Chapter II
Two philosophies
of one family
The Aliyev line · eldest and youngest
Emin’s death was a turning point for both sons, but not at the same point. Ali was two years old and does not remember his father — he remembers what happened after. Mehdi was too small to remember anything and grew up on accounts of a man no one ever disputed.
Ali expected his father’s old friends to back the family: Emin had helped them when several of them had practically nothing. After the death there was no support. Some stopped answering calls, others suddenly turned out to be too busy, and the third kind began explaining that their circumstances were now entirely different.
Mehdi drew the opposite conclusion: if the circle breaks, it has to be re-threaded by hand — each person separately. Even today he prefers the telephone to a contact list.
Ali AliyevYou are not obliged to rescue every stranger.
Mehdi AliyevAnd you are not obliged to see an enemy in every stranger.
After such talks the brothers could stay days without speaking, and then sit down at one table as though nothing had happened.
Chapter III
Luxury
as a way of life
The Aghayev line · the son for whom it was never enough
Hussein grew up in a family where money had stopped being a subject of conversation long before his birth. Education, clothes, travel, surroundings and opportunities simply appeared — like the light in a room where no one remembers where the switch is.
At eighteen he had a car his peers read about as though it were someone else’s dream; soon after — a second car, dearer than the first; at nineteen — property in another climate. To other people this looked like the life of a man who had been improbably lucky. Hussein himself considered it perfectly natural.
Parviz gradually noticed that his heir understood the cost of cars, property and watches impeccably, and understood the cost of responsibility far less well. Their relations were good — with periodic contests between two people who picture success differently.
A guest at the family dinnerHussein, can you actually drive an ordinary car at all?
Hussein AghayevOf course. I simply see no reason to spoil my own mood.
The phrase quickly became a family joke. Hussein took it for a compliment.
Parviz wanted to leave a legacy behind him. Hussein wanted to enjoy the inheritance. The archivist notes that both versions require the same person — the one who will come after them.
the archivist · marginal note
Chapter IV
A legacy,
that would have been better left unreceived
The Naziriv line · two sons, two versions of silence
Anar’s eldest son had the qualities that would have made him an outstanding leader: mind, ambition, decisiveness, character. He studied history, politics, economics and international relations, and could reason about the fate of states better than those who dispose of that fate. Some families acquainted with his saw in him a future statesman.
Not one of them knew what went on behind the closed doors of his house. The archive knows, and will not tell.
Material closed · grounds stated at the end
In the file of Hussein Naziri there is a sheet which this archive does not open in any format. It concerns a childhood, and a violence a child is not meant to survive. Grounds: the text involves a minor, and the archivist refuses to turn another person’s trauma into reading for entertainment — even in a text written as entertainment.
The story itself, however, remains. It lies in one phrase, and the phrase is enough: this person spent his whole conscious life proving to himself that he is capable of being strong without becoming the one he hates.
the archivist · decision not subject to appeal
The younger one, Sadiq, became another form of the same family error. At seven or eight years old, alarming changes began to be noticed around him: too early an acquaintance with adult people who had destructive habits, behaviour absorbed too quickly, too specific an interest in what ought not to be accessible to children. It emerged later that this was not childish disobedience.
The family preferred silence. Anar took what was happening as a threat to reputation; part of the relatives proposed keeping the boy out of other people’s sight. The principal question, though, no one asked: why the child had ended up in such a situation. This is one of the most tragic lines in the volume — the story of a child whom adults tried to hide instead of protecting. And the older he grew, the more problems the family was left with.
The archive did not close the second part of the chapter out of caution. It closed it out of stubbornness — and insists that stubbornness is a professional quality of the compiler.
the archivist · office note
Chapter V
The last man
of the old principles
The Badirov line · only son
Suleyman differed from the other heirs in practically everything. He had no need of expensive cars in order to feel significant; he did not display his standing and did not think that a surname gave a right to special treatment. He could give his last to a person who had fallen into trouble, and walking past an injustice was harder for him than walking past his own advantage.
At fifteen his familiar world collapsed: the house that ought to have been a place of safety turned out to be part of the family conflict, and his relations with his father became much more complicated.
Unlike Ali, he did not try to establish who was to blame. Unlike Hussein Naziri, he did not dream of one day taking power. Unlike Hussein Aghayev, he did not mean to prove to other people how well provided his family was. He wanted one thing: that the people he loved should stop hurting one another.
In a world where everyone wanted to get something, Suleyman most often gave. But even in the kindest of people patience one day runs out — and that is exactly why his line in this volume matters more than it looks.