Ever since they were born, all she’d ever wanted was to do right by them. To be done, in a way. Not that she hadn’t enjoyed raising them. She had. She’d buried her face into their infant bellies, held them up and delighted in their perfection, laced her fingers through theirs while walking them to school. She had never known, nor could she have guessed beforehand, that her children would consume her so. Once each kidney bean–sized embryo formed inside her, her world was reconstructed. Once they were born, she had spent sleepless nights holding them close, rocking and singing while they cried their hearts out. Those nights had spooled into years.
Every toothache, every cough, every ear infection they had, had been hers too. She did not know she could stand so much love.
In those early days, she’d tripped over their scattered toys on the living room floor, not realizing that she’d soon be tripping over their unannounced friends, their political choices, their careers and mates.
When Hooman sank a basketball into the net, her own body extended. When Kayvon threw up at the new restaurant on Queens Boulevard, her own insides flip-flopped. And with every step Mina took, every head she turned, every drawing she drew, Darya held her breath, enchanted.
It was for them that Darya had come to America. It was for them that she had stayed. But not one day had gone by when she hadn’t thought about the place she’d left.
But these children were no longer just hers. They were grown now. Hard as it was to believe. She needed to let them live their own lives.
It was her and Parviz now, more or less.
And ever since Parviz had shown up in his wool hat and scarf and had sat in that chair at the coffee shop with her and Sam, and ever since that quiet ride home, it was as if something tiny had broken between her and Parviz. She hadn’t done anything wrong. Parviz, she knew, knew that.
That moment in that coffee shop, sitting there between Sam and Parviz, the air had been so charged. She couldn’t place it. In the next spreadsheet class after the coffee shop incident, she’d still sat next to Sam. They’d still stood outside together during the breaks. Talking was allowed, wasn’t it?
Darya’s confusion was what made going back to Iran all the more enticing. To get away and to go back. Even though it had been so hard to come over here in the first place.
Those first few weeks in America, Darya had kept turning around, expecting to see the extended family she loved right behind her. But no one was there. Every time she saw a woman her own age with someone who seemed to be her mother, Darya felt empty. Those grown women with their mothers by their sides—how jealous she was of them. She had been one of those women once. She’d had a mother. She’d had just about everything.
What is done cannot be undone.
In those early years, Darya waited in their house in Queens for relatives who never came. She even made tea. Brewed the leaves and placed a cozy on the pot. Tea glasses clean and ready. But no one came.
She’d give anything to throw the dinner parties she used to complain about. Her young, naïve self had dared to say, “We never have any time to ourselves as a family.” What a fool she’d been. They’d floated as a family of five, alone, for so many years. And now here they were, down to two. Just she and Parviz.
Americans went about their business as if life were short and all their energy and efforts had to be spent today. Rushing around with gargantuan shopping carts and rushing off to appointments and errands and whatever was next on their schedules. They saw shrinks and doctors constantly, bought do-it-yourself home-repair kits, and believed self-esteem could solve problems. They acted as if every action they took were just for the sake of taking action. They acted as if everything were a race. As though the faster you moved, the more it mattered. As though by simply repeating something, you could make it true. And how was it that Parviz, her husband, a doctor, for God’s sake, had bought right into it? Hook, line, and sinker. Parviz repeated mantras and took bloody action all the time.
But that’s not how it worked. That’s not how it added up. Not for one minute.
This much Darya knew: Life was cruel. Beauty passed. Children grew. Countries transformed overnight. Fundamentalists tortured the young. Mothers died from bombs. Why act as if a single bit of it were okay?
That’s why she loved Kavita and Yung-Ja. Because they didn’t buy into the hype. That’s why there was something so intriguing about Sam. Because, though American, he seemed to have looked behind the façade and figured it out. He wasn’t like the others. He didn’t rush around in useless activity but was willing to sit quietly and listen. He seemed calm and at peace.
Part of Darya had always felt ashamed of her homesickness for Iran. How could she be homesick for a place filled with cruel laws and bottomless sadness? Because it was filled with so much more than that. Because her father was still there. Because her sister was too. Because the lemon trees and pomegranates were still there. Because the poetry was still there. Because her ancestors had cultivated a life and a legacy there. Because that place was home. Her home. Maybe not Mina’s. Maybe not even Parviz’s anymore. But hers.
So as Mina sat there and insisted she needed to go back to visit, Darya had to bite her tongue at first. Because how could she tell her daughter that she too had wanted nothing more than to go back all these years. How could she break Parviz’s heart, Parviz, who so loved where he was, and let him know that she could not wait to go back? And how on earth could she let Mina go alone?
Go back, go back, go back.
Home.
It made sense. It added up.