Where Jasmine Blooms

by Holly S. Warah

  Jan turned to Margaret. “That’s such a cute outfit on you.”

  She smiled and looked down at her fitted blouse. It wasn’t just the hijab; she had also dropped her shapeless clothing. It was all part of her midlife makeover—her “midlife hijab crisis” as her friend Liz had called it. Yet it wasn’t so much a crisis as it had been a fresh start. It was only after the scarf came off that Margaret realized how withdrawn she had been in hijab, how she had allowed it to become a barrier, an excuse.

  She sat down and took out her scrapbook. The room filled with cheerful talk of plans for the Fourth of July and day camp for kids. All three J’s appeared fresh, at ease, and well adjusted—not one of them worn down by situations beyond their control.

  Margaret opened her scrapbook. It was their family album, displaying photos of events such as birthdays and the Eid holidays. She felt a surge of inspiration as she visualized the pages she would create.

  Jan set a dish of artichoke dip and four wine glasses on the table. She poured white wine in three glasses, stylishly twisting her wrist at the last drop. Each glass displayed a different charm attached to its base for identification purposes, although Margaret’s glass didn’t need one. For her, Jan brought out a jug of orange juice.

  The other women sipped their wine and explained what pages they were working on.

  “I’m doing Khalid’s graduation,” Margaret said, eyes fixed on the bright juice in her stemmed glass.

  Jan looked up. “He graduated?”

  “Yes, and I got some great photos at the rose garden.”

  Jackie tilted her head and smiled. “And how’s the family?”

  This was Margaret’s cue to amaze and entertain. “The graduation was lovely,” she began, not wanting to disappoint, “although Ahmed’s mother didn’t think so. She was bothered by something.” Margaret looked at a photo of the mother, her face devoid of expression as she stood next to Khalid, smiling broadly, his arm around her. “Look at this.” Margaret slid the photo across the table.

  “She doesn’t look too happy,” Jackie said.

  “I thought she’d be thrilled—Khalid finally graduating.” Margaret took a sip of juice. “He just married this young woman, Alison. She graduated, as well.”

  “Same graduation?” Josephine asked.

  “Yes, and her parents came out from Chicago.” The women worked quietly, cropping, arranging, and adhering as Margaret spoke. “It was strange because the mother barely said a word to them.” Margaret examined a photo of Alison with her parents at her side. They had attempted smiles, yet there were no arms around the shoulders in this photo. Alison’s mother gripped the strap of her purse while her father stood awkwardly. “I wanted to pat this woman’s hand and say it’d be okay, Khalid’s a great guy.”

  “Why didn’t you?” Jackie asked.

  Margaret studied a photo of the young couple in their caps and gowns. Alison’s smile accentuated her high cheekbones and revealed her perfect row of teeth. “I’m not sure it’s true.”

  The women looked up, eyebrows raised. Margaret passed the photo to Jan.

  “She’s pretty.”

  “Her background’s Syrian American.”

  “Syrian? But she’s blonde.”

  “There are blonde Syrians. Have you see that anchor woman on CNN?”

  “They make a nice couple.” Jackie was holding the photo now. “You don’t think he’ll be a good husband?”

  “He’s a bit irresponsible.” Margaret tried not to sound bitter. “He gets away with it because Ahmed basically supports him.” She looked at the image of Khalid. Granted, he was charming with his dark eyes and good looks. “For Palestinian families, it’s natural for the older brother to do everything for the younger.”

  “Honestly, Margaret.” Jackie shook her head. “I don’t know how you do it.”

  “Don’t get me started,” Margaret said, but she already had.

  “You’re a saint,” Jan said.

  “I wouldn’t say that.” Margaret strained to keep her smile as her thoughts flashed with arguments she had had with Ahmed over Khalid. Their father had sacrificed and saved for Ahmed’s university with the understanding that Ahmed would do the same for his younger brother. It had seemed fair in the beginning. In fact, Margaret had found Ahmed’s devotion to his family endearing. She had not understood until years later what these obligations truly meant.

