The Language of Baklava

by Diana Abu-Jaber

Our regular English teacher, Mrs. Loprienzo, goes on maternity leave, and when the substitute takes over, everything changes. It turns out that Mr. Sims, a man with an innocent, simple-minded expression, has a fondness for modern classics. My English class veers away from studying the ruthlessly dull Leatherstocking tales and begins reading works that were written in the same century in which we were born. Mr. Sims brings in cases of new books, one of which is an anthology with the words Here and Now on the cover. These are full-bodied, difficult, modern works. I want to crawl into these books and live there.

  One afternoon, Mr. Sims brings in an oversize book and reads twenty pages of The Waste Land to us in a theatrical, puffed-up voice, gesturing with one open hand as if to tap the ideas floating around his head. I don’t understand most of what I’m hearing, but I feel it. I’m entranced and distracted by the writings of Sylvia Plath, Ezra Pound, James Joyce, F. Scott Fitzgerald, thrilled by Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, and Edna St. Vincent Millay, startled by John Dos Passos, Flannery O’Connor, and William Carlos Williams. One of the books that most intrigues me is The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, replete with Stein’s descriptions of salons and dinners full of painters and writers. I’ve grown up within the curve of dinner parties; the years of inviting and cooking vibrate behind the pages as I read Stein’s descriptions of a witty, artistic community. What seemed parental and dully natural to me now becomes charged with possibility. I glimpse the electricity of the dinner party, the way that one might join the perfect yet incongruous worlds of eating and thinking, food and art.

  Inspired, I ditto off fragrant blue hand-printed invitations to come to my house and read literary works, to perform and “converse.” Across the bottom I’ve written, “A light French Picnic will be served.” I bestow these invitations upon a selection of friends whom I have deemed sophisticated and urbane enough to invite. This group consists of my three closest girlfriends, Olga, Sonja, and Mahaleani, and the three American boys with long hair in my English class.

  We get to the house before my parents get home from work, so I can sidle my friends in the front door, through the house, and out the back door. We sprawl in the long, blowsy backyard grass, and my sisters watch us from the kitchen window. Suzy opens the back door. “You know that Dad’s going to be home soon,” she says. They don’t know what to make of this. I haven’t told anyone I was planning to do this, so no one has had a chance to tell me not to. Boys have always been forbidden in the house, but nonetheless there we are, sitting together in a circle, reading aloud. I’m hoping that Bud will back down from making a scene in front of a group.

  We sit cross-legged while Jay Franklin strums his yellow guitar. Jay wears his hair in an unbroken oily sheath, propped to one side of the rim of his glasses. He closes his eyes and leans into his song: a quavering plea. The spring sun heats the grass, releasing its sweet, starchy scent. I close my eyes halfway and the light reddens my lashes. It wouldn’t be so hard to imagine myself falling for Jay Franklin. Why not? He isn’t obviously good-looking, but he has wonderful, watery blue eyes and Coke-bottle glasses, and he’s brave enough to sing this awful stuff to us in his feeble, half-shattered voice. I think he must be sensitive and, therefore, completely different from Bud.

  I’m almost sixteen now, and circuits of feeling run through me. What I think I want is love. I want to be in love, to be set loose in a mystery. I lean back into the scent of dandelion dust, the sun-cooked dirt and grass, and Jay’s fragile singing sounds lush and promising. Something in that sound and that sweep and that light is just what I want, and exactly the thing I’m not to have. Boys. Their hands and voices and minds, hidden and uncharted.

  Next comes Jerry Depiza’s reading of a short story that renders in minute, Escher-like detail a scene in which a man bullies his young son into shooting a deer. It’s a drippy yarn, meant to be read through tears, but I’m enchanted. It may be the first story I’ve actually known to exist outside of a classroom. Finally, Martin Chapelle gives an impassioned reading from The Communist Manifesto that I ignore. Olga opts out of the performance; she has already decided that she’s a conceptual artist who will make assemblages out of things like kitchen appliances. And my other two girlfriends shake their heads when I ask them to read. “We’re the audience,” Sonja says. “Somebody has to listen.”

