Things Left Unsaid

Someone I Used to Know

SOMEONE I USED TO KNOW

“Shirin,” Kian Rahimi says, lips parted, his eyes squinting slightly, like he is wondering whether he is mistaken, whether it is really her. Shirin is also taken aback by the image of him before her. In her mind he is always sixteen, baby-faced but beautiful. His face has developed a sharpness to it that it didn’t have back then—his jaw and cheekbones strong and well-defined. It is the strangest sensation, to see someone you once knew very well as a teenager standing before you, matured, as though out of nowhere.

“Hi,” she eventually says. She has imagined this moment many times before and she always says something much grander than hi .

“You know each other?” Millie asks, looking from one to the other.

“Yeah, we went to school together,” Kian says with apparent ease. “Back in Hull.”

Seeing Kian again after all these years makes Shirin regret coming here. Her gut, she knows, is usually right about these things, and she should have listened to it. Being so close to him now brings memories to the surface, up out of her belly, almost spilling out of her throat. Even him saying “we” makes her heart thud wildly and pathetically. All this is made infinitely worse by how nonchalant he sounds now.

“Oh. Small world, I guess?” Millie says, uninterested by this moment that is so monumental to Shirin. She tucks a blond strand of her hair behind her ear before continuing to say, “Well, I’m sure you have lots to chat about…”

And Millie is gone, returning to Henry, and Shirin is left reeling, thinking: Please, for the love of God, don’t leave me alone with this person I used to know.

“Well, hello,” Kian says, beaming. It is an uncomplicated smile. The kind of smile Shirin cannot imagine having. She struggles to smile on cue, her face a permanent frown that she often tries, and fails, to soften. Like now, the tops of her lips are raised upward, but the rest of her face is unmoved. The smile does not touch her eyes because, when she looks at Kian, she does not just see a person she cared so deeply for, she sees all of the shit from her childhood that she has worked so hard to leave behind. Her heart aches, wrestling between the soaring excitement at seeing him after so long and stomach-punching dread that she can no longer pretend to escape her past.

“It’s been a while,” she says, her voice cooler than she feels.

“What are you doing here?”

“I came with Millie. I didn’t know you lived here.” She scratches her neck to have something to do with her hands, and to mask that they are shaking.

Kian tells her that he sometimes hangs out with Henry—because Henry is Dylan’s hometown friend—and that Dylan went to university with Kian. It is a too-coincidental and long-winded connection. What are the chances, she cannot help but think, that these two people from Hull have found themselves in a connecting friendship group ten years later? Isn’t that the whole point of moving away from your hometown, so that things like this don’t happen?

“It’s weird that we’ve not seen each other before, at parties and stuff, when I’ve come down to London,” he muses.

Due to her avoidance of Henry, it is not that weird. But the fact that Kian, of all people, is tenuously linked to her friendship group is. In the past, Shirin attempted to look Kian up on social media, curious to see what he was doing with his life. His Instagram, however, displayed no photos of him, instead showing landscapes lacking in filters so that they looked dull, or his paintings, which Shirin thought were impressive and experimental, almost dizzying if you looked at them for too long. She admired that he had continued with his art. She’s realized how easy it is to lose sight of your passions, of who you were before adulthood kicked in.

“So, you’ve just moved here?” she asks.

“Yeah. I was living in Manchester before. You’ve been here awhile though, right?”

She nods, conscious of every part of her body. Her head bops too aggressively. She makes a mental note to chill the hell out, though that’s easier said than done. “I went to uni here, at Queen Mary’s, and stayed since.” She pauses as though she is thinking, trying to be slower and more considered in her movements. She is attempting to play the role of a cool girl, albeit terribly. “Where’d you go to uni again?” She knows already though, from her aforementioned stalking.

“Glasgow.”

“Right, nice,” she says a little too quickly. She did not pace her response correctly, and there is a short silence before she fills it by blurting, “You’ve lost your accent?” It’s not really a question, though she says it like it is.

He raises an eyebrow, laughs. “I definitely haven’t.” The side of his mouth twitches upward as though he is deliberating about whether he will say what he wants to next. There is a glimmer in his dark eyes, and her insides flip. “Yours hasn’t toned down, though, I see.”

Despite not living in Hull for eight years now, Shirin’s accent has remained, just as strong as it was when she left. People she meets for the first time habitually comment on it, like it is a quirk of hers. Sometimes they do not understand her, sometimes it colors their perceptions of her—they see her as less intelligent because she has a soft drawl and elongates certain words. Kian’s accent, by contrast, sounds neutral to Shirin, like it has been tempered through the years.

She narrows her eyes at him.

“It’s a good thing,” Kian adds. “It reminds me of home.”