  “How long is Ahmed’s mother staying with you?” Josephine asked.

  Margaret held up her hands. “Who knows?”

  “My mother-in-law comes for three days,” Jackie said. “I want to slit my wrists.”

  “Now that Ahmed’s father has died, we don’t know where his mother will live.” Margaret mindlessly slid her photographs around on the page. “Traditionally she’d live with her oldest son—that’s Ahmed—but we just don’t know where she’ll end up.”

  “Why don’t you ask her?” Jan said.

  Margaret lined up the best graduation photos in front of her. “Once we bring up the subject, we need to invite her to stay permanently. It will no longer be just a visit.” She began trimming them one by one, cropping away parts of each photo that weren’t necessary. Too much brick wall. A stranger that made his way into the photo. The grumpy mother. Margaret wished she could trim the mother right out of her life.

  “It’s true,” Josephine said, “You’re a saint.” That word again.

  “There’s also the issue,” Margaret explained, “of Nadia. The mother can’t exactly leave Jordan for good until Nadia gets married.” Margaret leaned forward until she had everyone’s attention. “My plan is to have the mother live with Khalid and Alison.”

  Jackie raised an eyebrow. “Sounds like you don’t like Alison.”

  “She’s a bit of a know-it-all. I mean, she’s only been married five minutes. A marriage like that takes work.”

  “You’d know.” Jan stood and topped off the wine glasses. “Hasn’t it been twenty years, you and Ahmed?”

  “Twenty years next month.” Margaret pondered the length of two decades. So much had happened, from the good times of the early years, to running the restaurants and raising three children, to the never-ending demands of Ahmed’s family—all culminating with the mother moving in with them. What could Margaret do? She couldn’t turn away Ahmed’s mother, newly widowed and still in mourning, could she?

  “How are you going to celebrate?” Josephine asked.

  “We’re staying in a hotel downtown. Going out to dinner, window shopping. No kids, just us.” The women expressed their approval, and Margaret continued, “But before we can enjoy that, there’s one more family event we have to attend—Khalid and Alison’s wedding.”

  Jackie looked up. “I thought they were already married.”

  “They did the marriage license at the mosque, but there wasn’t any celebration.” Margaret fingered her long beaded necklace. “Now they’re having a wedding, more like a reception. The fabulous thing is that her parents are paying for it.”

  “Isn’t that the tradition?” Josephine asked.

  “Not in Palestinian families,” Margaret said. “I was worried Ahmed and I would be the ones to pay.”

  “You’d pay for their wedding?” Jackie asked.

  “That’s what Arab brothers do. It’s their system. They help each other out.” Margaret stopped herself. How could she explain the very social customs that made her crazy?

  “What are you going to wear?” Jan said.

  “Not sure yet.” Margaret had flicked through the dress racks at the mall, surveying the strapless and backless gowns—all too revealing. So instead, she had channeled her energy into getting a dress for Jenin, whose breasts seemed to have grown one cup size since the last time Margaret took her shopping.

  Thankfully, the topic shifted to Jan’s two-page spread of a St. Patrick’s Day party. In one photo, people wore green hats and held up pints of beer.

  Jan stroked the base of her wine glass. “It was a great party. I go
t a lot of good pictures.” She held up a photo. “See this? Totally staged. The first shot was a dud, so I refilled their glasses and made them do the toast all over again.”

  “Living the lie,” Jackie said in a voice full of cheer.

  Josephine held up a photo of a child blowing out candles. “Mine, too. Completely faked. We had him blow out the candles three times.”

  “Living the lie,” Jackie repeated.

  Margaret looked down at her scrapbook. The entire thing was a lie, a highly abridged version of their life, edited as she wished it to be. Page after page denied the sprawling chaos just outside the viewfinder.

  The day of the wedding arrived quickly. In the driveway, their household all piled into the minivan. Margaret took her seat behind the mother and stared at the back of the woman’s head, covered in a white scarf. It was one thing for Margaret to give up her seat for a week, but this arrangement was going on month after month. Today especially she wanted to arrive at the wedding like a normal family.