  They look at me expectantly, and I feel the gravity of my hostess-performer role. First I try to bribe the audience by bringing forth the French picnic from a Styrofoam cooler. The menu is inspired by M. F. K. Fisher’s descriptions of meals in the Alps and on the French Riviera, but it is influenced more specifically by the availability of ingredients in upstate New York. The sandwiches are meant to be composed of a little Brie and prosciutto tucked inside buttered baguettes. But the closest I could come to baguettes at a moment’s notice are the spongy loaves in paper bags that the Super Duper Supermarket calls “Italian bread,” the only unsliced bread in the store. The kindly grocer with the bristling eyebrows at the Greek import market downtown unearthed some prosciutto—at stunning expense—but no Brie. He did, however, have fresh wet balls of a white cheese that he advised me to place sliced on the bread with fresh tomato and basil leaves and dark green olive oil, so this is what we do. There is also supposed to be a foie gras pâté and cornichons and whole-grain mustard, but, finding none of these items at the Super Duper, I guiltily substitute chips and French onion dip. Dessert is based on our French teacher’s junior year abroad in Aixen-Provence, when he learned to eat slim black bars of good chocolate upon a baguette. Our version: Hershey’s and more Italian bread.

  IMPROVISATION SANDWICHES

  For when you want them to keep their minds on the art.

  Split open the baguettes with a serrated knife. Spread the insides well with butter. Layer each baguette with prosciutto, and then Brie slices. Top with fresh herbs, if using.

  Serve with a nice, creamy pâté and little cornichons—if you can find them where you live.

  SERVES 6.

  I slip some loose-leaf pages out of a manila envelope. While my audience eats, I read them a story that I’ve been rewriting for years, a seven-page opus about, yes, the man who constructs a pair of getaway wings out of pull-off beer tabs. I don’t know if it’s more frightening to invite a mixed group of boys and girls to the house or to read my work to them. The pages rattle in my fingers, and I can’t seem to remember how to read and breathe at the same time. I am on high alert, prickling with the expectation of Bud bursting out of the back door at any moment and scattering us like wild birds. The boys are oblivious to my state, but my three immigrant-kid girlfriends are also on alert, their gestures crisp and light. I notice Mahaleani eyeing the back door, Olga and Sonja twisting their hair, nipping at their nails. They all know Bud, and they’ve all heard Bud’s speech as well as their own parents’ versions. When I invited my Indian friend, Mahaleani, to my literary salon, she stared at the printed invitation, then looked up and said, “You’re inviting boys?”

  “And girls, too!”

  “To your actual house?”

  “Why not?” I said fake defiantly. I wrapped my arms high around my rib cage.

  “Right, right, why not? Great question,” she said grimly. “Just don’t tell my father, either.”

  I keep reading my story, as if I’m not possessed by hyperconsciousness. I can’t help myself. I take risks—going out with friends, letting my room go to ruin, throwing a literary salon in the backyard. Over and over again, I just let go. What choice do I have? Everything presses down on me—the walls are too close, our house is too crowded. I snarl at everyone in the family, guarding every boundary, half-crazed for privacy and retreat. Because of this, of course, I’m constantly in trouble. Bud grabs his head and rants, beginning with the trauma of his arrival in America and finishing with the trauma of his eldest daughter, her ingratitude, her outrageous rebellion, her basic badness.

  Still, occasionally, miracles happen, small moments of grace where I dive into space and Bud doesn’t notic
e.

  When I finish reading my story, I don’t even say, “the end,” I just start to stuff the papers back into the envelope as if I’m hiding evidence. My friends smile, begin to clap, and then the back door opens. I don’t look up. Bud comes out and sits on the back porch, the wooden boards creaking. “Well, something big is going on here,” he says. “Something, something, something!”

  Everyone glances at me. My lungs ache. What was I thinking? I stare at the pages in my hands, the curled, smudged edges, the hand-printed words and blurring blue lines. I’ve heard this tone of voice before, the careful neutrality as Bud studies the situation. Wind washes through the maples and birches, stirring them around; I cannot imagine that I will not always be here, sitting on the grass under this long scrutiny, waiting.

  The step creaks again as Bud shifts his weight. He says pointedly, “So. Are you studying?”

