How It All Blew Up

by Arvin Ahmadi

  That stupid stereotype kept poking and prodding at my head. Iranian and gay: as incompatible as Amish people and Apple products.

  That’s when I spoke up: “I want to talk about the gay thing.”

  Interrogation Room 38

  Soraya

  I WAS TRYING to sleep when Amir spoke up. Mom was sitting in the aisle seat, Dad was in the middle, and I was over at the end of the row, my head against the window. I was trying to get some rest before my performance, when I heard Amir go, “I want to talk about the gay thing.”

  My eyes shot open. The plane was quiet and the cabin lights were dim.Amir was just standing there, in the aisle by Mom and Dad. He looked so nervous. I couldn’t believe what he was doing. Other people around us were sleeping, too, and my mom asked him to lower his voice.

  Interrogation Room 39

  Afshin Azadi

  IT WAS A surprise. I will admit that. But Amir looked upset, and I told him, “Okay, baba jaan.” That is a term of endearment in our language. He seemed upset, and I thought it might calm him down, and I said, “Okay, we can discuss it later.”

  Interrogation Room 37

  Amir

  I SAID, “NO, not later. Now.” I looked over at my seat across the aisle from them. I didn’t want to sit down. I knew that if I did, the minute I let myself get comfortable again, it would be game over.

  I didn’t want to talk about it later. I knew myself; I knew that I would hide behind later.

  It was like, I don’t know, I was in control and not in control at the same time. Like an invisible hook was pulling me into this new place where I didn’t want to be quiet. Not anymore. Not for one second longer.

  Interrogation Room 38

  Roya Azadi

  IT WAS SO public. People were sleeping. But Amir, he was insistent. His hands were shaking. He was saying, “No, not later. Now.”

  I said, “Amir, please. Sit down and we will talk about this when we are home.”

  Interrogation Room 38

  Soraya

  THAT’S WHEN AMIR said, “The whole reason I left home was because I was afraid to have this conversation. I’m not afraid anymore.”

  Interrogation Room 39

  Afshin Azadi

  THE OTHER PASSENGERS were staring. I wanted my family to be safe, and I knew how it must have looked for us to be raising our voices on an airplane. And so I tried comforting Amir. I tried rubbing his arm—

  Interrogation Room 38

  Roya Azadi

  AMIR KNOCKED HIS arm back.

  Interrogation Room 37

  Amir

  IT WAS A REFLEX, I think. I could tell my dad was just trying to keep the peace, put on a happy face. It didn’t feel genuine.

  Interrogation Room 38

  Roya Azadi

  YOU HAD MENTIONED someone who said they saw my husband and son get “violent” with each other. They were not violent. But it was enough for a woman in the row in front of us, a young white woman in a magenta athletic sweater, to get up and interfere. She got between Amir and my husband.

  Interrogation Room 38

  Soraya

  MY DAD AND that woman got into an argument. She was really pushing his buttons, and I could see he was trying to control his temper. Other people started to turn around and watch.

  At one point my dad said something about Amir I really didn’t like—I’m not going to repeat it—and that was when I got involved. I told Dad if he said that again, I wouldn’t speak to him for the rest of my life. I’m pretty sure he was going to shut up after that, but that was when the flight attendants came and we got in trouble.

  Interrogation Room 39

  Afshin Azadi

  THE WOMAN WAS yelling at me. She was calling me backward. She said some very unkind things about my religion. I tried my best to stay calm, to ask her to please not interfere, because it was a family matter, and we would prefer to deal with our problems in private. But then the woman said—

  Interrogation Room 37

  Amir

  “YOU THINK IT’S a problem that he’s gay?” She yelled this really loudly. Then Soraya started screaming at my dad. I guess maybe she actually believed he had said that, even though he hadn’t. The woman had twisted his words. He definitely didn’t say that. But it was too late.

  Interrogation Room 38

  Roya Azadi

  WHEN I SAW the flight attendants rushing up the aisle, I had a terrible feeling in my throat. I knew that we would not be going home. Afshin had been stopped and interrogated before for much less. His history would not help us. I knew that we would have to explain ourselves in a room like this.

  Today

  THE ROOM WAS cold and sterile, like a doctor’s office. A Customs and Border Protection officer had escorted us past security, past the long lines and luggage carousels, and told us to sit and wait until our names were called. I was surprised to see so many other people in this waiting area: families, solo travelers, even a little boy who seemed to be by himself. Everyone looked nervous. Some of the families were chatting quietly.

  When the officer walked away, Soraya took out her phone and started recording.

  “Soraya, put that away,” my mom said, swatting at her hand.

  “This is unfair,” Soraya said, yanking the phone away. She was recording a video. “What you see here is a Muslim family, being held against their own will—”

  “Soraya!”

  “Ma’am, you must turn off your cell phone in this room,” barked a female officer standing against one of the walls.

  My mom snatched the phone out of Soraya’s hand and put it in her purse. She let out an exhausted sob.

  “This is all my fault,” I whispered. My mouth was dry. “I don’t know what got into me. I just—”

  “Amir, not now,” my mom said.

