In the grocery store, where she and Sami had to struggle through a crowd of other Iranians shopping for their New Year's parties, she couldn't help asking, Who are these people? The children were using the familiar you when speaking to their parents; they were loud and unruly and disrespectful. The teenage girls were showing bare midriffs. The customers nearest the counter were pushing and shoving. This is just… distressing! she told Sami, but he surprised her by snapping, Oh, Mom, get off your high horse!
Excuse me? she said, truly not sure she had heard right.
Why should they act any better than Americans? he demanded. They're only behaving like everyone else, Mom; so quit judging.
Her first impulse was to snap back. Was it so wrong to expect her countrymen to set a good example? But she counted to ten before she spoke (a tactic she had learned during his adolescence) and then decided not to speak at all. Instead she proceeded down the aisle in silence, dropping cellophane packets of herbs and dried fruits into the basket he was carrying for her. She paused before a bin of wheat kernels, and Sami said, Will there be time enough to sprout them? There was plenty of time, as he knew full well. He must be asking only to make amends. So she said, Well, I think there will be. What's your opinion? and after that they were all right again.
She did judge. She knew that. Over the years she had become more and more critical, perhaps because of living alone for so long. She would have to watch herself. She made a point of smiling at the next person who jostled her, a woman with short hair dyed the color of a copper skillet, and when the woman smiled back it turned out she had a single, deep groove at the outer corner of each eye just like Aunt Minou's, and Maryam felt a rush of affection for her.
The Donaldsons had been invited for lunch on a Sunday that fell a full eight days after Ziba's parents' party; so there was less reason than ever for Maryam to host the event at her house. By now, though, she was resigned. She cooked the whole week before, a dish or two a day. She set up the Haftseen table in the living room the seven traditional objects, including a vibrant little putting green of sprouted wheat kernels, artfully arranged on her best embroidered cloth. And Sunday morning she rose before dawn to make the final preparations. The only other windows alight were in houses where there were small babies. The only sounds were the birds, a clamor of new and different songs now that spring was here. She padded around the kitchen barefoot, wearing muslin pants and a long-tailed shirt that used to belong to Sami. Her tea cooled on the counter as she rinsed the rice and set it to soak, and climbed on a stool to fetch down her trays, and snipped the stems of the yellow tulips that had been waiting overnight in buckets on the back porch. By now the sun was rising, and through the open window she heard the newspaper carrier's squeaky-braked van and then the slap of the Baltimore Sun against her front step. She brought the paper into the kitchen to read with her second cup of tea. From where she sat she could see into the dining room, where the silver gleamed on the table and the stemware sparkled and the tulips marched down the center in a row of slim glass vases. She loved this time before a party when the napkins had not yet been crumpled or the quiet shattered.
At twelve-thirty, freshly bathed and dressed in narrow black trousers and a white silk tunic, she was standing at her front door to welcome Sami and Ziba. They came early to help with last-minute preparations, although, as Sami pointed out, she had left them nothing to do. No, but this way I get to have a little visit with Susan, she said. Susan was a very competent walker by now, and the minute Sami set her down she made a beeline for the basket where Maryam kept her toys. Her hair had grown long enough that it fell in her eyes if they didn't tie it up into a sort of vertical sprout on top of her head. It wisped around her little shell ears and trailed in thin strands down the back of her flower-stem neck. Susiejune, Ziba told her, say, 'Hi, Mari — june!' Say, 'Hello, Mari — june!'
Mari — june, Susan said obligingly, only it came out more like Mudge. She gave Maryam one of her tucked smiles, as if she knew exactly how clever she'd been.
Ziba wanted to fiddle and fidget Is there anything we can do? Should Sami open the wine? Which tablecloth did you use? but Maryam told her it was all taken care of. Have a seat, she said. Tell me what you'd like to drink.
Ziba didn't answer because she was pummeling cushions, even nudging Sami aside so she could get to the one he was sitting against. She was nervous, Maryam supposed. She had dressed up a little too much for daytime, in the same shiny turquoise mini-dress she'd worn to her parents' party, and two circles of rouge on her cheeks made her seem feverish. Probably she was comparing Maryam's house to her own Maryam's too-small living room and traditional, rather dowdy furniture overlaid with paisley scarves and little Iranian trinkets and finding it lacking. Susan, put that back! she said when Susan hauled out a plush dog. We can't have toys scattered all over the place when guests are coming!
Oh, why not? Jin-Ho will want to play too, Maryam told her; and Sami, lazily twirling a string of clay prayer beads he'd picked up from the coffee table, said, Relax, Zee. Settle down.
She made a cross little puffing sound and flung herself into a chair.
It didn't help that the next arrivals were Ziba's parents. They were a bit early, having misjudged the travel time from Washington, and when Mrs. Hakimi apologized to Maryam in Farsi (I'm very sorry; I ask your forgiveness; I told Mustafa we should just drive around a bit but he said), Ziba cried, Mummy, please; you promised you'd speak English for this!
Mrs. Hakimi sent Maryam a rueful glance. She was a pleasant-looking woman with a plump, tired face, and she let her family walk all over her, Maryam had noticed especially her husband, who maintained the rigid posture of a military man although he'd made his money in business. He imported things. (Maryam wasn't sure what.) He had a bald yellow head and an enormous stomach that strained the vest of his gray sharkskin suit. Susie — june! he roared, and he pounced on Susan, who smiled shyly but curled over till she was practically a shrimp shape, and no wonder; Mr. Hakimi was a cheek-pincher. Pinch-pinch! with his big yellow fingers while Susan squirmed and looked around for Ziba.
I understand your party last week was a great success, Maryam told Mrs. Hakimi.
Oh, no, it was nothing. A very plain affair, Mrs. Hakimi said, and then she took a sudden swerve back into Farsi. I'm sure our meal today will be much more elegant, since you were the one who prepared it and no one else I know makes such delicious Her words came all in a rush, as if she hoped to get as much said as possible before she was apprehended; but Ziba said, Mummy! and Mrs. Hakimi broke off and looked at Maryam helplessly.