Darius the Great Deserves Better

by Adib Khorram

  “Oh. Hey.”

  “You look like you could use a hug.”

  “I guess so.”

  Javaneh snorted and pulled me in.

  I couldn’t remember ever hugging her before. She felt warm and comfortable, like your blankets when you first wake up in those late fall days before you turn the heat on, and you can’t imagine ever getting out of bed because you know the floors are going to be cold.

  “How’re you doing?”

  “Okay. Trying to keep it together for my mom.”

  She nodded. “When my grandmother passed away, my dad had a really hard time too.”

  “That sucks.”

  “Yeah. I still miss her sometimes.”

  I sniffed. Javaneh pulled a couple Kleenexes out of her huge black purse.

  She was still in high school, but she already had the voluminous purse of a True Persian Woman, the kind that opened into an alternate dimension.

  “Thanks.”

  “Sure.” She looked behind me. “I think someone is here for you.”

  “Oh?” I turned to find Landon standing in the doorway. He was dressed all the way up, in a dark suit with a white shirt and gray tie.

  He looked impeccable.

  “Hi.”

  “Hi,” he said, and wrapped me in a hug. I melted into him.

  We didn’t kiss, though. I think maybe he was trying to figure out what the rules were, surrounded by a bunch of Iranian strangers.

  Maybe he was.

  Maybe I was too.

  When we pulled apart, I said, “Javaneh, this is my boyfriend. Landon.”

  Javaneh beamed and offered her hand.

  “Javaneh Esfahani. I go to school with Darius.”

  Landon’s shoulders relaxed as he took her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Same.” Javaneh glanced toward the big room, and her eyes bugged out for a second. “Oh, no. My parents are trying to help.”

  Landon blinked. “Is that bad?”

  “My parents are, like, Olympic-level taarofers.”

  “Oh no,” I agreed.

  Landon looked between us. Despite my best attempts to explain taarof—the complex set of Social Cues that governed all interpersonal relations between Iranians—he had yet to grasp it fully.

  “Wish me luck.” Javaneh squeezed my arm and hurried out to stop her parents from taking over the entire memorial.

  Landon held my hands and looked me up and down.

  “You got rid of your nails,” he said.

  Grandma helped me take off the polish. Turquoise nails felt too happy for a memorial.

  Too gay.

  I would never get to tell Babou I was gay.

  I hated my own cowardice.

  “Didn’t seem like the right occasion.”

  “You still look nice.” He played with a few locks of hair that had fallen over my forehead. “Are you doing okay? Really?”

  “I’m okay.”

  Landon fussed with my shoulder seams.

  And I had this feeling, like I was annoyed with him for some reason.

  Dr. Howell said it was normal to feel things—ugly things—when I was processing grief.

  I tried not to let it show.

  “You ready to head out there?”

  I took a deep breath.

  “Yeah.”

  QUINTESSENTIAL PERSIAN PROFESSION

  The memorial service was simple: Once everyone arrived (about an hour after we asked people to show up because, as a people group, Iranians are predisposed to tardiness), Mom said a prayer, first in English, then in Farsi, then in halting Dari. She talked about Ardeshir Bahrami’s life growing up in Yazd: how he was born into the Zoroastrian community, went to school, opened a shop, weathered the revolution, raised three kids and eight grandchildren (with a great-grandchild on the way). How he was kind, thoughtful, generous. How he was a demon at Rook. How he loved his garden.

  “The only thing my father loved more than his garden was his wife, Fariba. And the only thing he loved more than Fariba was her cooking.”

  Everyone had been somber up to that point, and some people were even crying. But when Mom said that, the whole room’s mood changed. First there was a little chuckle here and there, and then some uncomfortable giggles, and then finally some actual laughter.

  At the table right behind us, Javaneh’s dad let out a full belly laugh. He—like most of the men in the room—was dressed in a suit.

  Clearly I had once again failed to accurately gauge the appropriate iteration of Persian Casual for the event.

  Mom wiped her tears and smiled. “I wish my mom were here to cook for us tonight. But instead we have Kabob House. Noosh-e joon!”

  Grandma and Oma got up to help at the buffet. I got up too, and took Laleh’s hand.

  “Can I help?” Landon asked.

  “Sure.”

  Laleh manned the bread station—her favorite—while Landon scooped rice onto people’s plates, and I portioned out the tah dig, which Kabob House made with thinly sliced potatoes on the bottom of the pot.

  The line moved slowly, as everyone took time to talk to each other, sometimes in Farsi and sometimes in English and sometimes both, arguing and taarofing and catching up with friends they hadn’t seen since the last time everyone came to the PPCC.

  Landon gave me this bewildered smile when two older Iranian ladies, who I recognized vaguely but whose names I didn’t know, stopped in front of us, arguing in Farsi. Their voices rose, shrill and sharp over the din, until they suddenly cackled. They turned to me.

  “Darioush!”

  “Hi.”

  “Look at you. You’ve lost weight.”

  “Um.”

  My ears burned.

  “Who is this? Your friend from school?”

  “My boyfriend,” I said. “Landon.”

