Together Tea

by Marjan Kamali

  “Going to change!” she sang out. “Back in a sec!”

  Because Darya was absolutely relentless in her tarof and would not take no for an answer, and because Mina pretended that she too really wanted to cook right then and there, Suri had no choice but to let them into the kitchen. Ceramic roosters stared at them from the kitchen shelves. On the glistening granite counter, they helped Suri put together a lentil, mint, and beet salad. Suri plucked leaves from the stems of washed mint, Darya chopped the mint into perfect pieces and added olive oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, and turmeric to Suri’s cooked lentils. Mina chopped cooked beets into uneven clumps, the swirls on the pads of her fingers staining red.

  A little bell sounded.

  “That’s my oven!” Suri pulled out a baking sheet filled with little sausages wrapped in dough.

  “Oh!” Mina said. “Pigs in a blanket!”

  Suri looked confused.

  “Oh, that’s just what they call it in the U.S.,” Darya explained and gave Mina a look that said: There are no pigs in Iran.

  “Oh, it’s not actually pork, of course,” Suri said. “It’s beef. But it’s quite good.”

  Mina only knew pork from going out with friends. Darya never served it. She made the kids order sweet-and-sour chicken in Chinese restaurants, never pork. Bologna sandwiches, if they ever had them at all, were beef bologna. The Jewish brands were Darya’s favorites because “they are the closest to who we are.” The Persians and the Jews go way back, Baba would always say. Don’t fall for this current political rhetoric. Heck, most of us WERE Jews and Zoroastrians before the Arabs invaded!

  “Don’t work too hard, Mina Joon.” Bita waltzed back into the kitchen wearing blue jeans and a sports bra.

  “Oh, it’s fine, it’s no problem,” Mina said. Mina had grown up in America while Bita had spent her adolescence in Iran shivering in basement shelters during the war, covering her hair with a headdress every day, and yet, in her presence, Mina felt like a dutiful, matronly lady servant. She felt suddenly very old-fashioned in her long, flowing, flowery dress that seemed Little House on the Prairie–ish next to Bita’s casual wear.

  Bita caught Mina looking at her outfit. “Don’t worry, I’m going to change right before the party. I won’t open the door with my bra on!” She bit into a non–pig in a blanket. “I wish it were real pork,” she said. “I never had real pork till after the revolution, and then they said we couldn’t have it. Now I eat it whenever I can. I like my pork roasted and spiced with chili flakes. I like it diced and salted. I like it on Thursday nights and on Friday mornings for breakfast.” She grinned. “I loooove sausages!”

  Suri stopped plucking. Darya stopped chopping. Mina looked at her beet-stained hands.

  “Thank you, Bita, for sharing. Now grab a board and chop some onions,” Suri said. “I’ve heard enough about your love of . . . sausages.”

  Bita grabbed an onion and brought a knife down on it, hard. Mina mixed the beets into the salad.

  “May this regime rot in hell!” Bita sang out and grabbed another non-pig, then swayed her booty in time with the onion chopping.

  Suri, Darya, and Mina looked at one another and could do nothing but laugh. You couldn’t stop Bita from being Bita.

  JUST BEFORE 11:00 P.M., DARYA left with Suri so “you kids can have your space.” Suri had arranged the food carefully on the tables and conveniently left the key to the liquor cabinet on the dining room table. Mina wondered if Darya would have gone to so much trouble for a party of Mina’s in the States. But then, Mina didn’t have too many parties. Baba and Darya were always worried about the possibility of drugs or alcohol being brought to their house. It was enough that their children lived in such a permissive culture. Baba and Darya erected boundaries wherever possible in order to maintain “decency.” But in Bita’s case, the opposite was happening. Her parents were going out of their way to help with her party and to ensure a good time for all. It was precisely because they lived in such a repressive country, with so much emphasis on the laws of “decency” that Suri compensated by giving her daughter free rein within the confines of their home.

