IRON GODDESS OF MERCY
Linda Kellner didn’t like to listen to music in the car. She always listened to the news.
She also didn’t like to talk very much.
“Hi, Oma,” I said as I buckled up. “Thanks for coming to get me.”
Oma nodded and then turned up her NPR.
That meant the conversation was over.
Like I said, I’d never been very close with Oma. Or with Grandma.
Linda and Melanie Kellner weren’t very demonstrative with their affection.
I thought maybe that was just how grandparents were, until I went to Iran. Mamou had practically smothered me with hugs and kisses, and even Babou’s reserve had cracked as we spent time together.
When we got home, Oma parked on Dad’s side of the driveway. I got out and punched in the code to open the door.
Grandma was at the kitchen table doing a puzzle while Laleh read. It looked like she had 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 book, like she didn’t want to talk about it anymore.
I leaned over and kissed the crown of her head.
“Love you, Laleh,” I whispered into her hair.
It was nearly nine o’clock when the garage door finally rumbled. Everyone else was in bed, but I was sitting in the kitchen, icing myself again.
I dumped the ice in the sink and pulled out the leftover taco meat for Mom.
“Hey, sweetie.” I wrapped my mom in a hug, but her whole body was like a polarized hull plate, rigid and brittle. After a moment she finally relaxed against me. But then the microwave beeped.
“You don’t need to do that for me.”
“I want to.”
“All right. How was your day?”
“It was okay,” I said. Mom didn’t seem like she was in the mood to hear about my testicular trauma.
I wasn’t in the mood to talk about it anyway.
“How was yours?”
“Long.”
I pulled down a plate for her and grabbed the rest of the taco fixings out of the fridge while she checked something on her phone. She looked up and frowned at me. “I can make my own dinner, you know.”
“I don’t mind. Want some tea?”
Mom sighed and sat down. “I better not. Thanks.”
I grabbed my cup—a second steeping of Ti Kwan Yin, which had more mellow floral notes than the first steeping—and sat next to her.
“How did your test go?”
“I got a C.”
“Do you need some help? We can go over your problems together.”
“It’s okay. I went to Chip’s after practice and we worked on it together.”
“Oh. That’s nice.” Mom took a bite of taco and studied me as she chewed. “You’ve been spending a lot of time with him lately.”
I don’t know why it felt like such an accusation when she said that.
I don’t know why I felt like I had to defend myself.
“He’s been really helpful,” I said. “Oh. I left my bike at his house. Think you can drop me off in the morning?”
Mom frowned. “I can’t tomorrow. Early meeting. Oma or Grandma will have to.”
“Oh.”
“I wish I could, though.”
“It’s okay. Really.”
I let Mom eat in silence after that.
There was something she wasn’t saying out loud, something I was supposed to know but didn’t.
When she finished, she wiped her hands and mouth, careful to avoid her lipstick.
“I better go put Laleh to bed.”
“Oma already did. She even got her to take a bath.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“Well then.” Mom glanced toward the stairs.
I sipped my tea.
“Want to watch something? Star Trek?”
“Um.”
Mom had never asked me to watch Star Trek before.
That was always me and Dad’s thing.
I didn’t know what to say.
I was trying to figure out if we should continue where Dad and I left off, or start a different series, but then Mom said, “Never mind. Sorry.”
She got up before I could say anything.
Before I could tell her I wanted to watch Star Trek with her.
Mom ran her fingers through my hair and kissed my forehead. “I’m going to go to bed.”