She resists the urge to smile—the urge in general to pick up where they left off, which she is realizing would be very easy to do. In her fantasies—or rather nightmares—of this moment, Kian is cold and bitter toward her. They argue. He is not friendly, and perhaps that’s because it’s harder to think of him as he was all those years ago. Perhaps she needed him to be a villain to justify the things she said. Her gaze wanders past his shoulder, toward Millie’s back as she leans into Henry, and other people Shirin does not know well, chatting together.

“What are you doing then? Did you get a job here or something?” she asks.

“I got a place to do an MFA in fine art at Goldsmiths.” His tone is marginally less confident and quieter when he says this. He clears his throat, covering his mouth with his fist.

Her gaze returns to his eyes and she cannot help the real smile then. “That’s amazing. Congratulations. I always knew you were talented.”

He looks away and presses his lips together. It is a somewhat embarrassed, uncertain expression. “Thanks.” He then scrunches his nose before adding, “I know some people say masters’ are pointless, but I think it’ll be good for me. There’s the potential to spend some time abroad, too, which would be sick—and it was partially funded.”

“I don’t think it’s pointless. It’s your passion. It always has been.”

Kian smiles then. It touches his whole face, lights him up entirely. It’s like he needed this validation, this confirmation that he is doing the right thing, from Shirin specifically. His mouth is open, and he’s about to say something, when Hana comes over, as though out of nowhere, sidling her way between them. She is wearing a black leather bustier and red flared trousers, her lips a wine red to match her bottoms. Her skin is buttery smooth. Shirin has never seen Hana with a blemish, even in their late teens at university. Having witnessed Hana’s skin-care cabinet, though, she knows such faultless skin takes supreme effort. It somewhat softens the blow of how gray and lackluster Shirin’s own skin is, despite various The Ordinary serums that she uses.

“I didn’t know you were here yet,” Hana says to Shirin, almost accusatory.

“I just arrived.”

Hana looks at Kian pointedly, then back at Shirin, with an expression that reads What’s going on here? Shirin cannot help but feel a twitch of irrational irritation then, like Hana needs to know—or be involved in—every facet of her life.

“You said you couldn’t come,” Shirin says.

Hana smiles, pleased with herself. She likes to show up unannounced, declining invitations and then appearing suddenly. So Shirin shouldn’t be surprised, really.

At the start of their friendship Shirin found this energizing and unexpected. Now, though, she perceives Hana’s actions as indulgent, as though she always requires special attention, even at a party for people she barely knows. Shirin dislikes herself for thinking such things about her best friend. She thinks there is an ugliness inside her sometimes, some kind of repressed anger that she takes out on other people in her mind.

“I live to surprise. You know me,” Hana says. She touches Shirin’s hair gingerly. “I like the color. It’s very 2015.” On a whim, the night before, Shirin dyed her hair a color that Bleach London calls Awkward Peach. Hana’s words make her question her decision, given it is now 2018. She resists the urge to touch her very dry locks, which are coated in argan oil, in response. Her annoyance must show on her face because Hana backtracks and says, “What I mean is it looks cool.”

The doorbell rings. Kian’s eyes flick to Shirin’s, hold them for a moment, before looking back toward the door. “I better get that,” he says, leaving them.

“So,” Hana begins once he has left. “Aren’t you happy to see me?”

Just looking at Hana, so immaculately put together, results in Shirin straightening out her geometric-patterned wrap dress, which by comparison feels frumpy—like Shirin is going to a garden party, and Hana to a club. Shirin used to dress edgy, though she’d never actually use the word edgy . She doesn’t know when that changed. She tries not to compare herself to others but often cannot help it. Especially when she gets the feeling her friend is also doing it to her, as she does now.

Hana perches herself on the armrest of the sofa and crosses one leg over the other. “God, have you seen them? Could they get a room?” she says with derision.

Shirin turns to see that Henry and Millie are kissing. His arms are around her waist, and hers are wrapped around his neck. They are the same height, which makes the kissing appear more intimate.

She does not know what to say. Ordinarily she would join in, to appease Hana, but she is too wired, her heart beating too quickly. She feels a scary mix of wanting to take flight and wanting to freeze. Seeing Kian has made her feel so unsure of herself, unsure of anything. What are the chances of him being here, in her world, with her friends, after all this time? It’s like she has reverted to being an unhappy teenager, and she needs to be alone to process it all. She knows that not even Hana, who she loves but who also sometimes annoys her, can assuage her anxiety right now. So she shrugs and says, “I need to pee,” before leaving the room, allowing no time for her friend to reply.

She does a solitary tour of the house and finds herself in the kitchen, looking out onto the garden. People are smoking by the patio, and at the far end of the garden is a summerhouse. She opens her phone and sees that Uber has surge charging and so she decides to stay.

