Veil of Roses

by Laura Fitzgerald

  Ike and I laugh as she flounces away. But it feels too weird, to sit alone with him. I look down to my lap.

  “Hey,” Ike says quietly after a long moment.

  I look up.

  “I’m glad you’re here,” he says, with softness in his eyes.

  I smile, but I suddenly feel so very sad. I wish Minu were here with me. I wish she could have an afternoon like this. I look back down to my hands and try to move past my sorrow.

  “I brought you a present,” he says.

  “You should not be buying me presents,” I say to him, looking up to his smiling face.

  “It’s nothing.” He hands me a plastic bag from Fleet Feet. I reach in and pull out a box.

  “Shoes!” I say. I hold them up, delighted. These are the sort of shoes people wear to hike in Sabino Canyon. “This will be like walking on pillows!”

  “I guessed at the size,” Ike says. “I used to sell shoes in college. It was one of my many jobs.”

  “Thank you,” I say warmly. “This is such a thoughtful gift.”

  “I figure you can hide them in your backpack if you don’t want your sister to see them.”

  “Clever!” I tease.

  “Try them on,” he encourages.

  They fit perfectly. By the time I have the laces tied, Eva is back outside with drinks.

  “Hey,” she says. “Nice shoes!”

  “Ike gave them to me.”

  She gives Ike an appraising look as she sits down.

  “So, Ike, are you dating anyone?” she asks unabashedly.

  I will never bring Eva here again, I resolve as I stare studiously at my new shoes.

  There is barely a pause before Ike responds. “There’s a particular girl I like, but I wouldn’t say we’re dating.”

  My heart skips a beat. I bite my bottom lip and continue looking at my feet. These shoes are so white.

  “She’s somewhat…Hmmm, how to say it?” He pauses.

  Reflectors, too. Very well thought out.

  “What is the word?” he thinks out loud.

  My insides churn. Can’t wait to head home in these new shoes. Like walking on clouds.

  “It’s not that she’s shy, exactly,” he continues. “It’s more that she’s…” Again he pauses.

  “Obsessed with her new shoes?” Eva suggests.

  “Exactly.”

  I smile immediately. I look up at him, so relieved he meant me.

  “They’re beautiful shoes,” I say warmly.

  He laughs. Eva rolls her eyes. “This could take forever, you two.”

  “We’ve got time.” Ike keeps his eyes locked firmly with mine.

  “Not really,” Eva tells him.

  I lift my right foot and kick her shin with my new shoe.

  “So, do you like working here?” I ask brightly.

  “Yeah, do you?” Eva echoes me. “I need to get a job one of these days.”

  “It’s not bad,” Ike says. “Great benefits. Great coworkers. Great experience for when I open my own place. That’s my plan, a chain of coffee shops.”

  “How soon are you going to open them?” I ask.

  “My dad and I are looking at places right now.” I look at him with admiration. So he is not only a coffee shop worker. He will be a business owner one day, too! My sister might even like him a little better if she knew this about him, I think. But no. He is a distraction, and she will never think him anything else.

  “So I can work for you, then,” Eva suggests.

  “Only if you tell me all of Tami’s secrets.”

  “You’re on,” Eva agrees. “Speaking of which—”

  “Eva!”

  “Speaking of what?” Ike asks innocently, raising one eyebrow at me and looking back to Eva.

  I jump up. “Come on, Eva. We’ve got to go.”

  “I think I’ll hang out here for a while and chat with Ike some more. I’ll catch up with you tomorrow in class.”

  I put my hand on my hip. “There’s no way I’m leaving you all alone with him.”

  “Afraid I’ll learn all your secret plans and clever tricks?” Ike grins mischievously.

  “Afraid I’ll seduce him?” Eva grins mischievously, too.

  Ike watches me, curious to see my reaction.

  “You can seduce him all you want, if that means what I think it means.” Ike’s face falls. “Only not tonight. You’re coming to dinner at my house, remember?”

  “Why does she get to meet your sister?” Ike pouts.

  “Aha!” Eva jumps up from her chair, excited. “Dinner with the Wicked Witch of the Middle East. This should be fun!”

