Together Tea

by Marjan Kamali

  KISSES AND HUGS AND HAIRSPRAY surrounded the guests as they arrived. Their house had one of the most coveted designs in post-revolutionary Iran: a big private foyer. Here, when the women arrived, they could stop and remove their heavy roopoosh, release their hair from their headscarves, and slowly transform themselves into the women they were—the women they had been before the revolution’s new laws. The state’s obligatory flat shoes were thrown off and feet slipped into stiletto heels pulled out of plastic bags. Flattened hair was fluffed and teased back into shape. Tight red dresses, shimmery tank tops, miniskirts, and mutually admired spaghetti-strap gowns emerged from under the roopoosh. The women joked and grumbled about the Islamic hijab as they pressed tubes of lipstick to their mouths and smeared eye shadow above their lids. They shared one another’s black-market Chanel No. 5, spritzing between their breasts and inside their wrists.

  In the foyer, on special hooks Darya had hammered in after the revolution, hung the discarded roopoosh in a row. They were lifeless and colorless, even more so without their owners in them.

  After greetings and cocktails, after dolmeh and pistachios, Baba announced it was time for a little music. He drew the blinds shut and made sure all the doors were locked. Darya pulled curtains over the blinds as an extra precaution, and Mina’s uncles piled chairs against the front door. If the Revolutionary Guards decided to break in, the extra buffer would buy them all some time.

  “Don’t worry, they’re not around this neighborhood tonight,” Baba reassured the guests. “Big wedding in Yousef Abad. They’re all downtown, most of them anyway.”

  “Well, last weekend they stormed the Honaris’ wedding.” Aunt Firoozeh sucked an olive off a toothpick. “They heard pop music and broke in, ten Comiteh Revolutionary Guards. Fined the host. Kept the guests in custody. Poor Niloofar said she should’ve never had a reception.”

  “Firoozeh Joon, you’re being negative again,” her husband, Uncle Jafar, said. He sat stuffed in an armchair drinking homemade beer he’d brought with him in yogurt containers. “Don’t scare these good people. One shouldn’t be paranoid. Maybe think a little before you say things that scare children?”

  Aunt Firoozeh glared at him as she sipped her wine. Mina had watched them argue all her life. “May God release me from this man and his criticism!” Aunt Firoozeh muttered, then stomped into the kitchen. Uncle Jafar continued talking to no one in particular. “Have you heard of Viktor Frankl? Have you read his books? He knows about the power of positive thinking.” He coughed, his eyes burning from the brew. “Also, there’s an American woman, by the name of Glooria Gay-Lord who has sung a song with which I’m very pleased. It is called ‘I Veel Survive.’ Have you heard it?”

  A few men nodded politely and feigned interest because he was an elder. Other guests smiled and looked down. Darya then handed Mina a silver tray filled with bowls of different nuts and Mina trotted around the room, balancing the tray in her hands.

  “Would you like some nuts?” she asked the old powdered aunts who sat with Mamani on the couch.

  “Oh no, thank you, may your hands not ache.”

  “Please take a nut,” Mina insisted.

  “No, no,” the ladies politely refused.

  “In God’s name, take a nut, please,” Mina said.

  “Well, okay then, maybe just one.” Mamani extracted a few nuts from the bowl.

  “May it nourish your soul,” Mina said, bowing her head. Darya always said that before people ate.

  “Thank you, my soul is yours,” Mamani said.

  Mina continued around the room.

  AT NINE O’CLOCK, COUSIN LEILA arrived with her father, Professor Agassi, and her mother, Dr. Agassi. Tall and thin, Leila wore dark blue jeans and a white blouse. She was the only Iranian woman Mina knew who didn’t dress as if she were attending an opera every time there was a party at someone’s house. She didn’t wear any makeup, but she still looked better than the others. She had big dark eyes and long black hair that was always moving, fluid around her fair skin. Leila hugged Mina amidst the loud greetings and laughter at her family’s arrival.

  “Tavalodet mobarak, happy birthday.” Leila was the only person who remembered what this party was actually for. Presents were piled high in the living room, but few others had uttered “Happy birthday.” “How’s it going?”

  “It’s going. Aunt Firoozeh and Uncle Jafar argued already. Baba insists on playing music. My mom cooked my favorites. Mamani wants you to marry Mr. Johnson.”

