Things We Left Unsaid (12 page)

Arsineh said, ‘Well, you can stay, too. That way, grandmother will get a good long rest.’

Emile chuckled and looked at me. ‘Wouldn’t imposing upon you two nights in a row be quite cheeky?’

I was sure that he was merely trying to be polite. ‘Stay,’ I said. ‘Artoush, wherever he is, will soon turn up.’ Before the sentence had completely left my mouth, I heard
the Chevy come sputtering up our street.

Armineh and Arsineh jumped up and down. ‘Stay! Stay! Please.’ Then they pinned their eyes on me.

‘I’ll telephone Mrs. Simonian,’ I agreed. We had all quickly learned that permission – not only for Emily, but also for her father – rested in the hands of the
grandmother.

I returned Artoush’s greeting while he let the twins climb up his back like it was a tree, and dialed Elmira Simonian’s number, wondering how she would react. Her voice sounded tired
and listless. ‘It’s not up to me. They can decide for themselves.’ And she hung up.

I started making dinner – cutlets and French fries. The unexpected occurrences of that afternoon and my sister’s strange conviction seemed like a long ago memory. What had made me so
mad? It wasn’t the first time that Alice had arrived at this kind of decision. There was the Armenian doctor at the hospital, after all. And the brother of a friend who came from Tehran. The
reason I had felt queasy this time was that...

My self-critical streak butted in: ‘...was that what?’

I poured the oil in the frying pan. It was that I was tired. It was because...I don’t know. Emile and Artoush were playing chess in the living room, and the children were running around
outside in the yard.

I was thinking about Elmira Simonian as I flipped the cutlets over. Mother had said, ‘Her father’s house was like a palace. More than fifty rooms, a huge garden, servants, and
retainers. The nurse who committed suicide was English. They said the lady, despite her dwarfish stature, had a hundred admirers, both before and after marrying. Dashing, debonair European men
would come to Isfahan just to see her and attend her fashionable parties.’

I peeled the potatoes and figured that they must have spun a whole-cloth about her out of a single strand of yarn, the stories sounded so exaggerated. After all, short as she is, how...

I was trying to imagine Mrs. Simonian in her youth when Armen and Emily, breathless and sweaty, burst into the kitchen. Armen got the pitcher of water out of the fridge and poured some, first
for Emily, then for himself. Emily’s hair was sticking to her forehead and her eyes were sparkling. It occurred to me that if the grandmother, in her youth, looked like her granddaughter does
now...I put the pitcher, which Armen had left on the counter, back in the fridge...maybe what people said about her is true.

I plopped the potatoes into the hot oil. Mother had said, ‘What a wedding her poor father threw for his daughter! An orchestra from Tehran, a chef from France. He bought the oldest wines
from the cellar of Levon the wine-merchant. He invited a crowd of grandees, from courtiers to foreign ambassadors.’ I turned the potatoes over and thought, after the luxurious life Mother had
described her leading, this house in north Bawarda must seem quite contemptible. I remembered the dim empty rooms of the house; the quite expensive and once beautiful tablecloth and cloth napkins;
the tarnished, almost black, silverware; and the chipped china. Only the twin candelabras retained their long-ago luster and brilliance, along with that wooden cabinet.

I was standing over the potatoes so they would not burn, lost in my imagination. Where was Elmira Simonian when she first spread out that cotton tablecloth in her dining room? In her house in
Calcutta? Or in her apartment in Paris, which she said was opposite Notre Dame? I remembered the long tablecloth almost touching the floor on all four sides of the table, so it must have been
designed for a much larger table, a twelve-person setting maybe, with high-backed plush velvet chairs. The hostess – all made-up, her hair jet black, dressed in a gown with a lace collar,
maybe, wearing long earrings to match her heavy diamond necklace – would raise a crystal-cut wine glass to her red lips. Her dark eyes must have sparkled like her granddaughter’s did a
few seconds ago, over the rim of the glass.

Emile’s voice – saying, ‘It smells so good’ – cut off my reverie about his mother’s parties in her youth, and I looked down at the potatoes, which were
starting to burn.