  I grimace as I realize it’s equally dangerous to have Eva spend time with Maryam as it is to have her spend time with Ike. She is a land mine waiting to detonate.

  “When do I get to meet your sister?” Ike asks.

  “Never,” I tell him, and smile sweetly. “But thank you very much for the shoes.”

  I remember my camera, and bend to pick it up. I feel awkward, very on display, but I want proof of this day. I snap a picture of our three coffee cups, their round rims on the round table, the lack of hard edges. The rim of Eva’s cardboard cup is splashed with sheer red lipstick; she has made her mark. I take a picture of Eva from her waist down—the thigh-high black boots and the leather miniskirt. Then I take one of my new white running shoes, chaste and cheery.

  “Let me take one of you and Ike,” Eva orders, and reaches for the camera.

  “Nah,” I say casually, and turn to photograph the three blond college girls at the next table. Each wears a formfitting, sleeveless shirt and talks on her cell phone. They are together yet separate. Their nails are fake-long and manicured; their teeth are too white. They are very much the same, interchangeable. Barbie doll girls. Not one would dare to wear a hair clip like Agata’s.

  “Here, let me take one of you and Ike,” Eva demands again.

  I snap the plastic cap back onto the camera lens. “That was my last shot. No more film.”

  “Then what did you waste it for, taking pictures of people you don’t even know?” My friend Eva is not very polite.

  “Tami’s trying to spark a revolution when she goes back to Iran. Aren’t you?” I look at Ike quizzically. He’s not joking.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t know,” he admits. “But you seem to be taking them with some sort of purpose. To use in some way.”

  Eva stretches her arms and strikes a sultry, kissing-the-camera pose. “Take another of me and staple it up on all the light posts in Tehran. I am freedom.”

  You are pornography, I think but do not say. I giggle instead. “I’m looking for more…what is the word?”

  “Subtlety?” Ike suggests.

  “Yes,” I agree. “More subtlety.”

  “You are looking for freedom in all its often overlooked details. You want to document some of the little choices that free people make.”

  “Yes!” I am amazed, openmouthed amazed. He grins at me like he has figured me out, and continues, “You are photographing tiny acts of everyday rebellion.”

  I gasp. “How? How could you know this? What makes you think it? I have only taken four pictures just now.”

  He shrugs. “But look at your choices. I can totally imagine you back in Iran showing them to all your girlfriends.”

  I step back, startled, and stare at him in awe. He hardly knows me. And I am not going back to Iran, he is wrong about that. Yet he is right, too. I do take my pictures with the hungry, yearning eyes of Leila and Minu in mind.

  How did you do that, look into my soul like that? This is what my eyes ask his. Ike’s eyes are as blue as the Tucson sky, with not a cloud in them. I don’t know, they twinkle back. But it’s pretty cool, isn’t it?

  Eva interrupts the moment. “Hey, Ike. How big is your biggest belt buckle?”

  “I beg your pardon?” He looks from her to me. I shrug. I cannot be responsible for her silliness.

  “We’re taking
Tami dancing at The Rustler. Want to join us?” I clear my throat at her to indicate this is not a good idea, but she just smirks at me.

  Ike has seen my discomfort. “Ah…”

  “I’m sure he has other plans,” I say quickly.

  “We don’t even know when we’re going yet!”

  “Still,” I insist, looking imploringly at Ike. “I’m sure he has other plans.”

  He studies me before responding. I hold my breath as I wait for him to answer.

  “Actually, you’re right,” he says. “I probably can’t make it.”

  I nod in gratefulness. But Eva just rolls her eyes at the two of us.

  All the way to my house, I drill into Eva’s head that while in my house, she must not mention Ike. Must not. Must not mention the men in the pickup. Must not mention Ike. Must not mention the shoes. Must not mention Ike.

  “I get it, Tami.”

  “I don’t think you do, Eva. We come from different worlds. Mine is not so flexible as yours. It’s not like maybe things will be okay if only we bring them up a certain way. If my sister knows that I am spending time with Ike, she will not let me walk to class. She might not even let me go to class anymore.”