  The woman on my left, who wore her brown hair in an elaborate bun, turned to her friend and asked something in Farsi.

  Her friend, who was taller, with long black hair and ornate gold hoop earrings, said something back. She eyed me, and then Landon, then said something else to her friend. “Just tah dig for me, Darioush,” she said.

  I gave her a wedge with a nice chunk of potato. “This okay?”

  “Perfect.”

  Her friend kept looking from me to Landon and back.

  “No rice for me, thank you,” she said.

  And then she said, “Nice to meet you,” and moved along.

  “What just happened?” Landon whispered to me. “What were they talking about?”

  I didn’t catch enough to understand.

  I was pretty sure I didn’t want to understand.

  “Not sure.”

  Javaneh’s dad, a doctor, held his plate out for Landon to spoon him a wedge of rice. He had a mustache that reminded me of Babou’s, though his was black and trimmed instead of gray and bushy. “Oh, just a little,” he said, when Landon offered him a big scoop.

  “Sorry,” Landon said, and started to put back half the rice.

  Panic flashed across Dr. Esfahani’s face.

  “Please have more. There’s lots,” I said.

  “If you insist.”

  Landon glanced at me, baffled, and then gave Dr. Esfahani his rice.

  Like I said, Landon still hadn’t mastered the art of taarof, which required you to politely decline food even if you actually wanted it, and to force people to take food they said they didn’t want.

  “Darioush. Javaneh said you’re on the soccer team this year.”

  “Yeah.”

  “How’s it going?”

  “Good. We’re six and one.”

  And Landon said, “He’s the best defender on the team.”

  I blushed and shook my head.

  “Of cou
rse he is! Persians are excellent at soccer. It’s genetic.”

  As a doctor—a quintessential Persian profession if ever there was one—Javaneh’s dad was always claiming things were genetic.

  Dr. Esfahani accepted a big piece of tah dig without argument—he was clearly still shaken up by his near-miss with the rice—and moved down the line toward the kabob.

  I served Javaneh’s mom, who was also a doctor—a PhD, who taught physics at Portland State—and then Javaneh’s two brothers, who were still in middle school.

  When our first tray of tah dig ran out, I took it and a couple other empties to the back. Mom was in the kitchen too, refilling huge thermoses of tea from the hot water spigot on the coffee maker.

  “Oh, Darius. Can I talk to you for a second?”

  “Yeah, sure. Are you doing okay?”

  Mom nodded. She’d made it through the day so far without smudging her mascara.

  I had already cried four times myself.

  “What’s up?”

  Mom pursed her lips for a second.

  “You know, a lot of our guests are more . . . traditional Iranians.”

  “I know.” I held up my hands, nails out.

  Mom’s eyes fell.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay.”

  Mom looked at me like she wanted to say something else, but Oma stuck her head in. “We’re almost out of kabobs.”

  “I’ll get some.” I turned back to Mom. “Have people been saying things about Oma and Grandma?”

  “No. You know Iranians. They’ll just mutter to each other.”

  “Okay.”

  Mom grabbed my arm.

  She looked at me for a moment.

  “Make sure Landon gets enough to eat. It was sweet of him to come.”

  * * *

  Once the line had died down, I helped Landon make a plate. It was his first true chelo kabob experience, so I showed him how to make the most of it: layering his plate with bread to soak up the juices, explaining the different philosophies for rice (butter or no butter, mixed with chopped-up grilled tomato or not), introducing him to sumac as a seasoning.

  “I think you gave me too much,” Landon said when he beheld the heaping pile of rice and meat and vegetables I had squeezed onto his paper plate.

  “That’s Persian tradition too.”

  He snorted and smiled.

  “Thank you for being here. Really.”

  “Of course.” He set his plate down and brushed my hands with his. “I’m glad to do it.”

  I made a plate for myself and then we sat next to Laleh, who was already shoveling up her rice with a serving spoon wider than her mouth.

  After dinner, while everyone drank tea and ate zoolbia—essentially a syrup-soaked, starchy Persian funnel cake—Mom and Laleh and I told stories about Babou.

  “The first time I met Babou he was on the roof of his house,” I said. “He wanted to water his fig trees.”

  “He loved his fig trees!” Mom shouted. “I think he loved them more than he loved his children!”

  That made everyone laugh, especially because there was a non-zero probability that it was true.

  “He was all dressed up too, in dress pants and his nice shoes.”

  Mom nodded and laughed, but her eyes were sparkling. I wasn’t sure if it was from laughing too hard, or because it was finally getting to her.

  Maybe it was both.

  “He kept shouting at Sohrab to help him. Sohrab’s his neighbor. My best friend. Anyway, Sohrab was trying to untangle the hose, and I was there watching the whole thing, and Babou was like, ‘I’ll be down in a minute, I don’t care you just flew across the globe to meet me, I need to finish watering my figs.’”

  “You didn’t tell me that part!” Mom shouted.

  After that, Laleh told everyone—through occasional hiccups and tears—about watching Iranian soap operas with Babou, who knew every character and every plot line going back twenty years.

  There was a lull after that, and I refreshed Landon’s tea for him.

