Veil of Roses

by Laura Fitzgerald

  “What’s he like, this man at the party? What’s his name?”

  “Mohammed Behruzi.”

  “His family is from where?”

  “Tabriz. But they’ve been here forever.”

  “You know them how?”

  “Ardishir knows his mother from having performed surgery on her knee.”

  “He is how old?”

  “Thirty-eight, I think.”

  That’s old. Not in terms of the age difference in a typical Iranian marriage, but in terms of how much more life than me he’s gotten to live before having to think about marriage. He got to go to college, establish a career, perhaps travel to foreign lands. I smother the flame of envy that rises in my chest when I think this thought.

  “Here it is,” Maryam says as we make our last turn onto a street called Calle Splendida. She slows the car.

  “This is your house?”

  Maryam nods proudly. I am in total awe, total shock. It is very beautiful, very rich. And very open. Spotlights show off the house’s design, which Maryam has told me is plantation style. There are balconies and shutters, green grass and a tall wrought-iron fence surrounding the property. But still, anyone can see in. And it is clear there is a party going on. The curtains are not drawn, and I can see men and women mingling. I can hear the sound of Googoosh’s voice all the way to the street.

  “If the police drove by right now,” I ask, my heart racing, “what would they do?”

  “Nothing, Tami. There’s nothing wrong with this. It’s only a party.”

  Only a party. How many times I have said this back home. Twice, I attended parties that were raided. Twice, my friends and I were hauled to the police station and harassed for being with men who weren’t our husbands and for not being veiled in their presence. Leila even spent two nights in jail. Never mind that we were behind high walls, behind closed doors, and behind drawn curtains.

  And this…America. Can it really be so open? Everything feels surreal, most especially the fact that I am here at all. That this house, this open life, is in front of me. That I am soon to walk inside, and it will, for a time, become my home, too.

  Maryam parks on the street. I get out and stand on the sidewalk, not taking my eyes off the house, off the obvious celebration inside, for even one instant. She opens the gate, and we step onto the path leading to the house.

  “Everyone will be so glad to see you,” she tells me. “I know Mohammed will like you. I just know it.”

  The sound of the jet engines that have been roaring in my ears finally begins to fade. All I hear are the sounds of the misters watering the lawn. I hate the thought of going inside to a loud, crazy Persian party.

  “Can we wait a minute, please? I just need to get my bearings first.” I bend down and unhook one sandal strap, then tentatively reach my bare foot toward the grass. I squeal as the night mist tickles my toes. I think, So this is what bare feet on wet grass feels like. Surely, when we lived in Berkeley I would have run about barefoot, so I must have felt this before. But I was too young to have captured the memory.

  But coming back from America, Maryam would have remembered. She was very young—still a girl—at the time. No wonder she left again at the first opportunity. She remembered, and I did not.

  I look at her spotlighted house. I look at the people dancing on the other side of the windows, those festive Persians, with their lack of fear, with their arms in the air, weaving their hands to the beat. All the might I’s, the can I’s, the will I be able to’s—I look at the spotlighted house and I look at the people inside and I know that the answer to all of my half-formed questions, my half-formed desires is yes, I might. I can. I will be able to.

  “Feels good, doesn’t it, Tami Joon?” I look over at Maryam. She shows by her smile that she understands what life must have been like for me these past years. The repression, the shrinking world, but mostly the loneliness. I nod through the tears that have filled my eyes.

  She knows what I have been through. She knows me.

  “Shh, shh, shh,” she calms me, and gives me a quick, energetic hug. “Let’s go. None of this. Are you ready to meet everyone?”

  I take a deep breath and nod.

  “Are you scared?”

  “A little.”

  “Just smile a lot, that’s all you have to do. Here.” She slicks one last layer of lipstick over my lips. “Everybody’s really nice. And you look beautiful. Mohammed’s going to love you. And if he doesn’t, he’s a fool.”

  “Keep your shoes on for a little while,” Maryam whispers to me after we slip inside. “Just stand here. I want Mohammed to see you in them.”

