Chapter 23
Earthy Brown
I left a bowl of ph? tái for Baba warm on the stove before I went to bed.
Chef V?ong so graciously wrote down the names of the dishes and what they were on each food container.
The flavor strangely reminded me of the yalanji Mama used to make.
The taste isn’t anywhere near the same, but something about the dish itself feels like home.
When I wake up the next day, the noodle soup is still on the stove, but it’s half eaten, which makes me smile. The bedroom door is open, meaning Baba left early.
After that dinner at Chef V?ong’s, I’ve started thinking more about food, the dishes Mama used to make.
Creating a Syria in New York. I think Jamie has the same thought to cook as well because a few days later during our lunch in the art studio, he comes with two pieces of Tupperware filled with food.
“I made stir-fry last night.” He proudly presents it to me where we’re sitting in our usual place at the back of the classroom. “Try it.”
I stare at the assortment of vegetables in their bright colors and the shiny pink shrimp laid expertly over white rice.
“This is a long way from your sad chicken breast. I’m impressed.”
He laughs and pushes one of the Tupperware pieces toward me. “Yeah, and I made a lot. An entire tub, actually. I can’t finish it on my own, so please help.”
I stare at him, something gnawing at my insides. “Are you feeding me?”
He rolls his eyes. “What? I can’t feed you?”
I poke my tongue against my cheek. He holds my gaze with a determined expression, as if daring me to argue.
I know what he’s doing, and the bruised part of my soul starts weeping. He’s rubbing a healing balm over the wound that’s been ripped open for ages now. I think about the times I was at Alexis’s house, with her salads and breads.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
He relaxes, his happy smile coming back. “Thank you.”
It doesn’t make sense why he’s thanking me, but I don’t say anything and take the stir-fry.
My appetite has been slowly coming back.
But now Jamie is making food for me as well, I want to return the favor.
I think I want to recreate the memories I’d almost forgotten.
I want to make something. So I ask Baba if I can do the grocery shopping, and he gives me some money.
I go to the store we always go to, beside our apartment building, and walking through the aisles fills me with a sudden rush of nostalgia about when Amal and I would come here with Mama.
I get what I need and visit the halal butcher for some chicken and meat.
On Sunday, when the world is still caught in the darkness of sleep, I pad toward the kitchen and take out Mama’s recipe book she put in the drawer beside the utensils. Her beautiful handwriting greets me, and I can’t help the smile on my lips.
She told me these recipes were her mother’s. Leafing through, I settle on making keshk, a yogurt-based breakfast soup we eat in Syria during the winter. And now with the cold weather, I think Jamie would like it.
Baba hears me working in the kitchen and shuffles toward me, his eyes wide, but when he sees me, they dim a fraction.
“All good?” he asks, and I nod.
It doesn’t take long to be done, and I tear pieces of pita bread into two bowls before pouring the steamy soup over them. I inhale the sour yogurt mixed with the fried garlic, and it warms me to my toes and my stomach grumbles.
I go for seconds and thirds. Even Baba eats two bowls.
The next day, I bring it in a Tupperware for Jamie during lunch, my heart in my throat.
He stares at the Tupperware, lips parted before glancing up at me. “What’s this?”
“I don’t know if you’ve ever had Syrian food before,” I say hesitantly, and he shakes his head. “Mom used to make this for us for breakfast during the winter.” I take out a bag of pita bread and tell him how to prepare it.
“You’re remembering,” he says with wonder.
I can’t help the smile in my voice. “It felt like she was with me.”
Tuesday morning before I go to school, he sends me a picture of a red bowl filled to the brim with keshk.
Jamie: I’m obsessed.
Jamie: thank you
It makes my heart expand to three times its size, and those feelings I’ve been firmly ignoring escape from their confines before I push them back.
I open my messages with Amal.
Me: hey what did you eat today?
She answers when I’m nearly at the school.
Amal: biryani
Me: recipe?
Amal: you cooking?
Me: I will be attempting
She sends me the link to the recipe followed by call me if you run into any issues.
When I get to English class, Jamie is already there, and he perks up when he sees me. I walk past Alexis, and we make eye contact, but she looks away. A dull weight drops in my stomach, and I think that’s that.
The world moves slower in December, frost overtaking banisters and branches.
It feels as if I’m standing in the eye of the storm, knowing if I step toward the whirling winds, it’ll take me away.
I’ve drawn one other mural of Mama trying to find her blessing in New York, with faded jellyfish surrounding her and her colors disappearing from parts of her arms and legs.