  Then the guests arrived. They came in couples, groups, some with their arms interlaced. They were all attractive and much hipper than Mina had expected. They had come for a good time, and at Bita’s house, they knew they would have one. One girl pulled off her headscarf to reveal dozens of long thin braids glittering with beads. She came with a tall, green-eyed twentysomething man with a goatee. When the girl unbuttoned her roopoosh, Mina suppressed a gasp. She was wearing tight leather pants with a silver, shimmery, barely-there tube top. Her bare midriff showed off six-pack abs and a silver belly ring.

  “You must be Mina. Bita has told me so much about you! You live in New York! I love New York!” the girl in braids said.

  “If I can make it there, I can make it anywhere!” The green-eyed man in the goatee tipped an imaginary hat.

  At that moment, Bita walked in—wearing a strapless black minidress with perfume and teased hair. She kicked up her legs, open-toed silver high heels piercing the air. “Da da da da dum, da da da da dum! It’s up to you, New York, Neeewwww Yawk!” She grabbed the girl with braids and the man with the goatee and they joined her in an impromptu cancan. Soon the three of them fell over into a messy pile on the floor, arms and legs and spiky heels everywhere. They untangled from one another in a fit of giggles. When the man straightened up, he looked at Mina. Even though he was still laughing a bit, his eyes seemed sad. He pulled at his goatee. “Well, welcome,” he said to Mina. “Welcome to Iran.”

  Bita untangled her arms from her friend’s. “Mina, this is Lilly.” She pointed to the girl with the braids and the belly ring. “And this,” she said as she poked the man with the goatee in the stomach, “is her boyfriend, Massoud.”

  “I’m very happy,” Mina said. “I’m very happy . . .” She faltered, not sure how to go on in formal Farsi. “I’m lucky to meet you,” she said, trying to use the correct, polite formalities.

  Massoud and Lilly looked puzzled and exchanged a glance with Bita.

  “Oh, don’t be so official and old-fashioned!” Bita said. “Come on, it’s the nineties!”

  They all laughed. Mina laughed too, but nervously.

  “Do you think the guards are patrolling around here tonight?” Massoud pulled at his goatee, surveying the windows.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of them,” Bita said.

  Lilly high-fived her. “Hey, do you have Tupac’s latest CD?”

  “You bet. I’m not just going to play Madonna! You guys want some wine? Gin and tonics?”

  Once they got their drinks, Massoud, Lilly, and Bita talked about music. Mina stood close and tried to join in, but she had nothing to say. She kept thinking about how Bita had introduced Massoud. Lilly’s “boyfriend.” Just like that. She thought boyfriends weren’t allowed. Baba and Darya always said Persian girls didn’t do the boyfriend thing. Thou shalt study and work hard and get straight As, and then, once thou hast achieved thy college degree, thou shalt marry a Persian man who has a secure, respectable position in life, and thou shalt have babies and take care of thy husband, home, children, and career. Baba and Darya’s code of conduct seemed startlingly old-fashioned here. Mina felt ridiculous in her long floral dress. She felt like a nerd crashing the cool people’s party.

  Lilly and Massoud were kissing now. Mina awkwardly backed away from them toward the food.

  “Oh, those two!” Bita shrugged. “Lovebirds! In their own nest of bliss. You know what I mean?”

  “Yuppo,” Mina said. She had a flashback of Mr. Dashti sipping tea at her parents’ house in Queens.

  THE GUESTS DANCED. THEY SWAYED to the rock and roll and sang the lyrics of the American Top 40. They were shocked that Mina didn’t know all the lyrics. “But don’t you live there?” they asked with baffled looks. “Wouldn’t you listen to
the Top 40 every day if you actually lived in America?” Mina shook her head. No, you wouldn’t. Not necessarily. It’s not like that. It’s not like that over there.

  Most of the guests were couples. Dating. Going steady. A few were single, like Bita, who had recently broken up with a man she only referred to as Silly Sassan.

  Bita introduced Mina to a tall thin girl who looked like a model and used to be Massoud’s old neighbor. She was now engaged to Lilly’s second cousin. Mina nodded and smiled and tried to say the right things in Farsi. A pattern soon emerged. Upon hearing that she was Bita’s old friend from the States, the guests’ initial reaction was one of excitement and curiosity. But then, after a few moments of small talk, it became clear to the guests that Mina was a bit square. After a period of polite exchange, the guests inevitably tuned out and walked off, uninterested. The men’s eyes would begin to roam, and the girls would look bored and move on. And soon, Mina stood alone by the food table, watching everyone dance.