  So I stand there feeling foolish for several minutes. First I am greeted by Ardishir, who comes to me and kisses me on both cheeks. He has always been so kind, has always treated me as a younger sister from the moment he began courting Maryam. “I see Maryam has worked her magic.” He grins. “You look very nice.”

  “Thank you,” I reply. “I am not used to dressing like this in public. It feels very strange.”

  “You’re safe here,” he assures me and extends his arm. “Come on in, I’ll introduce you around.”

  He wears only socks on his feet, and I can tell from the rows of shoes neatly lined up in the foyer that everyone else is shoeless, too, as is custom.

  “I can’t. Maryam says I must wait here for Mohammed so he can see me in my fancy shoes.”

  Ardishir shakes his head at my sister and smiles. “I’ll go find him, then.”

  Maryam and I continue to stand at the doorway, and I can see from the gold-edged mirror that the other guests are sneaking glimpses of me. I smile and try not to look scared.

  At last, Ardishir and Mohammed come to the doorway. I size up Mohammed with my eyes, and I see him give me a quick up-and-down of my face, dress, and feet. He does not look too intently, and neither does he look impressed. When he sticks out his hand for me to shake, I stand still and feel my face redden. This is not considered polite. This is not how it is done in Iran, for him to offer his hand first. As the moment becomes unbearably awkward, Maryam nudges me.

  “It’s okay, Tami,” she says in a light tone and nods toward his hand. I shake it tentatively and want very much to pull away from its frail delicacy. “She’s just off the plane, you know,” she tells Mohammed. “She’s still used to how things are done in Iran.”

  It looks to me like Mohammed hides a sneer under his polite, apologetic expression as he replies, “She dresses so American that I suppose I thought she’d act like one, too.”

  I know then that I do not like him. I know I will not marry him, and I know this night will be interminably long.

  Finally, I am allowed to take off my shoes and enter the house. It reminds me of an opulent home in Iran, like those belonging to older men who were in positions of importance with the Shah’s government. All the walls are white, mostly bare except for the occasional rug displayed. Gold-plated fruit dishes adorn the tables, with grapes and apricots and dates piled high. Persian rugs of high thread counts are draped across every available spot in the ample living room. There is a huge television in the room, larger than any I’ve seen in my whole life, and Maryam points out that we are watching an Iranian television station beamed in over satellite from Los Angeles, where half a million Iranians live and they call it Tehrangeles.

  I am much more interested in the music playing on the stereo. It is Siavesh, the biggest music star in Iran for young people, but because his music is banned there, you can only buy it on the black market. I am tempted for a moment to cry when I think back to how many nights Leila and Minu and I watched his bootleg concert video while dreaming of life in America, where girls are permitted to go to concerts and weep with joy and longing for their favorite heartthrobs, who sing to them of love. Em-rika, good. Very good. That’s how we said it.

  And yet here I am, feeling strangely let down. I hadn’t expected that America would be so…so Iranian.

  My sister takes me around to ev
eryone at the party and introduces me. I smile until the muscles in my face hurt. They all ask what I think of America. It’s good. All good, I assure them. What more can I say? I’ve gone from an empty airport to an empty road in the middle of the night to a house full of Persians who are related to an unfriendly dentist who seems not to approve of me, when all I really want to do is sleep. I know this is not a polite way to think, but it is what I think nonetheless.

  “This is Mrs. Behruzi, Mohammed’s mother,” my sister says as she leads me to a larger-size woman with sharp brown eyes. Mrs. Behruzi reaches for my hand and encircles it with both of hers. “You are a lovely girl,” she says. I thank her. “Your parents, they must be proud of you to come so far.”

  “Yes,” I agree. “They want for me a better life than I could have in Iran.”

  She questions me about my education, about the friends I have left behind, and about the northern Tehran neighborhood where I was raised. I can see she likes me just fine.

