by Adib Khorram
The lights in the store turned off, and Mr. Edwards hollered at us that it was time to go.
I kissed Landon one more time, and he gave my butt a quick squeeze before we straightened out our clothes and followed Mr. Edwards out the back door.
* * *
It was an uncomfortable ride home, with my messenger bag slung in front of my lap as I rode the bus.
Dad had some dinner heated up for me, and the tea ready to go. We had a two-parter to watch—“Improbable Cause” and “The Die is Cast”—and it was already late.
But I couldn’t sit still. I kept replaying the night in my head.
“Darius?”
“Yeah?”
“Are you mad at me about something?”
“What? No. Why?”
“You’re so quiet. And your leg is jiggling.”
I stilled my knee and paused the episode. “Sorry. Just, a lot happened at work. Mr. Edwards kind of offered me a job.”
“That’s terrific!” Dad pulled me in to kiss my forehead. “I’m so proud of you. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“I don’t know. It still feels weird. And, well. This other thing happened too.”
“What’s that?”
I almost jiggled my leg again, but stopped myself. “Landon and I are officially boyfriends now.”
Dad leaned back to look me in the eyes.
“How does that make you feel?”
“Happy,” I said. “Really happy.”
“That’s wonderful. You deserve to be happy.”
“Thanks, Dad.”
I hit play, and we finished the episodes, and I kept my hands folded across my lap, because I kept thinking about Landon.
I really needed to go number three.
I usually did it before bed, and sometimes in the mornings, too, after my run. Well, most mornings, if I’m being honest.
Ever since Dr. Howell had changed my prescription, it was like my sex drive had gone from impulse to warp.
I wondered if other guys felt this way.
I wondered if Landon did.
I wondered what it was that made me imagine Landon touching me when I masturbated, but cringe when he reached below my waist in real life.
That’s normal.
Right?
THE TAXONOMY OF BREAKFAST FOODS
Saturday morning, instead of sleeping in, I woke up to the smell of something amazing: cinnamon rolls.
In the taxonomy of breakfast foods, cinnamon rolls are the only food more exalted than bacon.
I grabbed my hoodie off the floor, pulled on yesterday’s joggers, and followed my watering mouth to the kitchen. Cinnamon rolls could only mean one thing: Grandma and Oma were here.
Sure enough, Oma was at the sink, scrubbing out a pan Dad had left soaking overnight, and Grandma was filling the kettle.
I cleared my throat. “Morning.”
Grandma turned around. “Morning, Darius.” Melanie Kellner was tall—nearly six feet—with gray hair cut in a pixie style and sky-blue eyes. She had a pair of clear-framed glasses pushed up onto her forehead, and she pulled them down to study me. “You’ve gotten taller.”
“Maybe.”
Oma peered over her shoulder at me. “And you finally got a haircut.”
I rubbed at the back of my head. “Yeah.”
She turned back to the dishes while I gave her a kiss on the cheek. Oma was taller than Grandma, but only just. She had longer hair, down to her shoulders, and it was a sort of light brown, though there were streaks of gray in it. She had blue eyes too, but they were darker, more like Dad’s. And she had Dad’s Teutonic jaw too.
I kissed Grandma hello and gave her one of those awkward side hugs.
My grandmothers only ever did side hugs.
“You’ve got quite a collection,” Grandma said, inventorying my tea cabinet. It was crammed full of tins and pouches and mason jars. Not to mention the jar of Persian tea we kept on the counter because it was too big to fit in the cabinet.
“What’s new?”
“Here.” I pulled down a mason jar filled with a single-estate Assam. “This is nice and brisk.”
She unscrewed the lid and sniffed. “Mmm. The cinnamon rolls are almost done.”
“Where’s Stephen?” Oma asked. She rinsed off the pot and then pulled the plug to let the sink drain. “And your mom and Laleh?”
“Dad likes to let Mom sleep in on the weekends.”
“Hm.”
But as soon as I said that, Mom stepped into the kitchen, already dressed for work.
I hated when she had to work on weekends.
“Those smell so good,” she said, kissing Grandma and Oma hello. “Save one for me?”
“Of course,” Oma said.
Mom kissed me on the forehead on her way out the door. “Have fun with your grandmothers.”
“I will. Thanks.”
While I made a pot of Assam, Laleh came downstairs, no doubt lured by the same tantalizing scent that had roused me from bed.
“You want to help ice them, Laleh?” Grandma asked. She handed Laleh the little plastic canister of icing.
“Yeah.”
Laleh used a fork to drizzle zigzags of icing over the rolls in their circular pan while I set the table for five.
“Your dad’s not still in bed, is he?” Grandma asked.
“Just taking a shower,” Dad said from the doorway. He was in his blue sweatpants and a gray Kellner & Newton T-shirt, his short hair still damp and messy. He usually kept his blond hair combed and styled with a perfect side-part, but that was before he and Mom were tired all the time.
