A Teaspoon of Earth and Sea (4 page)

“So lucky,” whispers Ponneh. “Read that,” she says, pointing to a headline.
“Ed Cox, a Scion of Old Money with the Instincts of a Liberal.”
“That has some difficult words, but Maman translated it for me once,” says Saba. “It means his money is old and his thoughts are new. Just the opposite of what you want.”
Ponneh is trying not to look confused, so Saba pulls her shoulders back and says, “Old thoughts are the thoughts of philosophers, which are better than those of revolutionaries. And new money is the money you earn—like my baba did.” Saba’s mother never liked to mention that the Hafezi lands were inherited—now dwindled to a fraction of what the family owned under the Shah. It was an inconvenient detail to the lesson, and sad to think that rising by you sweat and wit was an impossible thing in the new Iran. No
shalizar
owner becomes wealthy on rice sales alone. There are land rentals and bribes and compound interest. Saba knows this, has studied it with her math tutors, but follows her mother’s example of forgetting to mention it.
“What does this say?” Ponneh points to a caption, but Saba is no longer listening.
“This is where Mahtab lives now,” she says, looking at the opulent dining room with its lush curtains, sparkling decorative branches, and tuxedoed men.
The other two grow quiet and Reza mumbles, “In the American Shah’s house?”
“I don’t mean exactly here,” she says. She pulls out two other magazines hidden in the pockets of her backpack. She flips through the pages, every one filled with iconic images of American life— loose hair and color televisions. Roofless cars and apple pastries. Hamburgers, cigarettes, and stacks of music tapes. An expressionless statue carrying a torch. Pancake diners dedicated solely to the breakfasts of the peasant class.
Then Saba takes three handwritten pages from inside the magazine. “What if I told you that Mahtab already wrote to me?” She waves the pages in front of their faces, her eyes full of the exhilaration of knowing something they don’t. “It makes sense that Maman doesn’t call me,” she says as her eyes fall on an advertisement for a long-distance telephone company. “She doesn’t want me to hear Mahtab in the background because everyone thinks I’d be hurt that they chose
her
to go to America.”
“Stop,” says Ponneh, her voice shaking. “I want to go home.”
“Those pages are just your English homework,” says Reza, his gaze never quite meeting Saba’s. “Where’s the envelope? And the stamps?”
She folds the pages one at a time, tucks them together, and places them in the center of the
Life
magazine over an ad for a color television so that they will be out of Ponneh’s careful sight. “Who keeps an envelope anyway? It didn’t have an American postmark. It went through Turkey.”
The ad reads:
You made it number one in America. . . . There’s only one Chromacolor and only Zenith has it.
Number one in America must be the best anywhere. Saba tries to imagine the kind of television Mahtab watches these days. Big, hypnotic. Always in color, with ten channels, the latest shows, and no rules. No need for smuggled videotapes marked “Children’s Cartoons.”
“Do you know what’s number one in America?” Saba says. She tries to sound playful, as if she were making up a game, and when Ponneh plays along just like Mahtab would have, Saba loves her almost as much. She realizes more and more now that replacing her sister will require an impossible balance. Ponneh is like Mahtab in all the right ways: brave, willful, in charge. But just as soon as Saba begins to forget that Ponneh is not Mahtab, Ponneh says something unguarded that Mahtab never would, or she makes a seductive face that the twins don’t know how to make, and Saba breathes out, trying to release the guilt of comparing the two, of loving Ponneh too much. No, she hasn’t replaced Mahtab just yet.
“What?” Ponneh reaches for one of the magazines, her too-light almond eyes sparkling with exaggerated curiosity, as if trying to make up for an earlier disloyalty.
“Harvard,” Saba says, turning back to the
Life
magazine. In this one issue there are three separate mentions of the place. Shahzadeh Nixon’s fairy-tale fiancé went there to study law. And a few pages later, an article about the incoming president starts with the line:
The selection of a new Harvard president ranks in gravity with the elevation of Popes and premiers.
Clearly an important university—a place magical enough, special enough, to be the setting of
Love Story
, a film worshipped by Americans and Iranians alike, and discussed in every one of Saba’s magazines.
A place fit for Mahtab. A name most Tehranis and even some Rashtis recognize.
“Okay,” says Ponneh, putting both hands in her lap with all the resignation of a doctor or a school headmistress. “You can tell us about it if it helps. My mother says it’s a good thing to tell stories.”
“I don’t know,” says Reza, shaking his head. “It’s getting late.”
