Lion Eyes
Page 4
—Customer review
of Loose Lips on Amazon.com
There was no washing machine in my building, so I had to haul my laundry to the Laundromat several blocks away. I always put off the chore, especially since the Laundromat was cramped, moldy-smelling, overpriced, and always full of cranky old ladies who couldn’t figure out how to use the machines, or loud, rude, Spanish summer exchange students.
I had just put one load into the wash and was sorting another into lights and darks when the last person in the world I wanted to see walked in. Jimmy was wearing a sleeveless ribbed T-shirt that showed off his extremely well-developed biceps, his triceps, his deltoids, his trapezius muscles. Somehow, no matter how he abused himself, he still looked like the agile middleweight boxer he used to be. He should have looked like fifty miles of bad road, all things considered, but even the lines on his face only made him look rugged. I then realized that he was, in fact, the second-to-last person I wanted to see. Right behind him, and clearly with him, was a pair of five-inch stiletto-heeled sandals—gold-lamé sandals with gold-flecked clear platform soles, delicate gold ankle chains, and thin gold toe straps fringed with turquoise medallions and crystal beads, encasing ten perfectly painted, Rioja-red nails on the tips of the slender toes of a tall girl of about twenty in Argentine air-hostess sunglasses.
I was wearing sweatpants and a Morrisville State College T-shirt. Everything else I owned was in the wash.
I looked at Jimmy. He looked at me. “Hi,” he said at last, looking at me a bit as if I were someone whose face he couldn’t quite place.
“Hi, Jimmy. How are you.”
He looked at a loss for words. He attempted to smile; it came off as an unsuccessful smirk. Finally, he said, “Need to do me laundry.”
“Yeah.” My hands were full of dirty running clothes. I couldn’t leave; half my clothes were already in the machine. I took a good long look at the Sandals. She had the same coloring as he did—black hair and olive skin, which on Jimmy, I suppose, was the legacy of the Spanish Armada. His Mediterranean ancestors had evidently had a swell time in Ireland. Together, Jimmy and the girl looked as if they’d walked out of an advertisement for coconut suntan oil. She was a Spanish summer exchange student, from the looks of it. I expect he’d found her on the rue Saint André des Arts, adjacent to the Laundromat. The street was nicknamed Bacterium Alley by the Anglophones because of its many crowded bars, where at night it was easy to pick up not only a summer exchange student but an embarrassing itch.
Jimmy shrugged and went to put change in the soap dispenser. She hopped up on the counter behind him and began swinging her sandals back and forth. “Jee-mee,” she asked, “deed you bring dee theeg-a-rettes? I tink you leeve dem in my bedroom?” Jee-mee reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a packet of tobacco and some rolling papers. She obviously didn’t know him that well, I thought, if she imagined some wild Spanish monkey sex would make Jee-mee, the most committed smoker I’ve ever known, forget his tobacco. He handed the pouch to her. She began rolling a cigarette, delicately licking the rolling paper with the tip of her adorable pink tongue, and he began unpacking her laundry from her little wheeled hamper. That’s when I saw her underwear, which made her sandals look practical by comparison, and that’s when I decided to leave my laundry in the washer to rot. No one needs clean towels that badly.
When I returned to my apartment, I sat down and stared morbidly at the walls for a while. Then I began writing a letter to Samantha. “That must be some nurturing kind of love,” I wrote. “Those sandals. Those fucking sandals. How much more, God, how much more? I want to strangle her with the straps of her sandals and smash his nose with their platform heels.” He had a perfectly straight Roman nose. He was proud of it. Somehow, in all his years as a boxer, it had never been broken. I thought it was high time. “Well at least he’s someone else’s problem now. Just wait until she gets tired of paying for dinner.”
I sent the message off, brooding miserably and contemplating my own unpedicured toes while I waited for Samantha to write back. After an hour, I still hadn’t heard from her. Another message from the Iranian man arrived, however.
“That wasn’t precisely the response I would have expected to a letter about my bereavement,” he wrote, “but I’m certainly glad for the distraction.”
• • •
I’ve sent e-mail before to people for whom it wasn’t intended, and so has everyone else I know. Once, I sent a message to my father complaining about my “bozo editor” to that very bozo editor. Their names were right next to each other in my address book. Needless to say, I never worked for that bozo magazine again. So perhaps it was just an act of carelessness.
Imran, however, thought not.
From: Imran Begum imranbegum@gmail.com
Date: August 26, 2003 06:45 AM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: Re: Ack!
Dear Old Claire,
It is entirely possible that I am mistaken, but that was of course a textbook Freudian slip. By sending an inappropriate, seductive message to this Persian fellow you symbolically betrayed Jimmy as he betrayed you, and drew to yourself the masculine attention you crave to compensate for your feelings of invisibility as a woman. Sending the message “accidentally” spared you the burden of taking conscious responsibility for your inappropriate impulses. Well done!
I would have liked to discuss this with him at greater length, but he was off to Mayfair to go speed dating.