“Did you leave the fan on?” Oma asked. “We’re going to clean the bathrooms after breakfast.”
“You don’t have to do that, Linda.”
Dad always called Oma by her first name.
“Someone’s got to.”
Dad cleared his throat and rested his hand on my head. “Who’s hungry?”
* * *
After breakfast, I ran upstairs to make sure the bathroom was okay before Grandma or Oma got to it.
I mean, I’d been keeping my bathroom tidy since I was fourteen, when I noticed just how much leg hair I was shedding and felt weird that Mom and Dad had to sweep it up all the time.
And, since I shared the bathroom with Laleh, I was pretty careful not to leave anything awkward in view.
Not that I owned anything that awkward, anyway. Just an open box of condoms with only one missing, because Dad made me practice putting one on a cucumber during one of our talks.
Persians are more likely to have cucumbers around the house than bananas.
There was no way I would use any of them before they expired. I told Dad that. But he said to hold on to them “just in case.” Which is why I had a box of condoms hidden in my nightstand with only one missing.
Okay. Two missing.
I practiced on myself, one time.
“Just in case.”
“Darius?”
I banged my elbow against the counter.
“Ow.” I looked up. “Hey, Laleh.”
“What’re you doing?” she asked.
“Just making sure I . . . um, we had cleaning supplies and stuff. For Oma and Grandma.”
“I think cleaning is their favorite.”
“I guess.” I set the all-purpose cleaner on the counter.
“Are you almost done? I have to pee.”
“Yeah. Sorry.”
“Thanks.”
* * *
After dinner—one of those frozen lasagnas you bake in the oven, a staple of Grandma and Oma’s culinary repertoire—I made a big pot of Dragonwell.
“What’s this?” Oma asked as she sipped.
“Dragonwell. Long Jing. We tasted it yesterday.”<
br />
“It’s lovely.”
“Yeah.”
Grandma poked her head out of the fridge, which she had decided to scour from top to bottom. “Your dad said you got a job.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s great.”
Oma nodded at me, and we sipped our tea in silence.
It wasn’t an Awkward Silence, but it was an uncomfortable one.
Once Melanie or Linda Kellner said what they had to say, that was it.
They were as averse to small talk as Vulcans.
Dad popped his head in from the living room. “Darius. You ready for Star Trek?”
“Yeah. You want a cup?”
He nodded. “Mom? Linda? Want to watch with us?”
“No thanks,” Oma said.
And Grandma had already buried her head back in the fridge.
So I poured Dad’s tea, and topped off my cup, and settled on the couch to watch “Explorers,” this really excellent episode about Captain Sisko and his son, Jake, taking a voyage together in a replica of an old solar-sailing ship.
In the morning, Dad would be taking a voyage without me.
I felt melancholy and unsettled as I sat there with Dad’s arm around me, and I scooted closer to him so I could rest my head against his shoulder, although I had to kind of scoot forward on the couch in order to reach.
Ever since I grew taller than Dad, all my habits had to shift.
It made me melancholy.
And unsettled.
* * *
Sunday morning, the lights were on when I got home from my run. The garage door was up, and Mom’s car was in the driveway with the trunk open. I stopped at the curb to stretch my calves, but Mom looked out the door and waved me in.
“Can you help with your dad’s suitcase?”
“Oh. Sure.” I kicked off my running shoes, wiped my face, and jogged upstairs. Dad was sealing his toiletries in their clear plastic bag when I knocked on the door frame.
“Hey. Can I help?”
“Sure. Give me a second.”
He tossed his brown leather shaving kit into the suitcase—he hadn’t shaved yet, and his golden whiskers caught in the glow of the bathroom lights—and zipped it up.
I reached down for the suitcase, but he stopped me.
“You gonna be okay?”
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s only a month. And you’ll be home weekends. Right?”
“As much as I can.”
“Okay.”
Dad had gone on business trips before, but that was back when he and I didn’t get along, and him being out of town was like a little vacation for both of us.
Now the thought of him being gone for so long made my heart ache.
He pulled me closer, his hand resting on the back of my head where the fade had started to grow from bristly to fuzzy.
It seemed like he held on to me longer than usual.
And I got this feeling, this flutter in my diaphragm. I couldn’t explain it.
When he let me go, I asked, “What about you? Are you gonna be okay?”
“Of course. But I’m going to miss you.”
“We’ll have a lot of Star Trek to catch up on when you get back.”
“You know it.” Dad slung his messenger bag over his shoulder. “Come on. Let’s get these loaded.”
* * *
While Mom took Dad to the airport, Grandma and Oma decided to vacuum the living room.
I helped as best I could, moving the couch and the chairs, until they shooed me out because I was in the way.
So I made a pot of Persian tea instead.
Laleh had a cup, with a leftover cinnamon roll, while I made myself some scrambled eggs.
“Doing okay, Laleh?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you sad about Dad leaving?”
She shrugged. “I guess.”