‘Oh, no!’ I shouted, and without thinking, picked up the hot frying pan with both hands and put it on the counter. I didn’t feel the burn until I let go of the pan. I burned my
hands on a regular basis while cooking or ironing, so I was used to the pain of it and did not usually cry out, but this time I could not suppress a yelp. I was drenched in sweat.

Emile shouted, ‘What have you done to yourself?’ He grabbed my shoulders and led me to the table, pulling out the nearest chair for me. ‘Let me see.’

I sat down. Why was he using the formal ‘you’ again? I looked down at my palms, turning redder by the second. He poured water in a glass and brought the glass to my lips.
‘Don’t you worry. I’ll take care of it in a moment.’ He set the glass on the table and rushed out of the kitchen. This time he had used the informal ‘you’
again.

Worse than the pain and the worry about whether I would be able to work with my hands for the next few days, and what I would do about meals tomorrow, and who would wash the dishes, and a dozen
other what-will-happens and who-will-do-its, was the muttering of Artoush, who had come running into the kitchen in response to my cry. He was standing over me, grumbling as he always did when such
things happened.

‘I’ve told you a thousand times to be careful. If the potatoes burn, let them burn! Why don’t you think what you are doing to yourself? Why are you making French fries and
cutlets in this heat, anyway? We could have ordered food from somewhere. And don’t worry, restaurant food never killed anyone. You’ve inherited this irrational finickiness from your
mother. I wish your sister was half as finicky as you...’

I tried not to hear it. I had understood years ago that Artoush shows his love for people by chastising them when something happens to them. It was the same thing whenever one of the children
fell down or got sick or had a pain somewhere. If he seized the opportunity to criticize Mother and Alice at every turn, that was only because Mother and Alice did the same thing to Artoush. I had
long ago learned how to play the role of mediator. He was now walking round and round the table, and around me, talking away. It was making me dizzy, and the burning in my hands was getting worse
when Emile returned with a large brown jar. Without a word, he dug his hand into the jar several times and rubbed a cream of some sort, black and somewhat sticky, on both of my palms. Artoush stood
silently, watching over us. Eyes fixed on my palms, I suddenly felt very hot, and my hands began to burn once again, as if still stuck to the sides of the frying pan. Then my palms started to
throb, until they gradually grew cooler and cooler, and finally the burning and the throbbing stopped. I was drenched in sweat.

When I raised my head, Emile was watching me with a smile that seemed to say, ‘Didn’t I tell you I would take care of it?’

The three of us were sitting at the kitchen table. As he peeled potatoes, Emile was explaining the properties of the Indian burn cream. He had dumped the burnt potatoes in the
garbage pail, and picked out several fat spuds from the basket near the refrigerator. He was now peeling off the skins, and Artoush was trying to lend a hand. I wondered how many times in his life
Artoush had peeled potatoes, and how many times Emile had? Listening to Emile, I was still holding my palms open flat. ‘One of our cooks, who was from the south of India, brought two jars of
this cream for my mother many years ago.’

The twins came running in.

‘Ramu?’ I asked, immediately regretting the question. It was an unhappy reminder.

He put the knife down on the table. ‘It was Ramu’s father.’ He was quiet for a minute, then picked up the knife again. ‘I’ve had it tested several times in
different places, and no one was able to figure out the ingredients. They could only say that it contained roots and leaves of various plants, a fact which I had already figured out on my
own.’

Artoush closed the refrigerator door and sat at the table. ‘What did the children want?’ I asked.

‘Water,’ he said.

By the time Artoush had patchily removed the skin from a couple of potatoes, Emile had peeled the rest and cut them into even strips. He poured them into the strainer and got up. ‘Only one
member of Ramu’s family knew how to prepare that cream, and he taught it to only one other person before he died.’ He put the strainer in the sink and turned on the faucet. I noticed
that when his mother isn’t around, he does not speak so formally.

The phone rang. In the hallway someone picked up the receiver, and a few moments later, Armen was calling out, ‘Mommmm! Telephone. Mrs. Nurollahi.’

I yelled back, ‘For me or for your father?’

‘For you.’

I got up. ‘Will you be able to hold the phone?’ Artoush asked. Emile turned his head back from the sink. The water was pouring over the sliced potatoes in the strainer. Was it my
imagination, or did he look at me with worry?