. . . The lady places are sold out so it will be full of them. I’m quite apprehensive. I’m putting myself in the firing line for twenty consecutive rejections, as are they, brave one and all! Have just spent fifty minutes on shaving and shoe shining. Now wearing green cords with turn-ups, green cord waistcoat with lapels, red knotted silk tie, a brushed-cotton tattersall check country shirt with double-button barrel cuffs, and one of my favorite pocket watches, a very rare, late-eighteenth-century continental in a gilt consular case, with two escape wheels of thirty teeth, geared together to act directly on the staff of the balance. My hands are freezing cold. I feel as if I’m facing twenty consecutive medical school interviews. I even dreamt last night that I might puncture one of the tires of my car en route!
Wish me luck,
Immie
• • •
I wished him luck, then went back to Arsalan’s message and read it again.
. . . I would love nothing more than to give your heartbreak the full attention it merits, but I am obliged this evening to entertain twenty Saudis. Would you perhaps know how one prepares a lamb stew without rice or potatoes? I beg your indulgence for such a ridiculous inquiry, but I am rather at my wits’ end.
Yours sincerely and with utmost respect,
Arsalan
Was he making fun of me? I wasn’t sure. I decided to take the question at face value. “Yes, I do know. Why?” I replied.
He didn’t write back immediately, but when I checked my mail the next morning—having been woken up early by a round of hearty salutations among the pétanque-playing workmen on the Place Dauphine—he had replied.
From: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Date: August 27, 2003 08:15 AM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: Re: Re: (No subject)
Dear Claire, if I may take the liberty of addressing you in this familiar fashion, I am obliged to host a banquet for a team of visiting Saudi donors. The event was planned long ago. My mother, in addition to her many other gifts, was an accomplished hostess. She was to have supervised the cooking. Despite her passing, it cannot be canceled. The donors will fly in from Riyadh specially for the ceremony. I have delegated the preparations to the maid and her daughter, but they have not prepared so grand a banquet before, and the Saudis have made a most bizarre request: they wish to be served a meal without bread, potatoes, sweets, or starches. I have no idea why. Do you? With warmest regards, Arsalan
I had no idea why
he was asking me this, but I did happen to know the answer to his question. Evidently Isfahan was the only place on earth where no one had been apprised of the New Atkins Diet Revolution. I entertained myself for a moment by imagining twenty plump turbaned Saudi sheiks in white robes, hungrily eyeing the basket of warm Persian breads, then patting their waistlines and shaking their heads regretfully.
From: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Date: August 27, 2003 08:18 AM
To: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: Re: Re: (No subject)
Please do call me Claire. Are your guests fat? Because I believe they’re on a popular weight-loss diet. Try going to this site: www.lowcarbcooking.org, then do a search under “Persian Cuisine” to see if there are any suitable recipes your maid could prepare. Hope that helps, Claire
Within minutes, he replied.
From: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Date: August 27, 2003 08:22 AM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: (No subject)
Yes, they’re very fat, Claire, like mountains. I took a look at the site you kindly suggested. There are a few Persian recipes, I thank you very much. I think I will discover something suitable there. Do you perhaps know secrets about cats, as well? It is such a small, foolish thing, but at the moment it is the central problem of my life. Wollef behaves in a disturbing way. He follows me everywhere, even to my bath. He cries all night, keeping me awake. I am concerned for him, and for my own sanity if I cannot sleep. What am I to do, I wonder? I hope you do not think less of me for this query. Respectfully Yours, Arsalan.
Think less of him? I knew nothing about him in the first place. But I did know about cats; in fact, I knew more about cats than I did about carbs. My brother and I had rescued three of them once, as orphaned kittens, and raised them with milk from an eyedropper.
From: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Date: August 27, 2003 08:30 AM
To: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: (No subject)
He’s probably very confused and frightened. Cats don’t at all like changes in their environment. You could try feeding him a bit more. You can’t do it all the time or he’ll get fat, but right now he’s stressed, and if you give him a bit more to eat it will reassure him—and tranquilize him, too. Try giving him canned food, if he’s used to dry. He’ll probably gorge himself on it, then sleep for hours. Best, Claire.
PS: Who are you?
His response arrived no more than thirty seconds later.
From: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Date: August 27, 2003 08:31 AM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: (No subject)
Canned cat food? You mean special food for cats? This is Iran, not Los Angeles. They shot the dogs during the Revolution. Cats here eat mice.
He hadn’t fed the poor cat? I pressed Reply:
From: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Date: August 27, 2003 08:38 AM
To: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: (No subject)
Well then! I suspect your new cat is hungry, very hungry. I’m sure your mother fed him. He probably has no idea what to do with a mouse. Tell your maid to mix some fish with a bit of warm milk and cooked rice. Give him as much as he wants. He’ll go right to sleep.
An hour later, he wrote back.
From: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Date: August 27, 2003 09:40 AM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: (No subject)
You were absolutely right, Claire. He is sleeping now very peacefully. Thank you. I feel sadly for the poor creature; it had not occurred to me that he might, like me, not know how to feed himself. So we are both too used to my mother’s cooking, it seems.