  “My son would do well to marry a nice girl like you,” she tells me. Then she calls to him across the room, “Mohammed!” His smile is fixed as he makes his way over to us.

  In a country where women can show none of their curves and must always cover their hair, there is only one way to show sex appeal, and it is all in the eyes. When Mohammed approaches, I lower my head and present myself as shy, almost too shy to make eye contact. But then I raise my eyes to meet his with a slightly teasing tilt of my head and a tiny smile I seem unable to hide. There is, contained within the glance, an undertone of both submission and sexuality. It is a look Iranian mothers have helped their daughters perfect over the last two decades.

  Mohammed’s eye twitches when he notices what I am doing. His facial muscles are tight.

  “Tamila is the nicest girl,” his mother tells him. “Talk with her. Get to know her. You two have a seat on the couch. Go ahead.” She waves us away.

  Sweat explodes under my arms as I walk ahead of Mohammed to the couch. He seats himself two cushions away. From the corner of my eye, I see that we are the focus of everyone’s attention, although they pretend to ignore us.

  “So, did you have a nice trip?”

  I nod and smile. “Very nice, thank you.”

  “Good food on the plane?”

  “Yes, very good.”

  “What did my mother tell you about me?” he asks bluntly.

  I swallow. “That you are a good son.” She has not even said this. I realize she has said absolutely nothing about him.

  “Has she told you I live with my girlfriend, who she refuses to meet because she’s not Persian?”

  Mohammed’s eyes are sharp. Not unkind, I notice. Just resolved.

  “No.” I want to cry, I am so humiliated. “I did not know this. I am sorry for any problems this meeting has caused you.”

  “It hasn’t caused any problems,” he assures me. “I know a good Iranian son is supposed to marry a good Persian woman, and bonus points to him if he helps her move to America. But it’s not going to happen with me. If I get married, it’ll be to Shelly.”

  My heart sinks. Not for me, but for him to be placed in such a horrible position. “I understand. I am very happy for you to have found someone you care for.”

  “Thank you.” He is more relaxed now that he has made his intentions, or lack of them, clear to me. “Can I get you anything to eat?”

  “No, thank you.” All I want to do is slink away and cry. What a bad idea this party was.

  “Come on,” he urges me. “It will make my mother happy to see us talking together like friends. I will tell her later that I am engaged to Shelly and not to bother with these silly meetings anymore. I’ll be right back.”

  Mrs. Behruzi gives me a broad smile from across the room. She is a nice woman. I would like a mother-in-law like her. I feel disappointed for her, and for letting down Maryam. I mentally calculate: eighty-eight days left to find a husband. I can only hope I will not have eighty-eight more meetings such as this.

  Mohammed brings me a plate of fruit and nuts. He hands it to me, sits back down, and begins eating his own. I murmur my thanks and nibble on a dried apricot. At least my nerves have calmed now that the pressure to impress him is off.

  “Can I offer you some advice?” he asks.

  “Of course.” I am eager for any advice that will help me find a husband and stay in America.

  “The Iranians most likely to marry you are going to be the traditional, religious ones. So you shouldn’t dress like that.” He gestures with his eyes to my low-cut crimson dress.

  I feel my face redden. “But I am not so religious.”

  “Obviously,” he says. Again, I detect that sneer just beneath his smile.

  “I didn’t come all this way to wear a chador.” Of that I am certain.

  He sees he has offended me and he raises his palms in defense. “I’m just saying, it’s something to think about. If a Persian guy with citizenship wants an arranged marriage, it’s because he can’t find someone here who’ll go along with his traditional ways. Think about it. If he wants someone modern, he can find that here with an American girl who has none of the hang-ups Persian women do.”

  “I see.” I let the edge come through in my voice. I place my plate on the coffee table in front of me and stand. “Thank you for your advice. Please excuse me. I must splash some water on my face. I am so very tired from my flight.”

  I pass Maryam on the way to the bathroom. She tugs at my arm. “Well? How’s it going?”

