Rosewater and Soda Bread

by Marsha Mehran

  “Ooooh! Gormeh sabzi! Can I take some to school?” Layla trundled down the stairs, skipping the last three steps with gymnastic flourish. She landed soundly on the woven runner that spanned the kitchen floor, her patchy knapsack bouncing off her back like a parachute in midflight.

  Marjan placed the lid back on the stockpot and turned to her youngest sister. “It won't be ready for another two hours. You'll have to take some of yesterday's saffron chicken instead.” She wiped her hands on a gingham tea towel and opened the cupboard door.

  “Leftovers. God. Not again,” Layla groaned, pulling absently on her stockings. As was often the case, her school uniform was not the tidiest of numbers: a spidery rip ran down the ankle of one brown stocking, and her Doc Martens were scuffed on all sides. In accordance with school yard fashion, her striped blue shirt was not tucked in; it stuck out from the back of her dark regulation skirt, wrinkled and uneven.

  Layla's long black hair, Marjan was happy to note, was immaculate as ever. It gleamed within the folds of an intricate French braid, perfectly framing her creamy, oval face.

  “I don't know how I'm going to survive this year,” Layla complained. “At least when Emer was around I could trade lunches— she always had a bit of colcannon with her sandwiches.”

  “You and your mashed potatoes,” Marjan remarked, lifting down a large mason jar of chickpea flour.

  “Mmmm, I could eat colcannon every day,” said Layla, rubbing her stomach. She helped herself to a piece of lavash bread fresh from the brick oven. “Now it's just me and Regina. And all she eats is prawn crisp rolls.”

  Marjan grimaced. “That can't be too healthy,” she said. She shook the enamel colander in her hand, sifting the flour into a large bowl. Thank heavens for Mustafa's. Were it not for the Algerian specialty shop in Dublin, she'd have to ship the chickpea flour in from London. With the state of An Post, that could take months, whole seasons even, to get to Ballinacroagh.

  “It's not healthy. I don't know how Regina stays so skinny,” Layla said, in between chews. “Must be all the farmwork she does after school.”

  “Speaking of after school,” Bahar interjected, swinging in from the dining room, “can you please tell me once more why you need to personally pick Malachy up from the train station tomorrow? You can't wait ten minutes before seeing your boyfriend again?”

  “Here we go,” moaned Layla. “Miss Worrywart.” She plopped down at the round table in the corner and unzipped her knapsack.

  Bahar continued, ignoring the barb, “You know you can't drive the van without Marjan sitting next to you. I'm going to be left to fend for myself. At teatime no less,” she added testily.

  “The weekends are my only time with Malachy, and I want to make the most of them. Besides, he hasn't seen me with my L plates yet,” Layla replied absently, referring to her learner driver's status. “I want to surprise him.”

  She ruffled through the knapsack, retrieving a small leather-bound volume of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, her favorite play She opened the musty little book and breathed in its pulpy scent.

  “You don't see me complaining when you disappear every other afternoon.”

  “My free time is none of your business,” retorted Bahar. She tore off Fiona and Evie's order and pinned it to a silver carousel in the middle of the wooden island.

  “Where do you go exactly on your breaks, anyway? Got some lover you're not telling us about?” Layla winked at her sister, teasing her with a smile.

  Bahar stared hard at her younger sister. She opened her mouth but closed it just as quickly again on second thought. With teeth clenched, she turned to the island and began to prepare a plate of rose petal jam and breads for the two hairdressers' breakfast, her shoulders stiff with silent fury.

  Layla exchanged looks with Marjan.

  “Hey, I didn't mean that, Bahar,” she began, softly. Bahar continued her buttering in silence. Layla bit her lip. “Bahar. Come on. We're only going to be gone a few minutes.”

  Bahar paused. She swiveled slowly on her heels, her left eyebrow arched high. “What, no necking on Clew Bay Beach?” Her lips twitched devilishly. “I expected more from you, Layla Am-inpour!”

  “Oh!” Layla grabbed the gingham towel and threw it across the kitchen at Bahar. “Cheeky!”