  “I know you know this song!” Bita yelled at Mina from the dance floor. “Come on!”

  Mina walked over to her awkwardly. Bita grabbed her hand.

  “I guess I just don’t keep up with the top hits,” Mina said, doing something in between a bounce and a prayer movement, trying to mirror Bita, but feeling utterly out of step.

  Bita swayed her hips seductively. “You don’t get out much, do you?”

  “I’m usually . . . busy,” Mina mumbled. “It’s not like everyone in the States just parties.”

  Bita thumped her body to the beat. “If I were there,” she said, panting, “I’d enjoy every single freedom-dripping moment.”

  A short chubby girl in a green leather dress started to dance wildly and soon a group of other dancing guests formed a circle around her. Bodies twisted, stretched, shrank. The guests made themselves into tight balls, lowered themselves to the floor, rose up again, jumped to the beat. They thumped and bounced, lost in the flow. Dirty dancing took over. Mina tried to keep up. Everyone around her knew the moves. The forces outside the apartment were being exorcised. They were sticking it to the Revolutionary Guards. Freedom was available, in short spurts, indoors. A fugitive dance.

  The group grooved and thumped, closing in on Mina. The air was sexually charged. Mina began to nudge her way through the sweaty bodies. After pushing her way past elbows and flung arms and moving bottoms, she finally slid out of the cluster of dancers. She scurried to the wall, back near the table of food. It was too loud. It was too much. She was worried that a guard might burst in. She needed water. She went to the kitchen, the music pounding in her ears, black spots appearing in front of her eyes.

  MINA FELT RELIEF ONCE INSIDE the oasis of Suri’s well-lit kitchen, with its granite countertops and ceramic roosters. The swinging door closed behind her, and she leaned against it, closing her eyes as the sound of the blasting music diminished slightly. She took a deep breath.

  Suddenly, she was flung across the room. She barely caught onto the counter’s edge and tried to balance herself. Her flowery dress had ridden up her legs. Dizzy, Mina put her hand to her forehead to shield her eyes from the fluorescent kitchen lights. She tried to make out the figure standing in the door.

  “Are you okay?” a man said.

  Mina faltered for a moment and just stared. The man wore a blue dress shirt and khaki slacks. His dark hair was cropped short. He looked vaguely familiar, but she didn’t know why. This man was the only other person here who wasn’t dressed for a glitzy nightclub. He looked more Friday business casual. And he had spoken in English, with an American accent.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said, coming closer. “I didn’t know anyone was behind the door. Are you—” He looked at the long flowing dress tangled between her thighs, and then again at her face. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes, yes, of course.” Mina felt her face redden. She gripped the hem of her grandma dress and tried to tug it back down, but it was badly tangled and she had to pull hard. “I’m just fine,” she said, trying to look cool and composed as her dress finally fell into place. She looked up. He had a clean-shaven face and huge brown eyes.

  “Good. I’m so sorry.”

  Mina stood extra tall to show him she was just fine. Even with the black spots still dancing in front of her eyes, she could see how handsome he was.

  He pulled up one of the kitchen stools for her and held out his arm. Mina scooped up her long dress and hesitated, but then climbed up on the stool clumsily, holding on to him. He sat on a stool next to her.

  “You must be Mina,” he said, smiling. He had perfect teeth.

  “How do you know my name?”

  “Bita told me that her old friend was visiting from the States.” He smiled at her long puffy dress, gathered near her knees. “That would be you, no?”

  “Yes.”

  The ceramic roosters in Suri’s kitchen looked at them. Muffled beats from outside the kitchen thumped away.

  “And, um, where are you from?” She cursed at herself for asking a stupid question. Of course he was Iranian. She could tell from looking at him. But the perfect English. The lack of an accent.

  “Connecticut,” he said.

  Just the word Connecticut made Mina suddenly homesick for the States. Clean grass, mochaccinos, and newspapers in English. Normality. As opposed to this strange mix of Hollywood/Soho nightlife in the midst of Islamic fundamentalism.