  Without any prompting from me, in one of those miraculous moments of group telepathy, my friends say, “Yes!”

  “What are you studying?” Bud asks, hope and skepticism in his voice.

  “English literature,” Jerry Depiza volunteers at the same time that Sonja is saying, “Science.”

  “Social studies,” Martin Chapelle adds.

  “We’re talking about applying to law school,” Mahaleani adds. “Or medical.”

  Bud turns his head and looks at me out of the corner of his eye, as if this gives him X-ray vision: I catch my lip in my teeth.

  Then Jay Franklin delicately steers his hair behind one ear with a finger and says, “Diana told us you make your own hummus.” Even the wind hum in the trees stops. He pronounces it the way you pronounce the stuff you put in with potting soil. But the fact that in Syracuse, in 1976, Jay Franklin knows what hummus is at all is like a little star falling down into our backyard. Eventually it will be everywhere, in tiny plastic tubs doctored up with roasted peppers and spinach. But at the moment, nobody knows what hummus is.

  My father’s face becomes tender as he focuses on Jay, and I think this might be the first time he’s ever really looked at a young American male. Or at least the first time he’s ever looked at one without thinking molester or rapist. “You know hummus?” he asks in a low, ardent voice.

  It turns out that Jay’s parents were Peace Corps workers in Turkey. Jay also knows about pita bread, falafel, and “the eggplant stuff.”

  Bud and Jay form an instant food connection. The others lean back while those two hunch forward, chattering. We try to act casual and discuss poetry. But we’re amateurs at high art talk, and Bud and Jay drown us out with their excited discussion of tahini sauce.

  Bud stands abruptly, dusts off his pants, and with no further ado gestures for Jay to follow him up the back steps. The husks of my French picnic—seeded bread crusts, strips of prosciutto—are left to curl up in the sun. I want to call after Jay, tell him he doesn’t have to go! But, like an enchanted child in a German fairy tale, he seems to have forgotten about his past life. Jay actually wants to go in and see the kitchen. The two of them tramp up the steps, and soon we hear the sounds of pots rattling and cupboards opening. The other boys don’t know what to make of this, and we give up on high art and start whispering about whatever the hell might be going on in the kitchen. The guys get bored and decide to bicycle home without their friend Jay, who is now pacing around inside, wearing an apron. I want them to stay longer, but it’s getting near dinnertime and I realize to my horror that my French picnic was not enough food. Everyone is sixteen or so and hungry—appetite has overcome art.

  My girlfriends have a more optimistic view of things. “Your dad actually invited a guy into your house,” Mahaleani says. “That’s a miracle!”

  She’s right. Jay Franklin and Bud are making something in the kitchen, nattering on like old friends. Bud has stolen my boyfriend.

  Jay and my father prepare dinner that evening. They make hummus, rice, olives with chili paste, and a lightly braised chicken with thyme and onions. Jay sits and eats with us, the first nonfamily American boy ever to do so. He and Bud discuss varieties of foods—my father’s love of tagines and couscous, Jay’s recent discovery of mole, their mutual unhappiness with instant rice.

  “This is great chicken, Jay,” I say, trying to reclaim his attention.

  He nods absently and flips back his long shank of hair. “Is sumac a traditional Arabic spice?” he asks Bud.

  “Really, it’s so good!” I crane my face toward Jay.

  He and Bud trade an indulgent, knowing look.

  “Isn’t it funny how people never seem to write about food in novels?” I soldier on, determined to have some art tonight. “In—in —Howards End, for example, they’re always talking about houses and money, but you’d think that nobody ever ate back then or something. . . .”

  My sisters are mute and stupefied, blinking at me as if I’m speaking Swahili. No doubt they wonder if I’ve noticed that there’s this boy in the room. “Of course, now, Hemingway—he’s very good at writing about drinking and parties, of course.”

  Jay looks as though he isn’t sure who I am. I stir tiny meandering paths through my baba ghanouj with the tines of my fork. It seems at that moment that there will never be a way to have both E. M. Forster and baba ghanouj at the same table. Art settles to the floor of my mind like bits of snow in a snow globe.