“This feels like a modern Mona Lisa,” one video Jamie sends me says. “There’s a sad determination on her expression, but it’s still determined. I think she’s somewhere the ocean can’t hear her. Or the jellyfish, but she’s doing everything she can to find them.”
Jamie: do you have anything this afternoon?
It’s a Saturday morning, and I’m going over the notes I wrote for chemistry and comparing them with Jamie’s. Baba is at the gas station, and Amal called me this morning to tell me about the room she’s preparing for me.
Me: no. why?
Jamie: wait let me call you
My phone rings a second later, and I stare at it, the noise strange in this quiet, lonely apartment.
“So you’re going to find this very funny,” Jamie begins when I answer. His voice is so near, it makes goose bumps run all over my arms.
“What happened?”
“Bà Ngo?i is here,” he says brightly. “And I planned to have dinner with her and tell her I converted. But guess what?”
“What?”
“I told her as soon as I saw her.”
I press my lips together.
“I couldn’t keep it in!” he exclaims, and I hear feet shuffling like he’s pacing back and forth. “Mom and Dad were still at work. I got her from the airport. We were home alone, and I didn’t know if I would have a chance like this, and I didn’t know if I’d chicken out later, so I just told her.”
I draw a daisy in the corner of my notebook. “Well, what did she say?”
He sighs deeply. “She was surprised. Shocked, maybe. I don’t know. I was seeing everything and nothing at the same time. She went to put her stuff in her room, and then I made us tea, and she asked me questions. I think it went well. But she wants to meet you.”
I straighten up so fast, I nearly get whiplash. “What?”
“I told her all about you. And she wants to meet you. So would you care to have a late lunch with us?”
I stare at my notebook, the letters jumbling.
“Jihad?”
“I—I—why?”
“Well, I couldn’t stop gushing about you, and I think she thinks we’re dating.”
Heat creeps up to the roots of my hair.
“I told her we’re not,” he rectifies quickly. “But she still wants us to have a meal together. Please? Trust me, she’s really cool, and I know you’ll love her.”
“I don’t doubt that,” I whisper. “I’m just worried she won’t like me.”
He laughs loudly. “That’s impossible. Would you meet us at Chef V?ong’s?”
I swallow hard. “Okay.”
“Three p.m.”
“Sure,” I say faintly.
From everything Jamie told me about his grandmother, she’s a force to be reckoned with. I didn’t have the opportunity to know my grandmothers, both of them long gone in Syria. I wonder how it would have been if they were alive.
I settle on hand-me-down jeans from Amal that have white daisies sewn on one leg and an oversize gray collared jumper that hangs loosely around my frame.
It’s freezing outside with no chance of snow, like New York has solidified.
I put on my boots and coat and leave, sending a message to Baba that I’m out.
He replies with a thumbs-up when he sees it.
I pass by parts of my mural, filling my eyes with them. I’ve drawn everything about Mama, and now I’m coming to the final stage. For the reason she was gone and taken away.
A light flickers in my brain when I’m on the subway. I don’t have to give her the ending she got. I could give her a new one. I could make it better than what happened to her.
I get off at the station with a newfound fire burning in my heart. The streets are beautiful, all adorned with lights and ornaments, and I pass the Christmas tree in Washington Square Park.
When I reach Chef V?ong’s restaurant, I see Jamie is already there.
He’s in deep conversation with the older woman sitting opposite him.
Her hair is raven black, caressing her chin.
Other than the wrinkles around her eyes, her skin is flawless and her lips bright red.
She wears a white wool dress, and I wouldn’t have guessed that this is his bà ngo?i who runs a whole farm and has, as he told me, yanked birthing calves out of their mothers with her bare hands.
I heat up under my coat, and Jamie notices me standing outside before waving enthusiastically at me. I feel their eyes on me when I climb up the small steps and walk into the restaurant.
“Jihad!” Chef V?ong exclaims as the warmth of the restaurant engulfs me. “Happy holidays and welcome!”
“Thank you.” I nod warmly at him. “You too.”
Jamie stands abruptly when I come closer to the table. I can’t help but think this feels like meeting your boyfriend’s parents. Or in this case, his beloved grandmother.
“Hi, I mean, salam alaykum,” he says eagerly.
I smile. “Hi, I mean, wa alaykum elsalam.”
I turn to Bà Ngo?i, who’s watching me with an interested expression.
“Hello, Mrs. Bennet.” I extend my hand to shake hers. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”