  Marjan, who had been anticipating another row between her sisters, was happy to return to the harmony of her chickpea dough.

  THE ANGELUS RANG on time as always, the bells in Saint Barnabas's tower pealing the six o'clock hour. Evening, and time for rest.

  Marjan wiped the island with a tea towel and placed a jug of golden chrysanthemums squarely in its center. She could hear the Victrola playing Billie Holiday in the front dining room, interspersed with the television upstairs. Layla must have been done with her homework. At least Marjan hoped that was the case.

  She gave the kitchen one last look and sighed. It was still a mess. The piles of dishes left from teatime were waiting for a wash, and the brick oven had to be brushed of its ashes one more time. The countertops sparkled from her rosewater spray—a cleaning solution that smelled absolutely glorious—but the wooden floor planks were still grimy from the lunch and tea rush. Her shoes made sticky sounds as she crossed to the round table.

  She had to resist taking the mop to the floor herself. Cleanup always belonged to Bahar, after all. It was her duty to see that there were plenty of dishes clean for every turnover throughout the day, and to make sure the floor and counters were spotless by the ringing of the six o'clock prayer bell. That was the arrangement. Without it, the café would soon turn into one chaotic mess. Bahar knew this.

  In fact, she usually liked nothing better than a good scrubbing—and pruned hands to prove it—at the end of a long working day. For as long as Marjan could remember, her sister had been a stickler for getting things spick-and-span, even obsessive in her quest. She never had to be asked twice to take a sponge to a crumby counter.

  At least, that was how Bahar used to react to mess.

  It was a rare sight to see the kitchen clean by this time of evening nowadays. Their tidy system had been in flux ever since Bahar began taking her afternoon breaks. Often, Marjan found herself doing double duty during tea, fixing the orders Layla brought in to her while rushing to the sink to replenish their dwindling pile of clean dishes, all the while keeping an eye on the brick oven, which delivered constant rounds of bread and kebabs of chicken, mint lamb, and onion. It was getting to be very exhausting. When she had pointed this out to Bahar, her sister's response had been tepid, offhanded even.

  “I don't expect you to understand,” Bahar had said with a quick shrug. “You've got the café and cooking and everything— this is what you've always wanted. But I'll go crazy if I spend every single moment cooped up inside. I need my time as well.”

  And so the advent of her afternoon breaks, taken every other weekday.

  What she did on her time away, Marjan never asked. And Bahar wasn't terribly forthcoming about it. The only indication that she had accomplished something of substance was the glow on her face when she returned an hour before closing.

  It was strange to see her usually mercurial sister so calm, thought Marjan. It was enough to incite some worry.

  She knew she should be thankful to have Bahar in such a light mood for the rest of the night, but she couldn't help but ruminate, with some trepidation, on the cause behind her sister's recent demeanor. It wasn't the first time Bahar had been so secretive about a part of her life, after all.

  Nine years ago she had changed from a normal enough teenager to a raging revolutionary in a matter of days. Wrapped in a chador, she had taken to the streets of Tehran, joining a pack of women who were protesting the reign of the Shah and his decades of tyranny. To some it may have seemed peculiar, this sudden change that had come over Bahar when she was only sixteen, but Marjan knew it was in accordance with her pendulumlike personality. Bahar had always had an unpredictable mixture of garm (hot) and sard (cold) coursing thr
ough her veins. Its wellspring could be found in the seasons of life itself, the day of the equinox and Bahar's birthday as well, March 21. That was when new and old converged, creating an unpredictable nature in anyone born on that date.

  Still, even Marjan had been shocked when Bahar announced her engagement to a man twice her age.

  Marjan took a deep breath, determined not to let her worry get the best of her. Eager to focus on something other than her sister's mysterious behavior, she grabbed a cup of bergamot tea and sat down at the round table to go over the menu for the next day.

  It was one of the moments she most looked forward to, designing her schedule of treats. Planning and listing always cleared her mind of any stresses that had piled on her shoulders during the course of her working day. Cooking required a certain degree of compartmentalization, but it also involved a lot of variables, chaotic moments that were unscripted. With her lists, Marjan could be a lot more simple. Yet still adventurous.