  “I get it.” Eva sighs, clearly tired of my admonitions. “What about your shoes?”

  Good point. We are three blocks from my sister’s house. I bend to take them off and replace them with my boots. Ike suggested that I hide them in my backpack, but to have them in the house is too dangerous. I look around. We are in front of a pink adobe house. The house of the woman with the silly red hat I took a picture of the other day, from a distance with my long-range lens. Her yard is overgrown with native plants and long grasses. I push some grass aside and shove the shoes in, then cover them up with the grass. There.

  Eva shakes her head. “This is crazy.”

  “Not a word about the shoes,” I warn.

  “Shoes?” she asks innocently. “What shoes?”

  “You’re incorrigible, Eva.” I laugh, and link arms with her. “And I mean that in a good way. I think.”

  We walk into the house to the wonderful scent of Dolmeh-yeh Seeb-Zamini being prepared, one of my favorite dinners. Maryam must still feel bad about this morning. Or else she wants something from me.

  “That smells so good,” Eva says to me in a quiet voice.

  “It’s delicious,” I whisper back. “Let me go tell my sister you’re here.”

  I take off my boots and point Eva toward the couch. After she sits down, I lean over.

  “Remember, not a word about you-know-who.”

  Eva mimics turning a key to lock her lips and throwing the key over her shoulder. I laugh gratefully and head to the kitchen. Maryam stands at the stove, stirring tomato paste into the onion and lamb. She smiles to see me. I walk to her and we kiss hello.

  “I brought my friend Eva home for dinner,” I say. “I hope this is all right.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Is this okay?”

  “Sure,” she says. “I am glad you have made a friend. Of course it’s fine.”

  “She’s in the living room. Will you come meet her?”

  Maryam washes her hands quickly and follows me to the living room. Eva stands as I introduce them and they shake hands. She should have taken her boots off. I should have told her to take her boots off. Eva comments on how delicious the food smells.

  So far, so good. Keep it up, Eva.

  “My husband will be home in a few minutes,” Maryam says. “Please, sit down and enjoy yourselves. I will get some tea and fruit for us.”

  She disappears back into the kitchen to prepare the tea, and I feel awkward suddenly, unsure what we should talk about. It is only Eva who is at ease.

  “This place is beautiful,” she murmurs, looking around at the Persian rugs on the walls, the gold-plated vases with silk flowers. At the ornate porcelain samovar displayed on the coffee table, and the hookah in the corner.

  “Do you smoke pot in that thing?”

  “Pot?” I ask. “What is this word?”

  “Marijuana. Hashish.”

  “Oh, no. We use a highly aromatic tobacco. You inhale the smoke through the urn of water right there, which cools the smoke before inhalation.”

  “Very cool,” she says. “Where’s the cat?”

  “What cat?” I never told her we have a cat.

  “A Persian cat. That’s all this place needs to make me feel like I’m in Iran.”

  “Iranians don’t keep cats,” I inform her. “They’re dirty.”

  “Except for Persian cats, right?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Persian cats,” she enunciates loudly and carefully. “You need a Persian cat.”

  I furrow my eyebrows at her. I wonder if maybe it is this house that makes people crazy. I know Eva was not crazy before she came inside, yet now she is acting as oddly as Haroun and his bugs. That’s it. This house makes people crazy about invisible animals.

  “Eva,” I say firmly. “I need you to stop talking about cats.”

  She stares at me, dumbfounded. “Why?”

  “Do not, under any circumstances, mention cats to my sister.”

  “What was that you were saying, Eva?” Maryam asks, coming back in the room with a tray of tea, cups, and a bowl of fruit.

  “Nothing,” I say with a warning tone in my voice. “Eva was only saying how much she likes this house and thank you for inviting her here, and I was saying don’t mention it.”

  Maryam smiles, pleased by Eva’s compliment. She pours three cups of tea and, upon hearing Ardishir’s car pull into the driveway, pours a fourth cup. I pop two sugar cubes into my mouth and savor the tea as it warms my mouth and disintegrates the sugar cubes and slides comfortingly down my throat.