Tonight is a balmy summer evening and the sky is black, pollution providing a mask over the night stars. She makes her way outside for some air. Voices from this party, and other people in other houses around Brixton having parties too, spill out into the gardens. Occasionally there are the sirens of ambulances and police cars, and it is only now that Shirin is alone, with her heart finally beating more steadily, that she notices them.

Unthinkingly she finds herself by the summerhouse. Phoebe, her friend from back home, has one and it has always struck Shirin as a middle-class addition to a house. The glass doors are left slightly ajar, the inside unlit. As she enters, her phone’s torch illuminates the interior of the room. She shines it around the walls to find a light switch, and the bulb gives off a soft, dim light. It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust to her surroundings.

Against the wall is a white corporate-looking desk with gray legs and a clashing pine chair. The desk is bare, except for a Sports Direct mug containing pens and pencils. Boxes are stacked against the opposite wall. She peeks inside one of them. It contains various vinyl records, and atop the pile is Fiona Apple, The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do . She picks it up and runs her hand over the sleeve. It is covered in a thin layer of dust, which she brushes off with her fingertips and instantly regrets, wiping her now-dirty hand on her dress. She remembers listening to “Every Single Night” on repeat one summer when she was still at university, with an unrequited crush and feeling as though she might die from the lack of attention. She remembers thinking of Kian during that time, too, wondering what it might have been like if things were different between them.

“That’s her best album,” a voice says behind her.

She jumps, dropping it. The record lands clumsily back in the box. She turns and Kian is standing in the doorway. He has put on a navy denim jacket, and she immediately thinks he is one of few people who wear double denim well. He looks as surprised to see her as she is to see him.

“Sorry,” she says. “The door was open.”

“You not enjoying the party?”

“No, I am. I just needed a bit of a break.”

He nods like he understands. Stacks of painted canvas lean against the side of the desk.

“This is a really nice space.” She gestures around her.

“The former owner was an author. This was apparently her writing space,” he says.

“And you use it as a studio now?”

He nods. “Dylan’s parents bought him the house, and he’s been quite generous in letting me use it for my work.”

“Of course they did,” she says, her voice thick with derision.

Kian’s laugh is short and quick. She is struck by how different he seems now from the boy she used to skip class with, all those years ago. That boy was quiet, angry, and wore his emotions plainly on his face. The Kian in front of her is so much more confident; he stands straight and laughs, so easy and carefree. Age has refined him, whereas she wonders if she has regressed. She had such passion back then, about everything. She gently chews her tongue to gain clarity, to remain firmly in the moment.

Above his desk is a painting of a woman, nude, lying on her front, her arm just covering her breasts, her hair in two space buns. The subject is looking off into the distance, her eyes soft, as though they are about to flutter shut. Her expression is unguarded, like this is a shot between poses. Her lips are parted, like she is about to breathe out a sigh. The brushstrokes are both soft and strong in places, the paint heavy, overlapping different shades to make her olive skin, which is textured and slightly pink on the tops of her cheeks. There are pops of color in unexpected places, blended into natural tones. Surrounding her is a meadow, with bursts of pink, red, and orange flowers in the background.

His style has evolved into Impressionism. There is an ethereal quality to these portraits, quite different from his older work on his Instagram, which is bolder and sharp in color. When she goes to her friends’ gallery launches she rarely sees art like this, though she is no real art enthusiast. Their works tend to be abstract or conceptual and she often does not get them, which makes her feel dense, because everyone around her seems to. It is not surprising, looking around now, that Kian is being funded to continue his work at one of the best art universities in the country.

“You’re really good,” she says.

“Thanks.” His reply is quick. He does not take compliments well and visibly wants to move away from this topic of conversation. That this is still the case for him—that this hasn’t changed over the years—is interesting to her.

“You’re a proper artist now you know, Kian. It’s very cool—accept it.” She says this both because she means it and to make him more uncomfortable so that they can both be uncomfortable, not just her.

He lets out a laugh again. He looks boyish, up close, more how she remembers him from school, his dark eyebrows softly framing his eyes. But now he has well-groomed facial hair, which shapes his face, creating more angles, making his high cheekbones more pronounced. “I’m a proper artist, am I?” He shakes his head. “It feels pretentious to say it aloud, to be honest.”

“Well, you are one, I’m afraid. Pretentious or not.”

She gives him a close-lipped smile when he asks, “What was up with that girl talking to you earlier?”

“What girl?”

“The one wearing a corset.”

“Oh,” she says. “Hana?”

“Yeah, her. The way she talked to you… I mean, I might be wrong, but I don’t know—it was weird. Does she always do that?”

She waves her hand in an it’s nothing way. “That’s just Hana, that’s how she is with everyone when she’s in a mood. She’s not always like that.” This is true; sometimes Hana is considerate and caring. Other times, when she is feeling insecure, she takes it out on the people closest to her. She has difficulty hiding the ugly parts of herself, but at least she is honest.