I have chosen recipes to prepare, but I am not familiar at all with cooking terms—what is it to julienne? I am not sure how to translate this for the maid?
I offered to help, of course. Would the maid be able to purchase all those low-carbohydrate ingredients? I asked. He replied indignantly:
From: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Date: August 27, 2003 09:42 AM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: (No subject)
Of course! She can get anything at our magnificent market! Cattle, calves, sheep, lambs, ducks, geese, doves, stags, gazelles, everything! Just not pet food.
I took a look at the recipes he’d found, and sent him a grocery list. He translated it, gave it to the maid, and sent her out. Then, hungry myself, I went out for a slice of apple pie and a Coke.
Hours later, Arsalan wrote to say that the maid had acquired the necessary ingredients. Throughout the afternoon, as I sat at my desk trying to work, we exchanged messages. Arsalan translated my instructions, then replied with his maid’s questions; I offered my best culinary hints and a few more veterinary ones as well. After a while I stopped trying to work.
If it seems odd that I spent my day writing to some stranger in Iran, or that he spent his day writing to me, consider this: I was trying to write another novel, and finding it hard going. Arsalan was an archaeologist, I later learned; he was working on a short history of medicine in Mesopotamia. His book was now a year overdue. He had resolved not to return to the field before finishing it, but, as he later wrote to me, he had never much liked the part of his profession that involved sitting indoors day after day in front of a computer. It was the digging he loved, the outdoors, the adventure, the discoveries; writing up the results of his research bored him. When it came to writing he was a terrible procrastinator, he admitted, and I certainly sympathized.
We were not the only ones. Samantha wrote that same day to say that she had just wandered into a Barnes & Noble and surveyed all the books. So many books. So many writers who, unlike her, had finished their books. She’d had to sit down in one of the big comfortable chairs and put her head between her knees for a minute or two. So if we all found ourselves checking our e-mail a bit compulsively, and answering it with especial enthusiasm and diligence, chalk it up to the profession.
Arsalan wrote that the maid had slapped her thighs, crying “Bah! Bah!” in amazement when informed that an American stranger had come to be involved in the preparations for the banquet. I found this just as remarkable as she did. It was a miracle, really, that by means of the Internet I could sit at my desk in Paris and coach an illiterate sixty-five-year-old maid in some batshit-crazy country in the Middle East through the preparation of an eggplant appetizer with yogurt sauce and a lamb-vegetable khoresh—all in real time. I would have loved to know why the Saudis were on the Atkins Diet (or perhaps it was South Beach), but Arsalan was as mystified as I was. One of them, he said, was a diplomat who had spent time in Washington, D.C.; perhaps he had learned about it there.
I asked him again who these Saudis were, exactly, and why he was hosting this dinner, and where had he learned to write such lovely English, but he neglected to answer, though he did tell me that he had fed the cat again, several times.
From: Arsalan arsalan@hotmail.com
Date: August 27, 2003 04:22 PM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: Thank you
Wollef is contented. He eats everything he is served, licks his paws elaborately, cleans his whiskers, thanks me politely, then goes to sleep. I have now to fetch the Saudis at the airport. I thank you deeply for your help; you were my angel today.
After Arsalan left for the airport, I found myself at loose ends. I had no plans for the evening, and so out of idle curiosity began searching through some websites with news from Iran. I was surprised to learn what had been going on in his neighborhood while he and his maid were devoting themselves to the banquet. Students, armed with
assault rifles, had clashed that day with the military in the city of Semiram, near Isfahan. The regime’s militiamen had opened fire on the crowd. A photograph showed a street thick with protesters, their faces covered by bandannas, forming a sea of electrified—and totally insane—black eyes. They were running and choking on tear gas. A police car had been set ablaze. Several people had been killed. My correspondent hadn’t mentioned that, and I wondered if he even knew. Again, I thought how strange the Internet was. It was possible, I supposed, that I was better informed of the happenings near his home that day than he was.
• • •
Unusually, Imran wrote to me from London at one in the morning that night. I was still awake; I had been catching up on Iranian politics.
From: Imran Begum imranbegum@gmail.com
Date: August 28, 2003 01:05 AM
To: Claire Berlinski claire@berlinski.com
Subject: A success!
Dear Old Friend,
It was all much easier than I thought! Lots of pretty girls. Mainly executives, twenty-two in all, open and good at conversing. My first date was named Caitlin. She was quite nervous. I suggested she focus on deep, steady, good breath and be very wary of all teas and coffees. Got to get the basics right before worrying about the unconscious. I knew immediately that I couldn’t feel romantic about her, and thought at first I couldn’t feel sexual toward her, either, but after two minutes I began to feel erotic stirrings. I didn’t want to mislead her; she seemed a very decent person, so I was completely honest with her about feeling nothing romantic but having erotic stirrings. We discussed where we might go with that until the buzzer rang.