  Leila didn’t seem surprised at any of it. “Come on.” She took her second cousin’s hand. “I brought you a book. In English.” Leila spoke fluent English and tutored children in their homes. Darya always encouraged Mina to bolster Mrs. Isobel’s lessons with English conversation with Leila. “For your future, Mina Joon,” she would say. “It will be the language of the world one day.” Every Wednesday after school, Mina, Hooman, and Kayvon were dragged to Mrs. Isobel’s classes. Darya added an extra Monday session after the war began. She had heard from Baba’s brother, now seeking asylum in Chicago, that not knowing English made him feel blind.

  Mina and Leila went to the bedroom and thumbed through the paperback: it was a book from the Michelle series. Michelle lived in a place called Portland, Oregon. She had a best friend, Sandy, and was learning how to babysit. Sandy and Michelle both liked a boy called Brett. But Brett only liked the cheerleader Marcia. Marcia smiled on the book’s cover, holding pink fluffy balls, her bare legs raised in the air.

  “And the English-language bookstore can sell this?” Mina’s eyes widened at Marcia’s bare legs.

  “The booksellers have colored over Marcia’s legs with permanent black marker now,” Leila said. “But I got this before.”

  There was no need to say before when. Their world was cleaved into Before and After. Before the revolution. Before the new laws. Before the upside-down.

  “You went to trouble, thank you,” Mina said.

  Leila read out loud about Michelle and Sandy’s plan to stop Brett from taking Marcia to prom. Mina sat on her bed and tried to follow their problems, but she couldn’t help worrying about the Revolutionary Guards. If they burst in and arrested her parents for the party, it would all be her fault.

  “Dinner’s ready!” Darya’s head popped into the room.

  THE GUESTS HEAPED THEIR PLATES with rice and ghormeh sabzi, rice and barberries, and poured Darya’s walnut and pomegranate sauce on top of their saffron rice. They drank Baba’s illegal wine and insisted everything was the best they’d ever had. This time, Mina knew it wasn’t just tarof. Her mother’s cooking truly was superb. Mina broke some fresh naan and dipped it into her cucumber and mint yogurt.

  “To the chef, the lovely lady at the head of the table.” Baba raised his glass.

  Darya blushed. “May it nourish your souls,” she said.

  “To Mrs. Rezayi!”

  “Thank you, Khanom Rezayi!”

  “May your hands not ache!”

  “May you live long!”

  Darya beamed, her eyes bright.

  “And may God protect us from the Revolutionary Guards, damn them, and from the entire entourage of Secret Police that wrecks the lives of the innocent and tortures people’s children! And from British spies!” Aunt Firoozeh said, her face flushed with too much wine, as Uncle Jafar almost spit out a stuffed grape leaf.

  SOGHRA ARRANGED THE BAKLAVA INTO tiny diamonds on Darya’s wedding china and made sure the rose-flavored ice cream was topped with threads of saffron. She poured dark chai into small hourglass-shaped glasses. Mina rested her head on her hands at the dining table, inhaling steam from the tea. So far, so good. No Revolutionary Guards, no Saddam. Maybe when dessert was over, they could open the presents.

  Aunt Firoozeh chewed her baklava, looking sideways at Mr. Johnson. Earlier in the kitchen, Mina had heard Aunt Firoozeh say to Darya, “It’s the work of the Brit
s. They have a hand in everything behind the scenes, don’t you know. Just like when they helped the CIA overthrow our only democratic government in 1953. Wouldn’t they love to see this country ruined. So they can have our oil. That’s what they want!” She had waved a cucumber in Darya’s face as she said this. Darya had shooed the cucumber and Aunt Firoozeh’s theory away. “What things you say, Khaleh! Mr. Johnson is our friend!”

  Mr. Johnson was engrossed in a private conversation with Mamani and hadn’t noticed Aunt Firoozeh’s glares. Mamani pretended to smell something in her arthritic hands and Mina heard her say “foody good” in English. Was Mamani trying to convey cumin? Cardamom? Rose petals? Mr. Johnson nodded and then pretended to smell an invisible spice in his own hand with exaggerated delight, raising his eyebrows at Mamani.

  The lovely lesson in mime notwithstanding, Mina felt anxious to get to the presents before it got too late. She tugged on Darya’s blouse. Darya and Leila’s mother were talking in soft voices now, their heads close together, arms touching.

