Darius the Great Deserves Better - Adib Khorram Page 0,58
of Iranians would be complete without an overabundance of food.
Everyone wore nice dresses—Mom’s was black, but not mournful—while I was in gray dress pants and a dark blue button-up. Underneath I had on my jersey from the Iranian national soccer team, Team Melli.
Sohrab had gotten it for me, when I visited Iran. It made me feel closer to Iran, and Babou, and playing Rook, and sitting in silence drinking tea.
I grabbed a paper towel and wiped my eyes.
I kept crying at weird times.
I had never lost someone I loved before.
I didn’t know how to deal with it.
* * *
“Darius? Hey.”
There was one other Iranian at Chapel Hill High School: Javaneh Esfahani.
She was a senior, and now that we didn’t eat lunch together, I barely ever saw her. She was in AP classes during the day, and busy with Associated Student Body after school.
Javaneh wore a sleek black dress with a red blouse over it and a dark red headscarf. She had on new glasses too, cat-eye ones with green highlights on the frames.
“Oh. Hey.”
“You look like you could use a hug.”
“I guess so.”
Javaneh snorted and pulled me in.
I couldn’t remember ever hugging her before. She felt warm and comfortable, like your blankets when you first wake up in those late fall days before you turn the heat on, and you can’t imagine ever getting out of bed because you know the floors are going to be cold.
“How’re you doing?”
“Okay. Trying to keep it together for my mom.”
She nodded. “When my grandmother passed away, my dad had a really hard time too.”
“That sucks.”
“Yeah. I still miss her sometimes.”
I sniffed. Javaneh pulled a couple Kleenexes out of her huge black purse.
She was still in high school, but she already had the voluminous purse of a True Persian Woman, the kind that opened into an alternate dimension.
“Thanks.”
“Sure.” She looked behind me. “I think someone is here for you.”
“Oh?” I turned to find Landon standing in the doorway. He was dressed all the way up, in a dark suit with a white shirt and gray tie.
He looked impeccable.
“Hi.”
“Hi,” he said, and wrapped me in a hug. I melted into him.
We didn’t kiss, though. I think maybe he was trying to figure out what the rules were, surrounded by a bunch of Iranian strangers.
Maybe he was.
Maybe I was too.
When we pulled apart, I said, “Javaneh, this is my boyfriend. Landon.”
Javaneh beamed and offered her hand.
“Javaneh Esfahani. I go to school with Darius.”
Landon’s shoulders relaxed as he took her hand. “Nice to meet you.”
“Same.” Javaneh glanced toward the big room, and her eyes bugged out for a second. “Oh, no. My parents are trying to help.”
Landon blinked. “Is that bad?”
“My parents are, like, Olympic-level taarofers.”
“Oh no,” I agreed.
Landon looked between us. Despite my best attempts to explain taarof—the complex set of Social Cues that governed all interpersonal relations between Iranians—he had yet to grasp it fully.
“Wish me luck.” Javaneh squeezed my arm and hurried out to stop her parents from taking over the entire memorial.
Landon held my hands and looked me up and down.
“You got rid of your nails,” he said.
Grandma helped me take off the polish. Turquoise nails felt too happy for a memorial.
Too gay.
I would never get to tell Babou I was gay.
I hated my own cowardice.
“Didn’t seem like the right occasion.”
“You still look nice.” He played with a few locks of hair that had fallen over my forehead. “Are you doing okay? Really?”
“I’m okay.”
Landon fussed with my shoulder seams.
And I had this feeling, like I was annoyed with him for some reason.
Dr. Howell said it was normal to feel things—ugly things—when I was processing grief.
I tried not to let it show.
“You ready to head out there?”
I took a deep breath.
“Yeah.”
QUINTESSENTIAL PERSIAN PROFESSION
The memorial service was simple: Once everyone arrived (about an hour after we asked people to show up because, as a people group, Iranians are predisposed to tardiness), Mom said a prayer, first in English, then in Farsi, then in halting Dari. She talked about Ardeshir Bahrami’s life growing up in Yazd: how he was born into the Zoroastrian community, went to school, opened a shop, weathered the revolution, raised three kids and eight grandchildren (with a great-grandchild on the way). How he was kind, thoughtful, generous. How he was a demon at Rook. How he loved his garden.
“The only thing my father loved more than his garden was his wife, Fariba. And the only thing he loved more than Fariba was her cooking.”