  But Bud perks up. “That reminds me!” he says brightly. He takes out his special bottle of araq so he and Jay can drink a toast to themselves. “Here’s to cooking lots of nice food with your friends,” my father says.

  “Perfect,” Jay says. They touch glasses. I don’t drink araq myself.

  I see the light of pleasure and acceptance and approval in my father’s eyes, and I realize, with some regret, that I can never have anything to do with Jay Franklin again.

  A PERFECT GLASS OF ARAQ

  For making the perfect toast.

  Place a few pieces of ice in glass. Pour 1 ounce or so of araq over this. Top off with about 2 ounces of water. The drink will turn milky once the water is added.

  A traditional Arabic toast is “Sahtain!” or “Double health!” said to encourage good appetites of all sorts.

  I learn a valuable lesson about strategy from Jay Franklin. At the end of my junior year of high school, I discover a boy named Sam Ralston who is willing to take me to the prom. By this time, I am as anxious to go on a date as some other young people are to lose their virginity. Sam is in my advanced English class, an honors student and hockey star, on his way to Harvard to prepare for medical school. He has a cheery blank stare, the genial mindlessness of one who expects to inherit the earth. Under ordinary circumstances, a “date” like the prom, involving myself alone in a car with a boy, would have been out of the question. But I’d learned from Jay that you just have to ask the right question in the right way. It happens that red-haired, blue-eyed Sam is actually Samer Abdul-Rami. His immigrant grandfather changed the family name to Ralston. Samer is half Lebanese.

  I approach Bud while holding a tray of Arabic coffee and date-stuffed cookies. “So, Daddy, is it okay if Samer Abdul-Rami takes me to the prom?”

  “A what?”

  I repeat the question slowly, carefully vocalizing Sam’s full name with elaborate Middle Eastern calligraphic flourishes.

  Bud’s eyebrows descend, then lift, then descend again. He looks as if he is trying to solve an algebra puzzle. He takes a sip of coffee and scrutinizes the tiny cup as if he’s never seen it before, then asks slowly, “You’re asking—you want—what’s his name?”

  Now I repeat it nonchalantly.

  “Who are his people?”

  “From Lebanon.”

  “And what is his father’s trade?”

  “Electrical engineer.”

  “Christian or Muslim?”

  “Christian.”

  “And his grades are?”

  “Perfect. He’s the class valedictorian. The guidance counselor’s office can confirm that.”

  His eyes narrow, t
hen widen, then narrow. Bud gets on the phone with his second cousin who works as an engineer at the power company. They have a long discussion in Arabic. Somehow they ascertain that Sam’s father works in the same office as one of Bud’s second cousin’s friends’ daughters-in-law and that the report is that he’s “a good guy.” He may also be the nephew of Bud’s aunt’s cousin—a surprise bonus. Bud hangs up. He takes a bite of cookie and looks pensively through our picture window. He sighs. It is a sigh that is deep and blue streaked, reminiscent of late, bright, cedar-scented nights over the fig trees and olive groves. Finally he nods, first to himself, then to the world, and says, “Okay, why not?”

  “STOLEN BOYFRIEND” BABA GHANOUJ

  Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. On an oiled baking pan, roast the eggplant cut side down for 20 minutes, until the eggplant is very soft and tender. Scoop out the pulp. Place in a large bowl and mash with a large fork or spoon.

  In a medium bowl, mix the tahini, olive oil, garlic, lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste, and then add water for creamier consistency. Stir into the mashed eggplant. If a smoother consistency is desired, you can blend the ingredients in a food processor.

  Garnish with tomato slices or sliced cucumber. Serve with a dash of olive oil on warm pita bread.

  SIXTEEN

  Candy and Lebeneh

  When my alarm goes off in the morning, I stare holes through the ceiling, trying to think up reasons why I ought to go to school that day. Maybe it’s turkey chili day in the cafeteria or animal balloon day in art class. I wander zombie style through high school. Each week, my social studies teacher, Mr. Bushnutt, scowls, leans his wide backside against his desk, and spends the period reading us National Enquirer stories about his favorite television stars. I’m in my junior year, but I can’t take it anymore. The beige walls, the scent of linoleum and used lockers, the shrill bell between classes—high school is sucking the air out of me.