Darius the Great Deserves Better - Adib Khorram Page 0,26
finished Dune, but I couldn’t tell what the new book was.
“Hi, Grandma,” I said, and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Hi, Laleh.”
Laleh nodded but kept reading.
“Go get ready for dinner,” Oma said. “It’ll be done soon.”
“Okay.”
I didn’t actually have that much to do to get ready—just drop off my stuff in my room—but I took the opportunity for privacy to check the status of my testicles.
They were still red, but less angry-looking, and they didn’t hurt so much when I pressed on them.
I sighed with relief.
It was bad enough, explaining to Oma what happened and why I needed a ride.
I did not want to reopen the subject and ask her to take me to the doctor for broken testicles.
“Dinner!”
I put on a pair of clean compression shorts, to keep things supported, and headed downstairs.
My grandmothers had made ground beef tacos.
Mom always said the only spices Grandma and Oma knew about were salt and pepper, but that wasn’t technically true, if you counted the pouch of taco seasoning Grandma used.
I handed out plates, made two tacos for myself, and took my seat. I shifted a little, and tried not to wince, but Oma noticed.
“How’re you feeling?”
“Okay,” I said. “Just sore.”
“What happened?” Laleh asked.
My ears burned. “I got hit in practice today. I’m okay, though.”
“Stephen said you won your first game,” Grandma said. “He sent pictures. It looked like a good one.”
“Yeah.”
While Laleh crunched on her taco—which was mostly cheese and shell, with a little bit of lettuce and tomato and a sprinkling of beef—Oma asked, “When’s your next one?”
“Friday.”
“Well, keep on winning. If you do well this season, you might be in line for a scholarship.”
Oma said, “Especially if you get your GPA up.”
I crunched my taco so I wouldn’t have to respond.
The thing is, I wasn’t sure I wanted to go to college. In fact, I was pretty sure it would be a bad fit for me.
I knew my grandmothers were only trying to help, but somehow that only made me feel worse.
I swallowed.
“Maybe.”
* * *
While Grandma put away the leftovers and Oma did the dishes, I made us a pot of tea.
“What’s that you’re making?” Oma asked over her shoulder.
“Ti Kwan Yin.”
Ti Kwan Yin means “Iron Goddess of Mercy.” It’s a Chinese oolong with pretty much the coolest name ever.
Normally I made it in a gaiwan, but with three of us it wasn’t practical.
Grandma and Oma settled on the couch, each at one end, and I took the chair. After a while, Oma reached for the TV remote and turned on a cooking competition.
For people who didn’t use seasoning, Grandma and Oma really liked cooking shows.
We sipped and sipped as the silence between us built, a cascading wave of missed opportunities.
I wanted my grandmothers to ask me to sit with them.
I wanted them to pause the show so we could talk.
I wanted them to be more like Mamou and Babou.
But I didn’t know how to say that out loud.
So instead I said, “I’m gonna see if Laleh wants any tea.”
My sister’s door was half-open, but I still knocked on the frame: one-three-three, which was our special knock. “You want some tea?”
“Yeah.”
Laleh curled her legs under her and let me sit on her bed. She had one of those huge pillows with armrests built into it, soft pink with a purple fringe on top. It was dented in the middle from all the hours she’d spent sitting against it reading.
I handed her a tasting cup—a ceramic one emblazoned with the Rose City logo—and tilted my head to look at the spine of her book.
“The Shining?” I asked. “Is it good?”
“It’s okay.”
“Scary?”
“Nah.”
Laleh blew on her tea and took a sip. I took a bigger slurp from my own cup.
“Hmm,” Laleh said. She smacked her lips. “It’s sweet.”
“It’s got notes of honey,” I said. “And milk too. But I didn’t put any sugar in it.”
“Really?”
I nodded.
Laleh took another sip. “It’s okay. Not as good as Persian tea.”
“Noted.” We sat together, enjoying our tea.
Then I said, “Is school any better?”
Laleh shrugged.
“Are Micah and Emily treating you better?”
Laleh shook her head.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
But it wasn’t okay.
“Have you talked to your teacher?”
“No.” She sighed. “Emily’s her favorite. She never gets in trouble.”
“Oh.”
I wanted to build a force field around my sister, to shield her from Micah and Emily and her teacher and all the other Soulless Minions of Orthodoxy lurking in her future.
I hated how helpless I was.
“Is there something I can do?”
Laleh shook her head again, and then turned back to her