Darius the Great Is Not Okay(44)

I had put gel in my hair too, but all that did was make the black curls shinier and stiffer.

Sohrab smelled nice, like rosemary and leather, but he hadn’t overdone it. He had avoided the genetic predisposition many True Persians had toward using too much cologne.

“Eid-e toh mobarak,” I said.

You could also use toh for someone you were very close to.

Sohrab squinted at me, then held the door open for the woman behind him to enter. She was short—almost squat—but her hair was so huge, once it was freed from her headscarf, that it took up the whole room.

Sohrab said, “Maman, this is Darioush. Agha Bahrami’s grandson.”

Sohrab’s mom leaned her head back to look me up and down.

“Eid-e shomaa mobarak, Khanum Rezaei,” I said.

“Happy Nowruz!” she said. Her voice was throaty and sandy. And loud.

“It’s nice to meet you.”

She smiled, and her eyes crinkled up just like Sohrab’s. “Thank you.” She pulled me down by my shoulders and kissed me on both cheeks, then let go of me to find Mamou.

“Is your dad coming? Or your amou?”

Sohrab chewed on the inside of his cheek for a moment.

“No. Just me and my mom. We always come for Nowruz. Amou Ashkan goes to Feast.”

“Feast?”

“The Bahá’í celebration. Most of the Bahá’í families go.”

“Oh.”

I was going to ask more, but then I heard Sohrab’s mom let out a cry and charge across the sea of Bahramis separating her from her target.

“My mom loves Mamou,” he said, and his squint was back. “She is special. You know?”

I did know. Sohrab didn’t have to say it out loud.



* * *





We all had to take pictures behind the haft-seen.

Laleh and I sat on chairs from the dining room, while Mom and Dad stood behind us.

Persians have mastered the ancient and noble art of the awkward family photo—in fact, we probably invented it. True, Non-Fractional Persians refuse to smile in photos, unless they are tricked into it, or have been talked into it with a combination of pleading, guilt-tripping, and high-level taarofing.

Dad smiled behind me. He had very straight, very white teeth—exactly what you’d expect from his Teutonic heritage and years of aggressive dentistry—and Laleh smiled, because she was Laleh, and Laleh was always smiling.

But Mom just pursed her lips, which is as close as she came to smiling unless you surprised her.

I tried to smile too, but my face felt weird and rubbery, and it came out as a half smile, half-constipated look.

Dayi Jamsheed snapped a few pictures of us, and I thought we were done.

I was wrong.

Everyone needed pictures: with their own family units, with Mamou and Babou, with me, Laleh, Mom, and Dad. I kept getting pulled into different photos, with different arms over my shoulders or around my waist every few minutes. My family was everywhere.

And even though I hated getting shuffled around and grabbed by my love handles, my rubbery constipated face did relax into a smile.

I had never been surrounded by my family before. Not really.

When Dayi Jamsheed started herding us together into a big group photo, my eyes started burning. I couldn’t help it.

I loved them.

I loved how their eyelashes were long and dark and distinct, just like mine. And how their noses curved around a little bump in the middle, just like mine. And how their hair cow-licked in three separate places, just like mine.

“Darius? You okay?” Dad said. He’d gotten squeezed into the very back, with me, since we were taller than everyone else.

“Um. Yeah,” I clucked.

Dad put his hand on my back and gave me a little wiggle.

“You’re so lucky to have this big family.”

I was lucky.

That well inside me was ready to burst.

Mamou turned around—she and Babou were seated in the very front, the binary suns of the Bahrami family solar system—and she smiled at me.

For the first time in Bahrami family history, she had all her grandchildren in one place.

I loved my grandmother’s smile more than anything.

Dayi Jamsheed handed his camera—a big SLR—off to Sohrab, while Sohrab’s mom pointed someone’s iPhone at us. She had another two tucked under her arms, and one held between her chin and her chest.

It was deeply redundant.

“Yek. Doh. Seh,” Sohrab said. He studied the picture for a second. “Good!”

Babou stood and said something to Mamou. Whatever it was must have been bad: The room went silent, like the house had experienced an explosive decompression.

Maybe we had.

And then Babou started shouting.

It was incoherent and garbled and venomous.

Sohrab’s mom’s eyebrows formed perfect arches above her eyes, threatening to disappear into her hair, as my grandfather screamed at my grandmother for no reason I could understand.

Sohrab studied the floor and fiddled with the camera in his hands.

Mom’s face had turned chalky.

But Mamou was the worst.

She was still smiling, but it didn’t reach her eyes anymore.

At last, Babou stormed off toward his room.

No one said anything. We were all waiting for the atmospheric pressure to return to normal. As Mamou stood, I leaned in and tried to hug her, but it ended up as an awkward half hug. Mamou shifted and wrapped her arms around me. Her face was wet against my shoulder.