  Soraya rolled her eyes. “It’s never a good time, is it?”

  “Soraya—”

  “Amir shouldn’t have snapped on the airplane,” Soraya said, cutting my mom off. “That was a mistake. But that was his only mistake. The only one.”

  Soraya glared at my parents. Then she reached over my mom and held my hand.

  We sat there waiting for five, ten, fifteen minutes. My dad and I were sitting on opposite ends, with Soraya and my mom between us.

  At the seventeen-minute mark, the officer announced she was leaving the room and that she’d be back momentarily. When she left, I heard my dad say something in a hushed tone. I thought he was talking to Soraya, but then she tapped my arm and he said it again.

  “Two times two,” he said.

  I couldn’t believe it. Multiplication tables. It’s what we used to do when I was a kid at the doctor’s office.

  I shook my head.

  “Two times two,” he said again.

  “Four.”

  “Three times three.”

  “Nine.”

  But I didn’t want to be that kid anymore. I didn’t want to be my parents’ baby forever, cute and innocent and harmless. I didn’t want to be their toddler, the one who tripped and hiccupped and made everyone laugh.

  I’m eighteen years old now. I’m practically an adult. I love my parents; I realize that now more than ever. I will always love them, and I will always be their son. But I have to be my own person, too.

  “I’m sorry for overreacting on the plane,” I said to my parents. “But I’m not sorry for who I am.”

  I turned to my dad, and while I know he’ll deny it—he was born a Persian man and he will die a Persian man, a descendant of Xerxes and Cyrus the Great and other tough, impenetrable men—I swear, in that moment, tears welled up in his eyes. He bit his lip and sat quiet for a few seconds.

  “Amir,” he said.

  The biggest lump formed in the back of my throat.

  The female officer returned to the room, accompanied by another officer.

  “Mr. Azadi,” she said. My dad’s face became serious again. “Please come with my colleague.”

  My dad got up a
nd left. I heard my mom let out a deep breath, and then a minute later, they called my name, and I went.

  Interrogation Room 37

  Amir

  MAYBE I’M EXPECTING too much, too fast. Maybe it’s a process. Soraya says they’re doing better than most parents in their position. She says, “How many Iranian gay kids do you know whose parents are okay with it?”

  I get what she’s talking about. I get that they’re trying. But I also know they’re struggling, and after the summer that I had in Rome, where I got to be me—all of me—it’s hard for me to accept that it might take a while.

  Interrogation Room 38

  Soraya

  WE CAN LEAVE now?

  I think I get it. I get why my mom talks to you so seriously. You treat her differently. People like my mom have to be extra careful. You gave me that ice cream from the vending machine, and all you gave Mom were judgy looks.

  Yes, I’m tired. Yes, I’m ready to leave. No, it’s not because I miss Amir that much. Not after all the trouble he caused. It’s because I have a dress rehearsal tonight, and there’s no way I’m letting my understudy steal my part.

  I guess I do miss Amir a little.

  I don’t care what my parents say or how long it takes them to accept Amir. I love him. We’re a package deal. Our family isn’t a family without him. I would say we’re even better with him just the way he is. We’re an even better family than we were before. This last month has been hard. The next month will probably be hard, too. But it’s going to be the good kind of hard. The kind of hard that makes us better.

  Now, can we go?

  Interrogation Room 38

  Roya Azadi

  I WOULD LIKE to assure you that everything is fine in my family. My daughter, Soraya, she is a performer. Consider this one of her performances. She has another one coming up, this weekend. She is playing the very old, dramatic cat in Cats. The one with the solo that everyone loves. I think she will do a wonderful job.

  Please, you don’t have to apologize, Officer. Are you a mother? Yes? Then you understand where I am coming from when it comes to my children, my beautiful children, Soraya and Amir.

  A mother’s job is simple: it is to love her children, unconditionally. I am beginning to realize that from the moment my children were born, I have looked at them and loved them with certain conditions in mind.

  It’s time I change the way I look at the people I love. I’ll admit that. It’s time I look at Amir not with the weight of answers, but with the comfort of questions. Perhaps more of us should look at one another in that way.

  A friend of mine with older children likes to say that at the beginning of your children’s lives, you are teaching them. But there comes a point in life when they begin to teach you. I am starting to see that point. The ship is turning around. It will be a stormy ride, but we are going to make it through this journey together. All of us.

  Interrogation Room 37

  Amir

  THAT’S ALL? YOU’RE sure there isn’t anything else you need?

  Thank you for returning my phone, sir. It looks like I have a couple of messages. Oh. A few of them are from Jahan. Voicemail. I don’t think I can listen to these right now. I’ll wait until I’m alone.

  Can I tell you one last thing? One time in Rome, I was supposed to meet Jahan at Piazza Testaccio. Just the two of us. There was a performer in the square that day, a man in a fedora, who was playing pop songs on his violin. Soraya and I used to love listening to this string quartet on YouTube that played pop music, and I just immediately thought of her. This was right after she had told my parents that I was gay, and I knew she still felt awful about it. So I called her. Soraya picked up and said, “How many times can I tell you I’m sorry?” And I said, “Don’t worry about it, just listen.”