  “The new officials,” Leila’s mother said, “want to pass a law saying female dentists can’t treat men. I can’t treat men and look into their mouths. Why? Because they’ve suddenly deemed it ungodly. Too much closeness between opposite sexes, they say. What, do they think that bleeding gums and teeth turn me on?”

  “They’re sick,” Darya said. “Everything is about sex to these fundamentalists. We have to cover up so they aren’t tempted. In the Shah’s time, just because we wore miniskirts and our heads were free, did everyone go around obsessed with sex?”

  “No,” Leila’s mother said. “Though you have to admit, Darya, our last year in university . . .” She broke off, giggling. “Remember those hikes with Behzad and Bahram?”

  Darya and Leila’s mom burst out laughing over their bowls of ice cream, squealing ridiculously. Mina noticed the tiny creases that formed around their eyes as they squeezed them in pleasure. She suddenly felt an inexplicable anger. Darya and Leila’s mom had worn miniskirts in college during the Shah’s time and hiked in mountains with boys. But for her, all of that was outlawed. Darya’s prophecy had been correct. After much discussion within the government and despite protests by women and some men, mandatory hijab was now law. Mina would never feel the sun on her legs again, never sit next to a boy in class the way her mother had. Her hair would not know the feel of wind or sunshine.

  Mina excused herself and went to the bathroom. She needed to escape from the political arguments and her mother’s squealing laughter. Mina closed the door and climbed onto the edge of the tub to nudge the window open. The cool night air washed over her, smelling of jasmine and dust. Mina could still hear Baba’s music. He had put on Googoosh, the most popular female pop singer, now banned as a voice of sin.

  Mina mouthed the lyrics, then she heard a noise. At first she thought it was a car crash. But then she realized. An explosion. Of course. From the open window, she saw the night sky. Burning orange-yellow. Saddam.

  WHEN MINA WALKED BACK, DARYA was clearing away dessert dishes, still talking to Leila’s mom. Aunt Firoozeh sat at the table, picking her teeth with a folded piece of paper. Leila leaned against the wall, talking with Mr. Johnson. He nibbled the tips of his glasses, then said something that made Leila laugh. In the middle of the room, Hooman and Kayvon practiced karate moves. Baba stood in front of the cassette player, arguing with Uncle Jafar, who kept showing him a tape with the English words “I Will Survive” marked on it in big letters. Uncle Jafar said something about its uplifting message.

  “No, let’s play ‘Dancing Queen,’ ” Baba said holding his own black-market ABBA tape. He pointed to Mina. “See? ‘Dancing Queen.’ ”

  Mina’s brothers pulled her into a group of people who were beginning to dance in the middle of the room. In a few seconds the emergency alarms would go off all over the city, alerting citizens to the bombs falling outside. They would have to drop everything, get in file, and go to the basement for shelter. The presents would have to be opened later, much later.

  But for now, Mina swayed with the guests, dancing to the forbidden music. She threw her head back, pointed a finger in the air, and glided with the group. Uncle Jafar’s song had won. A few guests sang along. I veel survive. From across the room, Mina caught a glimpse of her mother. She was sashaying, her hands pressed onto her hips. A choo-choo train of dancing guests formed behind her. As the emergency bomb alarm sounded from speakers lining the street and drowned out the music, Mina and her brothers joined the queue. Baba brought up the rear of the line. And they all followed Darya, breathless from their disco dancing, as she carefully guided them down the basement steps.

  Chapter Eighteen

  11:17 a.m.

  The next morning, Mamani called to say how glad she was that Mina’s party had gone well. No one hurt or killed or arrested. She told Mina to tell Darya that she’d be over at noon to help with the cleaning up. First, though, she was just going to stop by the greengrocer’s downtown, the one with the best pomegranates, to get some for her little Mina Joon—wait a minute, make that her big ten-year-old Mina Joon! Mina even remembered to tarof, saying things like Oh no, Mamani, don’t go down there just for me, you’ll tire yourself, it’s a long way. But Mamani insisted, and Mina gave in quickly. Okay, thank you, Mamani Joon.