  Especially for this season: autumn called for a touch of nuance from every chef.

  Marjan bit the end of her pen in thought. She'd stick to the gormeh sabzi she had made today: the two batches she had made were gone by one o'clock. But another garm dish was needed still, something warming, something like stuffed eggplants with turmeric-encrusted lamb. A poor man's saffron to some, turmeric. But for Marjan, it had much more use than just its ability to give rice a yellowy hue. The spice, when cooked with dark meats, tended to unseen inflammations in the body, which, if left unheeded, could mark the beginnings of disease.

  Gormeh sabzi, stuffed eggplants, and turmeric-encrusted lamb. Yes, she nodded, that would work out just grand.

  And she'd have to make some more chickpea cookies as well. She would need a few rounds for the Bonfire the next evening.

  As for a soup, she was thinking of a nice noodle with meat and rice dumplings—like the ones their mother used to make before the first frost descended over Tehran. It had been Marjan's job to press the sides of the dumplings with a fork, securing them before they were plopped into the steamy, perfumed broth. What a joy it was to see them defy the heat, staying intact until they were in her hungry little mouth!

  Marjan smiled softly to herself and scribbled away, sipping at her tea occasionally. She was down to her pastry list when Bahar swung through the kitchen doors, carrying a large mustard-colored teapot.

  “Have you closed?” Marjan asked, without looking up.

  Bahar shook her head. “There's one more person left,” she said, a funny look on her face.

  “At this hour?”

  Bahar placed the pot in the sink and turned to her. “It's some English guy. He says he wants to see you.”

  “Me?”

  “He said he wants to compliment the chef. I don't know what he's talking about. He only had a pot of tea and a cheese plate.”

  Marjan followed Bahar out the kitchen doors and into the dining room. The man was standing by the time she reached his table, the smaller one near the paisley-draped window.

  He held out his hand. “Ms. Aminpour?”

  “Hello. How can I help you?” she asked, returning his handshake. “Was your lunch all right?” She glanced quickly at the remnants of the cheese plate, happy to see all the herbs and feta polished clean from the oval dish. He had been drinking a pot of lemon oolong tea, the perfume of which still lingered.

  “It was just grand. I didn't think there could be better summer savory outside Iran, but I see I was wrong.”

  Marjan blinked and took another look at the stranger. Behind her, she could hear Bahar pause in her clearing of tables.

  He was at least half a foot taller than she was, well over six feet. The window behind him framed his broad shoulders and straight blond hair, which grew just past his neck, meeting the collar of his tawny corduroy jacket. He had a strong jaw and a narrow nose, Marjan noticed, an easy smile playing on full lips.

  “You've been to Iran?”

  “Hasn't everyone?” he said, a smile flashing across his face. “Actually, the last time I was there was in seventy-eight, right before the hostage crisis.”

  “We had left by then as well.”

  The man's green eyes flickered with interest. “We?”

  “My sisters and I,” Marjan said, surprised at the information she was letting loose even before knowing this stranger's name. She turned to indicate Bahar behind her, but she had already disappeared into the kitchen. Marjan turned back to the stranger. “I'm sorry, what was your name?”

  The Englishman reddened. “Oh, I do apologize. Julian Win-throp Muir. How do you do?” He shook her hand again. It was then that Marjan realized he had never let it go. He had a strong grip, she thought, noticing the golden hairs along his broad wrist.

  “Marjan Aminpour,” she said, letting go of his hand.

  “I know who you are,” said Julian. “I've read all about it in The Connaught Telegraph. ‘Mystic Marjan's Recipe of Magic. Mayo's Best Kept Secret.’ ” He swept his palm in the air between them, as though conjuring the heading as he spoke it. “ ‘Ireland's Number One Exotic Destination.’ ”

  Marjan blushed. “I think the Connaught was a bit biased. The editor eats here every Saturday.”

  “And why wouldn't he? Persian food's the thing, isn't it? ‘Two days between layers of baklava, in the quiet seclusion where souls sweeten.’ ”

  Marjan was surprised. “You know Rumi?”