  I kept Soraya on the phone for a while. I just wanted to listen with her. Eventually, I saw Jahan approaching, but I kept Soraya on the line until the very last second, when Jahan came up and put his hand on my shoulder and said “ciao.” I hung up the phone a second later. But in that tiny moment, it was like my two worlds had merged.

  That moment tasted sweeter than gelato.

  In a perfect world, I would get two families. My Iranian family and my big, colorful gay one. I would get two communities. Two chances to be myself. My whole self. That should be the only number, the only score I have to keep. Two. It shouldn’t have to look like a scoreboard. It should be simple.

  Please don’t get up, sir. I need more time. I need to put on a happy face before I see my family.

  I need to breathe.

  It is such a privilege, you know? To get to be yourself, all of yourself, in this great big world. To wear it like a tattoo, like all of Jahan’s tattoos: permanent and out there for the whole world to see.

  I’m tired of being quiet about who I am. Iranian people aren’t quiet. We’re storytellers. Jahan says we have a tradition of oral storytelling. That’s what I’ve been doing in here, isn’t it? Telling you my story. I may not be a brave hero like Rostam or a king like Cyrus, but damn it, talking to you today, telling you my story, is the most Iranian thing I’ve ever done.

  I don’t want to hide those parts of myself anymore. I want my family to see me. I want them to see me kissing Jackson in that car, blackmail be damned. I want them to see me riding on Valerio’s motorcycle, dancing late into the night with Jahan and Neil at Rigatteria. I’m proud of that person. That person shouldn’t be a stranger to them.

  It’s hard enough living one life; no one should have to go through the trouble of living two.

  I’m guessing our time here is over, since you keep looking at the door.

  Maybe that’s the magic spell. Time. Maybe real problems aren’t solved in those big fights, those loud moments, but in the time apart.

  No, I don’t need any more time. I’m ready. Let’s go.

  Soraya

  MY PHONE! THANK YOU! Ugh, I have so many texts. Madison really blew up my phone. She’s so needy.

  Hey! Look, Mom, there’s—

  Afshin Azadi

  AMIR!

  Amir

  Maman! Baba! Soraya!

  Jahan

  12:37 P.M.

  CIAO, AMIR! CIAO from Cleveland. How are you? How is Rome? I heard you were going up to Neil and Francesco’s mountain home—Franny was talking about it with someone the other night. Give them a big kiss for me.

  I miss you, too. I love that you texted me that out of the blue. I miss you, and I miss Neil and Francesco, and I miss Rome.

  I wish I’d gotten to say goodbye to you properly at my party the other night. I’m sorry if I seemed sort of cold or awkward. It was really sweet of you to come, and it was really not sweet of me to be in a bad mood. I had my weird reasons at the time. Anyway, it doesn’t matter.

  What matters is that you, sir, were a phenomenal friend this summer. I’ll never forget when I first brought you to that dinner party. You remember? The one where you spilled all the meatballs? After you went to change your shirt, some snide asshole asked if you were going to be a liability, and Neil and I went off on him. A liability? Che cazzo dici? What the fuck? That boy is our friend.

  And then you came back from Giovanni’s room looking all spiffy in that soft blue shirt, and that was it. The rest of our summer was written.

  We did have an incredible summer, didn’t we? Yeah. We did. It was incredible. You were a gift to us this summer, really. Don’t ever forget that. You are a fucking gift. People like you and me don’t hear that enough.

  Listen, I hope things get better with your family, Amir. If you ever want to talk about it, you call me. Seriously. I mean that now. I know family is important, and it’s a process and all that, so I want you to know, I’m here for you, buddy.

  Hey, remember those calculations you were going on about, that morning when I was being an ass? The “scoreboard” you were talking about? Look, you know I’m no math expert. But I can tell you this much: life is not a scoreboard, Amir. It is a big
, beautiful, messy equation. One of those extra-complicated ones even a Nobel Prize–winning mathematician couldn’t crack, let alone your poet friend who nearly flunked algebra.

  One more thing, Amir. When you get back to Rome, I need you to do something. I left my bike parked on the street—by the shop outside my apartment, the one with all the trinkets in the window. That old thing got me everywhere. I bought it on my first day in Rome, and it’s saved me more times than you can imagine. Just find a big pair of scissors, or a chainsaw or something, and cut the chain. It’s yours.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  It’s a strange time to be Muslim in America. But the thing is, it has always been strange for me. My birthday is September 11th. I remember that night after the terrorist attacks, when I turned nine, my parents closed the curtains, and we sang “Happy Birthday” quietly and blew out candles. It wasn’t until years later that I realized the reason we were celebrating so quietly was because my parents didn’t want the neighbours to see the Muslims celebrating on 9/11.

  The icing on the Muslim cake is that I’m also gay. For as long as I can remember, I have felt like a contradiction, coming from a religion and culture that isn’t exactly known for being friendly towards gay people. As a result, I kept those two sides of my identity separate. When I finally came out in college, I told my friends but not my family. I created a wall between the me that existed in New York City, that had boyfriends and danced to Robyn in gay bars, and the me that went home to my Iranian family.