“Go ahead, Saba jan,” says Ponneh, shooting Reza a warning glance. “I’ll listen.”
Saba beams, but doesn’t reach for the handwritten pages. “Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything,” she lectures importantly, so that Ponneh giggles and shifts in place. “America is complicated. It’s better to just imagine it like a TV show.”
Saba is the only one with a television, a VCR, and a whole set of illegally dubbed and undubbed American programs on tape, which her friends secretly watch with her, mesmerized by the cracked, grainy images; the way people’s lips rarely match the words; the twists and turns and perfect timing of American life. Saba imagines Mahtab’s life in episodes, each as vibrant and mysterious as Shahzadeh Nixon’s magazine spread, and every setback resolved as effortlessly as in a thirty-minute television comedy. She wipes her face one last time, having forgotten the smell of the mud wall or the tickle at the base of her throat. Now she has a story to tell, one that she has memorized over countless wide-awake nights in her bed, and that now Ponneh wants to hear. It begins like this:

The important thing to know about America is that over there every citizen is at least as rich as my baba. But the key is that you have to be a
citizen.
That’s the one thing our relatives in America want most. They talk about it all the time in their letters and on the phone with Baba. My maman and Mahtab are just immigrants now, so they are probably very poor. In a few years they will get their citizenship and they will be rich again. That’s the way it all works. You start off as a taxi driver or a cleaning woman, like the people in
Taxi.
Then you get your citizenship, go to a good university like Harvard, and you become a doctor like in
M*A*S*H
. Then, when you’re done saving the soldiers, you might go to Washington for your medal and, if you’re smart enough and get the best grades, even meet a shahzadeh and get your picture in
Life
magazine. It is all possible.

When Mahtab first arrived in America, she had to get used to the new rules, and that was probably the hardest part for her— because here, in Cheshmeh, the Hafezis are the most important family. But in America, she will have to work her way up. Don’t worry, though, because Mahtab can handle a challenge better than anyone.

Now, here are some things you already know:
First, you know that going to America was a very quick decision for Maman and Mahtab. None of us saw it coming. So it’s fair to say that it was full of last-minute losses: Iranian money being so worthless (if you believe Baba), and degrees from important Iranian colleges so useless because, over there, they have Harvard. And so, in America, Maman has no job and no money. Mahtab’s life is very different now. No more pocketfuls of forgotten toys and spare change. No more shelves bursting with illegal books. No more new dresses to show off to best friends. Probably no more best friends.
The second thing you already know is that in America television is free and music is free, and everyone wears cowboy hats and eats hamburgers for dinner. So even though they’re poor, they have a good life, except for the hamburgers, which Maman thinks are made of garbage. They watch television together every night from their shared bed, which is probably set up in the living room of a tiny apartment—like Baba’s cousins in Texas who wrote asking for money for a bigger house.
During their first week in America, when Mahtab asks Maman why their stews are full of lentils instead of lamb, why she has to join the public library for her books, why they sleep in the same bed, Maman just says, “We haven’t earned anything here.”
Isn’t that just the sort of thing Maman would say? She used to say that to us when she took away one of our toys.
You have to earn it back.
Maman takes a break from cooking dinner to have afternoon tea. She gives a long speech about how she will get a job and Mahtab will go to school, and they will both learn very good English and save money of their own. But Mahtab doesn’t like to hear this, you see. She wants to go back to Cheshmeh and live off Baba’s money and be comfortable. She misses me and wants us to be together again. She doesn’t like writing secret letters, and she thinks it’s unfair that she was chosen to go to America when she could have done just as well in Cheshmeh.
But then Maman comes up with one of those Smart Girl Quests she used to make up for us about working hard and being self-sufficient women. “This life may seem bad, but do you want to know the best part?” she says. “The rule in America is that people get to choose how rich or poor they are. It’s totally a matter of choice.”
You can’t blame Mahtab for being suspicious, but I’ll tell you that what Maman is saying is true. According to Horatio Alger and Abraham Lincoln and the girl from
Love Story
who ended up at Harvard even though she was poor, a brainy girl like Mahtab has every good chance. And so Maman goes on: “Here, smart kids can do anything they want. If they work hard, they can be rich. And that’s the simple way of everything.”
Maman always talked like that. Simple rules. Black and white. I loved that about her because when she was around, I knew exactly what I was supposed to do next. Then Maman swallows a mouthful of tea so hot that Mahtab imagines her insides turning to liquid, her throat and stomach swimming in
chai
, the lump of sugar between her teeth melting like the white sediment in my science experiments. But Maman’s tolerance for heat is magic and she just sighs with pleasure and keeps talking. I love that about her too.