I opened my hands and closed them. They hurt much less now. I nodded, indicating that I could manage, and went to the hallway. Through the door to the living room I saw Emily and Armen sitting
in the easy chairs. Emily was recounting something, animatedly gesturing with her head and hands. If I did not know better, I would have supposed her a young woman rather than a girl. Armen was in
the chair facing hers, his chin resting on his hand, watching raptly.

I picked up the receiver and wondered what Mrs. Nurollahi wanted with me. I looked at my hands, with a new appreciation for their importance.

Mrs. Nurollahi, as usual, greeted me warmly, asking after everyone at length, including each of the children one by one, before getting to the point. She had a good memory. She remembered not
only the names of the children, but what grade they were in. She even remembered the cold the twins had caught a few months back. Finally, she said, ‘I saw you last Friday at the talk at the
Golestan Club. I’m sorry that I didn’t get an opportunity to say hello.’

There was no hint of reproach in her voice. I was embarrassed. I should have gone up to her after her talk to congratulate her, and had not done so. Mrs. Nurollahi did not give me an opportunity
to explain and apologize, and did not seem to expect it.

‘I wanted to ask if you would be so kind as to attend the next meeting of our society? The Armenian ladies have not been inclined to join in with us. I know that you have your own society,
a very active one, but as you know, the Majles elections are coming up, and as you are also no doubt aware, because of the suffrage issue, the coming year will be an important one for Iranian
women...’

I did not know that the Majles elections were coming up, and had only heard here and there about the issue of women’s voting rights. I reproached myself: you, and most other Armenian
women, act like you are not living in this country! I felt embarrassed and ashamed.

‘I have a couple of questions I wanted to ask,’ said Mrs. Nurollahi. ‘Would it be possible for me to come see you some time, at your convenience?’

To make amends for my ignorance, I instantly agreed. ‘Of course. I would be delighted.’ Before hanging up, she asked, ‘By the way, do you have any gathering planned for the
24th of April this year?’

I hung up the receiver and headed back to the kitchen. Mrs. Nurollahi, who was not Armenian, knew about the genocide that had begun on 24 April 1915, and although I was born in this country...
Again I felt embarrassed. She had said, ‘We must learn a lot of things from our Armenian friends.’ Surely she said this merely to be polite?

I sat down again and looked at my hands. There was no trace of any burn. Artoush bent down over me, caressed the back of my hand and whispered in my ear, ‘Does it hurt?’ He was
smiling, and I knew he was trying to be nice. I smiled back and shook my head no.

I looked at Emile. He was facing us, strainer in hand, looking at me. The water was off. We looked at one another for a few seconds. Then he asked, ‘Where’s the oil?’

I jumped up. ‘You shouldn’t bother!’ I reached out to take the strainer from him, but he drew it back.

Artoush shifted from one foot to the other. ‘Is it absolutely necessary to have French fries?’

‘You go check on the kids,’ I said. Looking greatly relieved, he left the kitchen.

I looked at Emile. He gave the potatoes a little toss to turn them over in the strainer. ‘I guess I am one of the few men who likes to cook.’ The top two buttons of his shirt were
undone and his gold chain was showing. He looked toward the door of the kitchen and lowered his voice. ‘On the other hand, I hate politics. But it seems Artoush...’ He looked at me
expectantly.

I said, ‘No. Well, yes. I mean, to the extent of reading the news and well, sometimes...’ I turned around and took the tin of oil from the cabinet behind me.

He took the tin from my hands. ‘I’ve never liked politics. I can’t make head or tail of any of these movements or isms and their platforms. I’d rather read books. If the
world is ever destined to get better, and I for one have my doubts about that, it won’t be through politicking, right? What do you think?’ Instead of a reply, I gave him a stupid
smile.

Together we fried the potatoes and made salad. He talked about Indian food, about various spices and their properties. We talked about our favorite writers and the books we had read. He asked me
to call him ‘Emile’ rather than ‘Mr. Simonian.’ It also occurred to me that, when his mother was not around, he was quite easy and pleasant to talk to.

While I set the table, Artoush and Emile bent over the chessboard. ‘Will it be alright if I take some food for your mother?’ I asked Emile. ‘With her headache, she probably
didn’t feel like fixing dinner.’