  Eva plops a sugar cube into her tea and takes a sip. Maryam opens the front door for Ardishir. He comes in, kisses her gently on both cheeks, and removes his shoes. When he catches sight of Eva, he smiles.

  “Hello,” he calls out. “You must be a friend of Tami’s from school.”

  Eva stands and Ardishir walks over to her for a handshake. “That’s right. I’m Eva. I see that I should have taken off my boots.”

  “Don’t worry about it. It’s not necessary. It’s very nice to meet you, Eva.” He turns to me and kisses me on both cheeks, and then he takes a chair near the coffee table.

  “Tea!” Ardishir says happily. He pops one sugar cube in his mouth and takes a long gulp of tea. “Ah, nothing like a nice cup of tea after a long day.”

  “I was just telling your wife and Tami how lovely your home is, with all these beautiful rugs and Persian things.”

  “Thank you,” Ardishir says.

  “I was telling Tami that I feel like I am in Iran. Or what I imagine Iran must be like.”

  “Have you seen the Persian cat yet?” he asks her with a smile.

  Eva snaps her head toward me and waits for my explanation. She looks at me like I am the crazy one.

  “We don’t have a cat,” I assure her, and turn to Ardishir to scold him in Farsi. “Why would you say something like this?”

  He laughs and replies in English. “That’s the first thing Americans always ask when they come to our home. Where’s the Persian cat?”

  Eva looks victorious. “That’s exactly what I asked, and Tami acted like I was crazy!”

  Now Maryam giggles.

  “What is a Persian cat?” I demand. “I grew up there and I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

  “They’re those beautiful long-haired cats. Sometimes they have blue eyes that look like they glow,” Eva tells me.

  “I’ve never seen such a cat,” I insist. “Nor have I heard of such a cat.”

  Ardishir chuckles once more. “I had to look them up in the encyclopedia at the library when I first came here. Back then, I never wanted to say I was from Iran, what with the hostage-taking at the American embassy. So I always said I was from Persia, and few people knew what I was talking
about. Without fail, they’d say, ‘Oh, you mean where Persian cats come from, and Persian rugs?’ I’d always say, ‘Yes, where the rugs come from, exactly.’”

  “I think the cats actually come from England,” Maryam says.

  “Is this all people know of our culture?” I ask in wonder. “Cats and rugs?”

  “Pretty much,” Eva says. “Except now we also think of veils and hostages. And angry, bearded men in the streets yelling ‘Death to America.’”

  “This is horrible,” I say in exaggerated misery and clutch my hands to my hair.

  Maryam shrugs. “They see what the news shows them.”

  “But we’re wonderful people,” I insist. “We are good people making the best of a bad situation.”

  “Has anyone been mean to you since you’ve arrived?” Eva asks me.

  “No,” I tell her. “I have been met with nothing but kindness.”

  “Even when they know you’re from Iran?”

  “It seems like especially then.”

  “Well.” Eva shrugs. “That’s how it is. Germans were hated, too, after Hitler. And now most people like Germany just fine. This hard time for your country will eventually pass.”

  “It’s the ebb and the flow,” says Ardishir philosophically. “The ebb and the flow.”

  We are halfway through dinner and I am breathing easier. Maryam seems to like Eva just fine. More than fine, actually. Eva is on her best behavior; I have never seen her so polite and well mannered. She asks how the food is prepared. She accepts a second and a third helping. She says no, there is not too much salt in the dish. She inquires after my parents. She does everything right.

  The trouble comes when Ardishir innocently asks what Eva and I did that day after school.

  “We went for coffee,” Eva says quickly. “I took Tami to Starbucks, since that’s such a symbol of America.”

  “But Tami has already been there,” Maryam says. “Did you go to the same one as where you had the run-in with the police?”

  “What run-in with the police?” Eva asks me.

  “It is nothing,” I tell her, embarrassed. “Only a misunderstanding.”

  “Well,” asks Maryam a second time, “is that the one you went to?”

  Did you see that man again? That is what she is really asking.