  “He’s engaged to an American girl, that’s how it’s going. His mother is acting on her wishes, not his. Maryam, didn’t you know this? I feel so foolish!”

  She pulls me in and hugs me. “I’m sorry, Tami. I didn’t know.”

  “And he told me I have hang-ups.”

  “What?” She is incredulous. “No, you don’t!”

  “Maybe I do,” I tell her wearily.

  She purses her lips at me. I know how important it is to my sister that I believe myself worthy of finding a husband in the next eighty-eight days. And I do. Rather, I will. And maybe I will even convince myself that I want one. But not tonight.

  “I’m having a hard time keeping my eyes open,” I tell her. “Would it be all right for me to rest for a minute in my room?” It is past one o’clock here and I am too tired to calculate what time it is in my native time zone. But knowing Persians, the night is still young and this party has hours to go.

  “This party is in your honor.” Her voice is firm and her smile fixed. “Why don’t you freshen up? Then we’ll find some more people to talk to. Maybe someone knows of another man who is interested in marriage.”

  Yet when I look in the bathroom mirror at my rubbery, made-up face, with my curls drooping, I don’t want to go back out there. You shouldn’t dress like that. The dentist’s words burn in my ears. Persian women have hang-ups. I cannot, will not, face anyone else judging me on my first night in America. This is supposed to be a happy night, a night of hope. I cross my arms and turn away from the mirror. I take in the opulent bathroom around me. I look longingly at the deep claw-foot bathtub against the far wall. I want to lay myself down into it, curl myself into its deep curves. I have to, for just one minute or maybe two. Just until I am ready to face them all again. I gather the plush towels from the towel racks and spread them on the bottom of the bathtub.

  I hold up my dress to climb in, and then sink to rest my head on a rolled-up towel. I cannot suppress a sigh of relief. This is good, very good. I close my eyes; I cannot fight it.

  As I fade off, my slumber is invaded by strange, swirly dreams unlike any I have had before. I dream of low-cut dresses and boob jobs and sneering dentists.

  Those are the bad parts of my dream. I also dream of tongues, of men and their tongues. And those parts of my dream are not so bad. But they are very confusing to me.

  The dentist is the one who finds me in the bathtub. After I am gone awhile, my sister tries the bathroom door, only to find it lo
cked from the inside. Sound asleep, I do not hear her pleas to open the door. Mohammed comes up behind her in the hallway, realizes what has happened, and uses a paper clip to pick the lock. He opens it to find me unconscious in the bathtub.

  I am drooling. And snoring.

  And my panties are showing.

  They are Persian panties, mind you—big, white, all-cotton briefs with a little blue bow in front. Matronly, is how Maryam describes them. When they are unable to rouse me, the dentist and Ardishir haul me to a futon in a nearby guest room. The party continues without me until shortly before dawn.

  “You need new underwear,” Maryam informs me the next day as I sink my head in horror as she tells me what happened. It is after noon, and we are only now beginning our day.

  “I just got new underwear.”

  We are at the kitchen table having tea and fruit and Sholeh-zard, exquisite rice pudding made with saffron, which was left over from last night’s party. Ardishir raises his newspaper to hide his smile.

  “You can’t wear underwear like that and expect to find a husband,” Maryam insists.

  “It’s not like anyone’s going to see my underwear until after I’m married.”

  “Mohammed did last night,” Ardishir points out.

  “Mohammed probably thought they were too sexy for me to attract a good husband,” I grumble.

  “Hardly,” scoffs Maryam. “Those are the least sexy panties I’ve seen.”

  I tell them what Mohammed said about me, about my chances of finding a man to marry dressed like I was last night.

  “He’s crazy!” Maryam waves her bright red nail-polished fingers in the air in indignation. “You looked great. Ardishir, don’t you think he’s crazy?”

  “Yes, dear,” he says to her over his newspaper and winks at me.

  “Mohammed doesn’t respect his parents, that was clear,” Maryam declares. “He should marry a Persian girl. That’s really the best way. The right way.”