“Meow,” she replied, and Shirin’s breath went with the sound.
They kept on meowing and blushing until the cat came running and meowing too, indignantly like she would not suffer impersonators. They both laughed away all the tension in sputtering, happy bursts. The cat joined their cuddle. She deigned to forgive their insolence so long as they repaid her in warmth. Which they did.
Anis still had a hard time believing she was so happy. On some days there was a hint of guilt, like the price for that happiness had been the death of Shirin’s husband, like she’d caused it somehow, but it never lasted long, because Shirin too was happy, and her happiness was Anis’s, and Anis’s was their husband’s and their husband’s also Anis’s, so how could she not feel overwhelmed by all the bliss?
Ah. She really did dream too much.
“What are you thinking about?”
“Nothing at all. I just love rainy days.”
“Hmm. Would you like to head to the baths, tomorrow?”
Anis sat up from Shirin’s lap, looking unflinchingly into her sister’s eyes.
“I’d like to go anywhere, as long as it’s with you.”