“It’s different here, Mahtab jan,” she explains. “Yes, in Iran it’s good to be smart, get top grades, go to college. Plenty of smart women study and get degrees. But does it matter? You still have to do some things just because you’re a girl.”
“What things?” Mahtab asks, even though she knows.
“Marry, cook, have babies,” Maman answers. “If you want to be a lady doctor, great! As long as you have the clothes washed. The respect doesn’t come from being a doctor, Mahtab jan. It comes from the washing. They pretend it’s not true, but you hear it when you burn dinner because you were busy with a poem, God forbid. Not here, though . . .”
And then Maman reminds her that having her own money is the most important thing a girl can do for herself. She reminds Mahtab about sweet old Khanom Omidi, and how she spends her days tending house and selling her leftover yogurt for pocket money. It’s never very much, but it’s important that she does it. That’s what Maman told us and I’ve seen it myself. Khanom Omidi has hidden pockets sewn into her chadors and in her waistband—a place for her Yogurt Money. This is the name Mahtab and I gave to all secret money ever since the day we saw the old lady’s stash. A name for all the unseen riyals and dollars that you earn or don’t earn, but always,
always
keep hidden away.
“So if I’m the best in school and make my own money,” Mahtab asks, “then everything will be how it was?” Now my sister is starting to understand how things work in America—that factory garb leads to business suits. She should watch more television.
Maman thinks for a moment. Then she pulls out a copy of the
Life
magazine from 1971. She shows off the pictures of the American Shah’s daughter and her pale princeling and she nods.
Yes, yes, yes.
This is why every Iranian dreams of America.
“And then I’ll never have to clean my room?” Mahtab asks.
“You can have a maid,” Maman responds. “They give a discount to lady doctors.”
“And I don’t have to serve
chai
to the mullahs.” Mahtab used to hate that chore.
Maman laughs, because there are no mullahs in America. No mullahs in the street. No mullahs in your house, eating your food. No mullahs whispering about you to your father so that he gets worried and buys you a new, thicker, blacker headscarf.
Then Maman ends the conversation with her usual threats: “But if you don’t work hard, if you play around and get average grades, then you can always go back to Iran and marry one.” Her eyes widen, as if she were telling a ghost story. “You know those mullahs, they snore. And under their turbans, they have thin, greasy hair. They like to throw their big fat arms around your neck when they sleep, and they kiss like dead fish.”
Mahtab shudders. “I don’t want to marry a mullah.”
No one wants that
.
“No one wants that,” Maman says because this is how you teach girls to be independent.
Mahtab says, “I want to be rich and single with nobody telling me what to do.”
And then Maman says something important. Are you listening carefully? This part is critical. She says to Mahtab, “You
will
be, be cause Saba is rich.”
Maybe Mahtab whispers my name just then. You know, sometimes when she’s bored, she reads my letters and makes up stories of our days together.
“All of life is written in the blood”—Maman leans close and taps Mahtab’s nose, identical to mine down to the last bump—“and you and Saba have the same blood. It doesn’t matter where you live.” This is true. How much control does Mahtab really have? How much control do any of us have? It is all predestined like the old fortune-tellers say. Mahtab should know, because she was in the water that day too. And I’ll tell you, she will be insulted when she hears that you crazies think she is dead!
Maman gets up to stir the no-lamb stew. Look at them: my poor mother, my sister. Look how sad they are without me. It’s hard to know how much food to make for only two, or how to keep a conversation going. You need four for a full table. And look at the future that is now planted in Mahtab’s mind: she will be an American shahzadeh in a magazine, with four dresses in as many photos and a quiet, light-skinned man with old money and new thoughts. She has American ambition now, the kind you see in movies about orphans. Now Mahtab is the sort of girl who worries—about money, about love, about her future. There are so many things that America has taught her to want.
The next day Mahtab goes to the library. She finds out about school courses, and entrance tests, and free money from the government, which is how the girl from
Love Story
got to go to college. She fills her mind with all sorts of facts and deadlines and admissions rules—all the same things my high school cousins in Texas have been obsessing over since they arrived there. But most important, she stamps her dreams of glamour and riches with a name. She takes her girlhood goals, her love of books, her childish need for comfort, and her twinly self-hate and wraps them up in a neat little package, sealed tight and sizzling with an iron brand. A name that even the greasy, cumin-scented Iranian man at the gas station will recognize: Harvard.