  “Did my thesis on the Sufi poets back at Oxford,” Julian replied, shaking his head. “Decades ago now it seems.”

  “So you are a poet?”

  “Not in the least, I'm afraid. Though I make my way by writing. Novels, mostly.” He ran his hand through his hair, pushing it away from his face.

  Marjan gave him another quick glance before moving toward his table. She began to stack the empty plates and tea glass on the platter, aware of his following gaze. “What have you written?” she asked, suddenly feeling strangely nervous. “Maybe I've read some of your work.”

  “Oh, I doubt that. My stuff gets the critics but not readers, unfortunately.” He paused. “That's why I've come back. To get away from all the nonsense.”

  “So you've been to Mayo before?”

  “Family was from here. Down Louisburgh way. I'm staying at the Wilton Inn at the moment. Just checked in today, in fact.” Julian smiled again. “But I most certainly will be having my meals here from now on.”

  Marjan hoisted the platter on her arms. “Oh, I don't know, I hear the carvery does a mighty roast plate. Peppercorn gravy, turnip mash, and all,” she said, her lips curving.

  “But it doesn't hold its own to that cherry rice I saw being served. A meal that's taken its time to formulate. ‘Let the kettle boil slowly …’ ”

  “ ‘For stew boiled in haste is of no use to anyone.’ ” Marjan smiled again, recalling the proverb immediately.

  Julian nodded. “Exactly. Makes you wonder what would have happened if Marco Polo and the Silk Road had made it all the way to Ireland.”

  “Potatoes would certainly have taken a hit,” replied Marjan, tickled by the thought.

  “Might have even stopped the famine. Imagine that now: the Irish could have been clear of the English earlier but for that. Change the whole course of the nation with just a bowl of sweet cherry rice.”

  Marjan laughed. “Somehow I can't imagine Paddy's offering chelow with their Guinness.”

  “Well, you never—” started Julian. He paused and turned around: a loud crash had just come from the street behind him.

  They both glanced out the window, in time to catch Evie Watson storm out of the hair salon with a pair of sharp-looking scissors.

  “You gobshite!” she yelled, stomping up the cobbled sidewalk on the heels of Peter Donnelly, her beau and all-around sparring mate. “You bastard! Stop, you hear me! Stop right there, Peter Donnelly!”

  For once, the young hooligan chose to listen to his girlfriend. He braked directly in front of the Reek Relics shop and turned to face E
vie. From behind her store door, Antonia Nolan could be seen watching the battle while chewing on a Picnic chocolate bar, delighted by the display.

  “Now, Evie,” Peter started.

  The junior stylist stamped her foot. “Don't feckin' Evie me! I've given you the best year yet, and this is the return I get? You little bollocks! I could kill you!” The scissors sliced the air between them.

  Peter sighed. “All I said was that a man in my position needs to be looking to the future.” He held up his hands to protect the burdens of his sex. “It's called progress. Consolidation.”

  “Consolidate my feckin' arse! You're a chancer, you are, Peter Donnelly. Just looking for a cheap shag, that's it all right!” Evie took a step forward with the scissors snapping furiously.

  Just when it looked as if she was about to mow through Peter's wavy brown hair, the latter came back with what in retrospect was not his wittiest rejoinder: “By ‘shag’ I don't suppose you're offering a haircut, now. Eh, babes?”

  Evie screamed. Her reedlike body seemed to reverberate with the pitchy sound, a parenthesis of exploding fury. Opting for a weapon greater than the toothed scissors, she plunged deep into her bib pocket and pulled out a bottle of pink solution.

  Aware of his fate but unable to stop it, Peter could only cover his eyes as his head was set awash with the entire contents of a bottle of Panto Perm XLRate, the most powerful permanent solution this side of Eastern Europe. The junior stylist then turned and ran back inside Athey's Shear Delight, wailing all the way.

  Julian broke the tension: “ ‘Love is reckless, not reason,’ ” he said, quoting one of Rumi's better known verses.

  Marjan stared at a dripping Peter Donnelly, who despite his soaked exterior had retained his swaggering air. No reason about that at all, she told herself; love was reckless, there was no other word for it.