  The reception was held at a hotel on the Seattle waterfront. Margaret and Ahmed entered just as Mona cruised in with her husband and boys. The lobby was inviting and cozy with its stone fireplace. Even the children were subdued.

  “No new dress?” Mona raised her eyebrows.

  Margaret blinked. “What?”

  “You wore that to the last wedding.”

  Margaret glanced down. She had settled on a dress she’d worn to a previous wedding—not particularly flattering but suitably modest. Granted, the fabric and cut were a bit out of style. Meanwhile, Mona wore a never-before-seen dress—floor-length and glittery with a fitted jacket.

  “No, Mona, no new dress,” she said. “But yours is beautiful—so shiny!”

  Margaret retreated to the ballroom, where a quartet played jazzy Arab music near the dance floor. Each table was draped in white and topped with white roses. Beyond the tables were floor-to-ceiling windows with a panoramic view of Puget Sound, where a ferry passed by.

  Margaret, Ahmed, and their children chose seats by the dance floor. As the ballroom gradually filled, Mona’s boys darted between the dinner tables. Margaret scanned the room for Mona; of course, she was nowhere to be seen. It would be yet another event with those boys running around.

  Margaret sighed, and Ahmed reached for her hand and held it between his. It was a tender moment, one of unspoken affection—a feeling that had become increasingly rare between them. With the mother constantly around, Margaret and Ahmed hardly had a private moment together—and when they did, any conversation inevitably turned back to the mother.

  Servers circulated offering ginger ale and sparkling juice: the Muslim bar selection. The wedding cake was wheeled in—four tiers garnished in real flowers, a culinary detail Ahmed would surely take interest in, as he favored unusual garnishes for cakes at his restaurant.

  The appetizer buffet opened, offering Arab mezze, hummus, and babaganouj artistically arranged as a gourmet spread, not as the simple fare it really was. Margaret began filling her plate when something caught her eye across the room. Two of Mona’s boys were giggling behind the wedding cake. Margaret set her plate down and hurried over. Sure enough, the two were dipping into the white frosting and licking it off their fingers.

  “Stop that!” she said. “Get away from there!”

  The boys scattered, and Alison’s mother approached, her eyes surveying the damage. Her cropped silver hair matched her metallic sheath of a dress. “What’s wrong with these children? Don’t they know any better?”

  Right behind her was Alison’s grandmother, grimacing and clicking her tongue sharply, dressed in a beaded cardigan and calf-length skirt.

  Margaret found herself defending the children. “They’re just excited.”

  Alison’s mother leaned in and asked in a confidential tone, “Is this typical of these people?”

  A shiver passed through Margaret. She couldn’t think of anything to say except “Well, it depends,” then quickly excused herself and returned to Ahmed’s side, trying to erase what she had heard. These people.

  Margaret fixed her eyes on Ahmed’s mother making her way across the ballroom, shaking hands with the Arab guests. The mother was in her special-occasion regalia, her black velvet floor-length thob embellished with colorful embroidery. The mother was smiling, but her wrinkled face looked much older than her sixty-something years. It was an odd juxtaposition, the weary mother next to Alison’s mother, trim in her silver cocktail dress. Margaret considered the new family relationships forming. How would Alison fit into the Mansour family?

  At that moment, Alison’s grandmother came into view—standing directly across from Ahmed’s mother. Though both were Arab women of a similar age, they were worlds apart: Ahmed’s mother in her white headscarf and thob, and Alison’s grandmother in her prim clothing, handbag and heels, her hair stiff and coiffed. The two old women said not a word to each other but simply stared, scanning the other from head to toe.

  Margaret’s observations were interrupted by loud drumming. Making their entrance, Khalid and Alison walked in holding hands and beaming like they had just stepped out of the cover of Arab American Wedding. Alison’s slim-fitting white gown had tiny cap sleeves and an open back—way too sexy for this family but gorgeous nonetheless. They headed for the dance floor, where they raised their arms. Arab music started up, and Khalid’s shoulders took on the rhythm while Alison’s slim arms undulated. The guests clapped as the couple performed their own version of an Arab wedding dance.