  “Thanks,” he said. I squeezed his hand under the table, and he looked at me kind of funny.

  “Hey Mom,” I said. “Have you told everyone about Babou and the aftabeh?”

  Mom’s eyes got huge as the crowd around us tittered.

  “Who told you about that?”

  “Zandayi Simin.”

  “I am going to kill Simin-khanum!” Mom said. She sighed, and then started talking in Farsi.

  Behind me, Grandma asked, “What’s an aftabeh?”

  “It’s kind of like a watering can. You use it sort of like a bidet.”

  Oma snorted, and Grandma covered her mouth, but then I couldn’t say anything else over everyone cracking up.

  MIKE PROGRESSIONS

  Eventually the last guests trickled out. Landon helped Mom fold up the tables and stack the chairs while Laleh picked up paper cups and plates for the trash. In the kitchen, I helped Oma and Grandma manage the mountain of leftovers.

  “You doing okay?” Grandma asked.

  “I guess.”

  I held open a gallon-sized ziplock bag for Oma to load with kabobs.

  “You’re awfully quiet,” Oma said. “Something bothering you?”

  “I never told Babou I was gay.”

  Oma took the bag from me and zipped it closed. She looked at Grandma and then back to me.

  “Do you think . . .” I started to say, but Oma cut me off.

  “You know, I knew your parents had trans friends in college. But it was still hard coming out to them.”

  “Why? Did they take it bad?”

  Oma shook her head. “No. And they were so busy with you I don’t think they processed it all that much. You were just a baby.”

  I nodded.

  “I remember your mom, she kept asking what she was supposed to do with all her photos. From their wedding, from when you were born. But then she got used to it. She and Stephen both did. I think they adjusted quicker than Melanie.”

  Grandma cleared her throat, and Oma shook her head and started shoveling rice into another plastic bag.

  I had never heard my grandmothers talk about Oma’s coming out.

  I wanted them to keep talking.

  “What do you mean?”

  Grandma gave me this long look. She glanced at Oma, who had emerged from the refrigerator with two bags of sabzi.

  “Just that people can surprise you,” Oma said. She set down the sabzi and rested a hand on Grandma’s shoulder. “And sometimes you have to let them, and trust that things will work out.”

  Mom popped her head in. “I just heard from Stephen. His plane’s finally landed.”

  “We’ll finish up here. You go get him,” Grandma said.

  “Thanks. See you at home?”

  “Sure.”

  Mom kissed me. “I’ll take your sister. She’s exhausted.”

  “Okay. Love you.”

  “Love you.”

  * * *

  After we finished up, Landon and I filled the trunk of Oma’s Camry with the leftovers.

  “You wanna come over?” I asked.

  “Can’t tonight.”

  “Oh.”

  “Will you be okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  Landon squeezed my hand. “I think maybe you need to be with your family anyway.”

  Oma turned on her NPR but left it on low. It was kind of soothing: this low, melancholy voice I couldn’t quite make out, whispering in my ear.

  Landon looked at me and gave me this sad smile.

  And then he rested his hand on my leg, kind of on my inner thigh.

  I stared at it: the way his fingers rested against the smooth gray fabric of my dress pants. His pinky traced the inseam back and forth, b
ack and forth.

  My ears burned.

  I had this ugly feeling in me again.

  I wanted to tell Landon to stop, but I couldn’t.

  He had been so patient with me today, and maybe I should’ve been more patient with him in return.

  But I didn’t want to get an erection in my grandmother’s car.

  So I took my hand and wrapped it around his. I pulled it off my leg and wove our fingers together.

  He gave me this look.

  Like he was annoyed with me, maybe.

  Or disappointed.

  And I got another ugly feeling. Like I wanted him to just leave me alone.

  That’s normal.

  Right?

  * * *

  Even with finishing up at the PPCC—and dropping Landon off—we still made it home first.

  I put the kettle on, set to 165 degrees so I could make some Dragonwell, and got changed out of my Persian Casual clothes.

  I still felt kind of weird and tingly where Landon’s hand had been on my inner thigh, perilously close to my penis.

  The garage door rumbled beneath my feet. I shook my head and pulled on some clean underwear and a pair of joggers.

  I had to wait a minute before going downstairs.

  Mom was at the door, holding it open for Dad. She murmured something to him, and he laughed and whispered something into her ear, and then he saw me.

  “There he is,” he said, and pulled me into a Level Twelve Hug.

  I couldn’t remember the last time Dad hugged me so tight or for so long. His beard rubbed against my cheeks. It had gone past the scratchy phase and into the coarse phase, where it wasn’t super soft but it wasn’t bothersome anymore.

  I had never seen my father with a real beard before. It was darker than his sandy blond hair, almost a light brown, and it was patchy around the corners of his mouth.

  I felt something wet against the side of my cheeks too, but I didn’t say anything about that.

  I didn’t know how.

  So I said, “I’m glad you’re home,” and squeezed him back as hard as I could, until he finally seemed to have enough. He patted my back, then rested his hand on the nape of my neck and pulled me in to kiss my forehead.