  “I’m Ramin, by the way,” he said. “Pleased to meet you.”

  “Pleased to meet you too,” Mina said. When she spoke to him, it felt as if she were falling, sliding off the stool.

  He extended his hand for a shake.

  “Connecticut?” She shook his hand. It felt big and clean.

  “Transplanted to. Iranian-Connectican.”

  They both smiled now. Mina felt at ease. Even though he’d thrown her across the room, he had somehow steadied her.

  MINA SPENT THE REST OF Bita’s party in the kitchen. Ramin told Mina about Connecticut and his job at an architectural firm. He had moved to America when he was fifteen. He was back in Iran now for just a week, visiting his sick grandmother, who was on the verge of death. He’d had to pay a hefty sum of toman to avoid being drafted into the army upon entry. Like many exiles, he hadn’t served the mandatory army duty required of all Iranian males.

  “You risked a lot by coming back,” Mina said as she sipped the sherbet drink he’d made for her. “They could have drafted you.”

  “We were very close, my grandmother and I,” he said quietly. “During the revolution, she lived with us. I knew it was risky to come, but I couldn’t let her die without seeing her. My parents sent my brother and me to the States when I was a teenager because of the revolution. And that was the last time I saw my grandmother, and we never really got to say good-bye. We stayed with my uncle in California and thought we’d be back by the end of the summer. But sixteen years passed. So this time, I had to come.”

  He got up and took Mina’s empty glass from her hand. He made them more sherbet drinks, using the cherry syrup bottle that Suri had left on the counter. Mina watched his strong hands swirl the syrup into the water as the dark red cloud rose higher in the glass. As Ramin sat next to her again, the music in the other room was momentarily muted, the dancing bodies outside that door temporarily forgotten.

  Suddenly, the door swung open and Bita flew into the kitchen. Her hair was now puffed up like the mane of a lion. Her glittery makeup sparkled on her face.

  “Mina? Mina!” Her voice was wobbly with too much wine. “There you are!” She stopped when she saw them. Mina and Ramin were perched on the kitchen stools, cherry sherbet glasses in their hands, talking with their heads close.

  “Oh,” Bita said. “Oh. You’re fine. I see that you’re fine.” She seemed amused. She smiled as she walked out backward, tottering on her heels, twirling when she re
ached the door.

  Ramin looked at Mina without saying anything for a minute.

  “Seems like you’re fine,” he said, not taking his eyes off her.

  Mina felt her face burn under the fluorescent kitchen light.

  “Seems like I am.” She raised her glass. Ramin raised his too. And there under the supervision of the ceramic roosters their glasses touched. And when they clinked, something scattered in front of Mina’s eyes. In the tiny diamond of space where their glasses joined, the black spots in front of her eyes burst and split and finally broke away. With that clink, they were gone.

  And she could see just fine.

  DAWN SPREAD INTO THE GRAY night sky and aroused prayer callers. The guests quietly donned their Islamic uniforms, headscarves, and coats and got ready to tiptoe outside. The colorful, laughing, dancing scantily clad girls all became veiled women, like a row of crows, marching on, driving on back home. The boys straightened themselves out and walked away from the girls they had been holding, touching, loving. They would walk or drive home separately. Mina watched as Cinderellas turned to paupers, as the magic coach turned back into a pumpkin. It was that kind of hour. It was that kind of transformation.

  Later, when Mina and Bita sank into the pillows of Bita’s bed, the necessary reflecting on the night began. Darya had liked the idea of Mina spending the night at Bita’s and not having to worry about the hassles of returning home late. Now Bita updated Mina on new alliances forged through the party. She mentioned with awe the best dancers of the night. Mina tried to listen but all she could think about was the man from Connecticut. She kept replaying their evening in her head. As he had reached to take his coat from the hook in the foyer, he had thanked Bita and turned to Mina.

  “Good night.”

  Mina had pointed to the slowly emerging dawn outside the window. “Morning.”

  They had stood awkwardly in the foyer. He put on his coat while Mina waited by the door. He had looked into her eyes one more time, and there was a pull, an energy that was almost tangible. And Mina felt herself falling again, falling down, down, down.