Laleh wouldn’t look up at me. And I thought again that maybe there was something more bothering her.
Something she still wouldn’t say out loud.
Mom got back a little after nine. By that point Grandma and Oma had moved onto a deep-clean of the kitchen, so I grabbed a cup of tea for Mom before they erected their quarantine field.
“Thank you,” Mom said. “I’m going to call Mamou. You want to say hello?”
My chest tightened.
“Yeah.”
I really did want to talk to Mamou.
But every time we did, I was terrified the news would be bad.
We situated ourselves in the office with the door closed to silence the sound of dishes clattering downstairs. Mom’s nostrils flared every time a particularly loud bang rattled the floor.
After a couple rings, Mamou’s face appeared on the computer screen.
“Eh! Salaam Shirin-jan, chetori toh?”
Mamou and Mom talked for a minute in Farsi, and I listened and smiled. Mamou’s voice was warm and happy, even if her eyes were tired.
“Hi Darioush-jan, how are you doing maman?”
“I’m okay. How are you?”
“You know, I am okay. Keeping busy, all the time. How’s your school? Do you have a girlfriend?”
Mamou asked me that just about every time we talked.
I hadn’t told her about Landon yet.
I hadn’t told her I was gay.
Fariba Bahrami was Iranian, and I knew enough about Iran to know that being gay was a subject of some contention. No one ever really talked about it.
The only reason I told Sohrab was because I told Sohrab everything.
It’s not that I thought Mamou would stop loving me.
Not really.
But I couldn’t shake the fear that maybe, just maybe, she would have a problem with it.
I didn’t think I could take it if Mamou looked at me differently.
I didn’t think my heart could survive that.
Mom shifted. I could feel her eyes on me like a targeting lock.
So I said, “No. Just focusing on school right now.”
And then, to change the subject, I said, “How is Babou?”
Mamou sighed.
Sometimes when we talked to Mamou, she started crying.
It was a terrible thing, to see your grandmother cry. To be separated by miles and borders and sanctions from reaching out and giving her a hug.
But lately she just sighed instead.
“He has not changed much. He doesn’t wake up very often.”
“Oh.”
“He asks about you.”
“He does?”
“You and Laleh.”
I felt my own containment breach coming. I sniffed.
“We’re doing okay, Mamou. Will you tell him? And tell him we love him?”
Mamou smiled at me, but her warm eyes shone, and the corners stayed turned down.
I wiped at the corners of my own eyes with the crook of my finger.
“I will tell him, maman.”
LOLLY
“Laleh,” Mom called. “We’re going to be late!”
I couldn’t hear Laleh’s reply from my bedroom, where I was getting dressed for school, but I could tell it didn’t make Mom very happy, because she called out “Come on!”
Mom had waited to go into the office so she could take Laleh to school—usually it was Dad who did it—but that meant she’d be fighting rush hour to get to work.
I grabbed my stuff and headed downstairs. Laleh was sitting on the little stool by the garage door tying her right shoe through her sniffles.
“Can’t I just stay home?”
My sister’s face was red and tear-streaked.
I must have missed a Laleh-pocalypse while I was in the shower.
“No,” Mom said, stacking plates in the sink. “You better b
e ready when I come back down.”
Mom’s voice was pinched, and her face was a storm cloud.
“Morning, Darius,” she said as she ran back upstairs.
“Hey, Laleh,” I said softly. I knelt down next to her, took her left shoe, and slipped it onto her foot. “What’s up?”
Laleh sniffled but didn’t answer. She watched my hands as I tied her shoe.
“Too tight?”
She shook her head.
I retied her right shoe, then took her hands in mine and bounced them a little.
“Laleh?”
“I just don’t wanna go to school today.”
“Why?”
“I don’t like it.”
I was surprised to hear my sister say that, because she had always enjoyed school before.
Laleh had the gift of being good at taking tests—a genetic trait our parents had failed to pass on to me—and always got gold stars on her assignments. Her teachers and classmates liked her too.
I pulled my sleeve down over my palm and brushed away Laleh’s tears.
Maybe this was why she’d been so quiet lately.
“How come?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did your teacher do something?”
She shrugged.
“Did one of your classmates?”
She shrugged again, but then nodded.
“Want to tell me?”
Laleh looked up at me and then back down at her shoes. “Micah and Emily won’t talk to me anymore.”
“Why? What happened?”
“I don’t know.” Laleh’s voice cracked. “They keep calling me Lolly.”
That was preposterous. Micah and Emily had been Laleh’s friends since first grade. They knew how to pronounce her name correctly.
“That’s rude.” I frowned. “Why are they doing that?”
“It started ever since we went to Iran.”
“Oh.”
After our trip to Iran, I had to deal with my fair share of ostracism and rumor mongering. (Trent Bolger even tried to start a rumor that I had joined ISIS.) But I hated that it was happening to my sister.
No matter how old you are, it’s never good to remind your classmates that you’re different.