  BABA TOLD DARYA THE NEXT day that the body parts were definitely Mamani’s—he recognized her clothes. Hooman showed the article in the newspaper that noted the bomb was dropped at 11:17 a.m. Audacious time of day for bombs, even for Saddam. Darya left that day’s rice unwashed, uncooked. She didn’t soak anything in saffron. Hooman and Kayvon wept for weeks and stopped karate. They all wore black for forty days. Mina looked around and saw that someone, Saddam, had found a way to shut life completely down. Something had brought unbearable grief. She realized that the something was war. She vowed to stop all wars when she grew up. To make sure another war with Iran never began. She’d always known war brought pain and destruction. She just hadn’t known how much.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Cut Off Their Tails with a Carving Knife

  Bread, cheese, herbs spread! Saddam, why are you so scared?

  Iran’s not going to hurt you bad! It’s only messin’ to make you mad!

  The sweaty palms of the other girls stuck to Mina’s after the seventh time they sang the song and soon it was an exhausting, no longer fun, part of recess. In the late morning, the sun cast an orange-yellow hue. The rays burned into Mina’s headdress. Mina wanted to free a hand so she could scratch her eyes, but the other girls gripped her fingers as they walked in a circle singing the song for the eighth time. Mina’s vote had been for hopscotch, but Bita, in her usual bossy way, had insisted that they sing the Saddam song today. To hex his evil ways. And how could Mina refuse when only a few short weeks ago he had dropped a bomb on the greengrocer’s stall and made her grandmother a statistic. Mina had stepped carefully around the spleens and flattened hearts on the messy road in her dreams a dozen times, trying to identify fragments that belonged to her grandmother. Clearly Saddam had not given one thought to what would happen to her grandmother’s body once he’d dropped the bomb. Mina clutched Bita’s hand tighter.

  After recess was Lessons of Religion. When Mrs. Amiri entered the room, Mina jumped to her feet with the other girls. Just the sight of Mrs. Amiri’s acned chin and sucked-in lips made Mina wish she were far away from school and in her mother’s kitchen sipping sweetened tea. Mrs. Amiri scribbled words on the blackboard, and Mina tried to copy the words neatly into her notebook, but she found herself instead drawing over and over again the slanted boards of the grocer’s stall where her grandmother had shopped. Suddenly Mrs. Amiri was behind her. Mrs. Amiri struck Mina’s elbow and the calligraphy ink jar spilled over, splashing across the notebook.

  “Next time, before you draw, think a little about the consequences,” Mrs. Amiri said.

  Deep black blotches penetrated
a half year’s worth of notes. Mrs. Amiri backed away from Mina’s dripping ink. “And don’t live so much in the universe of trance. Pay attention to this world.”

  Mina tried to mop up the spilled ink with her handkerchief, but there weren’t enough handkerchiefs to blot the mess. Bita leaned over and gave Mina her hanky. And slowly throughout the class, girls began passing their handkerchiefs under the desks toward Mina, hoping to help her blot out the blackness. Soon there was a pile of scrunched-up embroidered handkerchiefs on Mina’s lap, small pieces of cloth that grandmothers had stitched and initialed, tiny sewn-in cherries and roses peeking out from the corners. Mina’s own handkerchief, which Mamani had embroidered with two tiny lemons, was now drenched in black ink. She lifted an arm in the air and cleared her throat.

  Mrs. Amiri stopped scrawling verses on the blackboard.

  “Khanom, excuse me, is there permission to go to the bathroom?”

  Without turning from the board, Mrs. Amiri jerked her head toward the door.

  Her handkerchief scrunched tightly in her hand, Mina got up, careful not to disturb the pile of the other girls’ hankies under her desk. She hadn’t used them because she didn’t want to stain them. She left as quickly as she could without seeming too vulgar (a few weeks ago Mrs. Amiri had told them that girls who walk fast are loose).

  In the bathroom, Mina washed her handkerchief in the sink. She rubbed it hard. Her tears came as they always did these days, almost entirely on their own, as if an infinite supply were stored up inside her. She scrubbed her handkerchief under the faucet, squeezing it and wringing it and rubbing more broken pieces of beige soap onto it. But the handkerchief was still gray. Mina wrung it out, folded it into a triangle and put it in the front pocket of her roopoosh. The two lemons peeked out from the top. Mrs. Amiri’s voice rang in Mina’s head. “A modest girl does nothing to bring attention to herself.” She stuffed the rest of the handkerchief inside her pocket and walked back to the classroom.