  When their dance ended, the dinner buffet opened. Margaret led Leena to the food and scanned the dishes: seasonal greens, wild rice pilaf, northwest salmon, roasted lamb.

  Leena looked up at Margaret. “I want a kid’s meal.”

  “They don’t have that here, honey. How about rice and fish?”

  Leena made a face and crossed her arms, and Margaret took her hand. “Okay, let’s see what we can find.” After some negotiation, they walked back to their table with Leena carrying only one item on her plate: breadsticks.

  They sat and took their first bites. Mona walked by, her eyes on Leena’s plate. She touched Margaret’s shoulder. “If my child ate like that, I’d kill myself.”

  Margaret sighed once more. She was again called upon to offer Mona a response, pointed but not too sharp. Margaret looked up and smiled. “Lucky for you, your boys are big eaters.”

  After the meal, servers placed fluted glasses of sparkling white grape juice in front of each guest. Alison’s father stood and clinked a spoon against his glass.

  He addressed the room, his face upturned and smiling. “Almost sixty years ago, a couple in Chicago married. A young Christian woman and a Muslim man, both new immigrants from Syria, defying the cultural norms of the time.” He paused and nodded. “Those were my parents.” At this, the crowd murmured. “And today my daughter Alison continues the tradition.”

  Margaret looked at Khalid, who appeared pleased with himself. She recalled the tiny photo Ahmed had shown her when they first met. “This is my brother,” he had said. Khalid was six years old in the photo. A first grader. When he came to the States, he was barely eighteen.

  Her gaze moved to Ahmed, dressed in his suit with his arm around Leena. He looked up and smiled at Margaret, his eyes warm and loving. Margaret responded with a tender look. Despite everything he had put her through, he was a good husband and father. And after twenty years, she was still happy to be by his side.

  Alison’s father finished speaking and raised his glass to the couple, gesturing widely. “I’d like to make a toast. To my beautiful daughter Alison and her husband Khalid. May they find love always.”

  Ahmed held up his glass and turned to Margaret, who knew what he was about to say.

  “Next year, Jerusalem.” It was a private joke between them, Ahmed’s toast. If Jews could yearn to return to the holy city, Ahmed reasoned, then so could he. After all, he still held residency there, something he said he would never give up—all part of his
bittersweet fantasy of one day returning to Palestine. Whenever he made this toast, Margaret smiled and played along. Of course, she had no intention of moving to Palestine—or anywhere.

  They clinked glasses, and he leaned in to whisper something.

  “Honey, I’ve been thinking,” he said. “I don’t think our cash gift is enough. We should buy Khalid some furniture, too.”

  Margaret stiffened. “What?” Her voice was high-pitched. “We’ve done enough for your brother.”

  “Lower your voice.”

  “He’s an adult now. He needs to take care of his own things.”

  “Okay.” Ahmed patted her hand.

  “No one bought furniture for us.” Margaret leaned back and rubbed her forehead. Damn. Why did they keep going over these same things? She pictured their split-level house at the end of the cul-de-sac and their unruly life there: the mother, the relatives, the shoes piled by the door, the tea glasses scattered about, the television continuously projecting news in Arabic, the needy brother, and Ahmed—who could never say no.

  In her mind flashed another image, her life separate from all that. She allowed herself a brief daydream, running through the usual considerations: where she would live, how she would support herself, how she would manage as a single mother. The snag in this scenario was always the same: would she willingly choose a life without Ahmed?

  The band was playing a traditional Arab song, and on the dance floor, guests danced for the newlyweds. This was their ritual to honor the couple and celebrate their happiness. The mother was there, too, her hips twitching, arms raised. Her weathered face held an open smile. It was the first time Margaret had seen her show any joy since her husband died. She was surely missing him, yet there she was, dancing for her son and his American bride—the one she didn’t want.