Kian does not look convinced, which makes Shirin defensive. It’s one thing for her to have the occasional negative thought about Hana, but it’s not okay for other people, not when they don’t know Hana like she does.

“Well, you look really good. I like your hair,” he says.

She is still annoyed at him, so she looks at him blankly, even though his face is coloring ever so slightly. He does not backtrack, though, as she expects him to, as she would have done in his position.

In the end she shrugs, despite her now-quickening heart, which she wishes would shut up and get a life.

“I don’t really take notice of what Hana says. I know she doesn’t mean it anyway.” The first part is a lie, but one she wants to be true. Perhaps if she says it enough times it will be. “You should probably get back to the party. People will be wondering where you are.”

“Is it bad that I don’t want to?” He is looking at his hands now, twirling the plain silver band on his right ring finger.

It is rare to see men wearing jewelry. She is reminded of summers spent in Iran, with her maman bozorg taking her to jewelry shops and haggling with vendors to buy her gold. It is something that in England appears extravagant. But in her motherland, jewelry is an investment, like putting your money in stocks. Shirin keeps her jewelry in a box underneath her underwear drawer: thousands of pounds’ worth in her shabby bedroom. Today she is wearing a gold chain, which is textured like rope and shimmers in the light. Though it is 18K gold, it is such a bright gold it appears fake. Her baba bozorg gave it to her before he passed away.

“Why? Everyone is here for you,” she says. She understands why she might not want to return, but not Kian, whose party it is.

“It’s a bit much in there.” He walks over to the desk, opens the drawer, and retrieves a bottle of whiskey. He smiles. “You fancy it?”

The corners of her lips move downward. “Probably not.”

“See, you might have clung to the accent, but you’ve lost your northern roots,” he jokes, raising one eyebrow.

“I’m trying not to drink,” she says, before pressing her palms against the wall.

“Oh,” he says, no doubt feeling like a dick and that maybe she’s an alcoholic. Or that she’s practicing her religion—their religion. He is not, and she is not. She is on new antidepressants that do not mix well with alcohol.

“I’m just… I’m trying to be good,” she says, not wanting to go into it.

He puts the bottle back in the drawer.

“Well, sit with me for a bit then?” he says. His hazel eyes are wide and hopeful, and she thinks she will disappoint him, but what comes out of her mouth is, “All right then.”

Later they are seated on the floor, their backs against the only wall that is clear of furniture. His shoulder is touching hers and she is acutely aware of it there. Fiona Apple is playing on his record player. They selected Tidal from his stack, and “Criminal” plays now. Her voice is warm, the instrumentals both fuzzy and deliberate. They talk about music and Kian speaks about his favorite artists—so many that Shirin jokes they cannot all be his favorite, that you cannot have that many favorites or else the word is redundant; you must just like them, she says. He disagrees and is almost bashful as he tries to defend his point. He reminds her of a puppy in his enthusiasm now; it is an endearing, familiar quality.

And yet. Being next to Kian brings back long-buried memories. She is pushing them down, biting the inside of her mouth, to focus on that acute pain instead. It almost works, though it is like putting your hand over a leaking tap: small forgotten moments are at risk of escaping like trickling water, and there is only so long she can hold it for.

“Why do you have vinyl anyway?” she asks. Her voice is light and she surprises herself by how good a facade she can put on around people; how what she is thinking is often so different from what comes out of her mouth.

“Why not? It sounds better, doesn’t it?”

“It’s different,” she muses. “Feels like more of an experience.” He smiles at her. “Exactly.” He leans over her to turn the volume up. They shut their eyes and sway slightly to the chorus, to the rises in Fiona Apple’s singing. Shirin opens her eyes and watches Kian. His eyes are still shut, and he has a flicker of a smile on his lips. His head is tipped back, and she thinks he is a man now; the years have made him at ease with himself, though there are glimmers of who he was when she knew him. She tries to erase such thoughts from her mind at the same time the song finishes. His eyes open and she looks away quickly. He turns the volume down.

“How long has it been since we last saw each other?” he asks.

Somewhere in the recesses of her brain she knew this would come up, that it was between them, hanging in the air, cramping the space in the summerhouse.

“I don’t know,” she lies. “It was just before we went into college, so I guess ten years, maybe?”

She is reminded of the days wearing polyester trousers that chafed, stiff white polo shirts, and shiny black sweatshirts. Of being seated boy, girl, boy, girl in every class and of all the boys in her year being knobheads, calling her various names, all nasty, with little consequence. Ten years have passed. So much time—and yet she feels herself being pulled back there so viscerally.

“Wow,” he says, and then turns to smile at her. It is a sad smile. “What have you been doing with yourself then? You got out, like you always wanted to.”

Her throat is dry, but she gulps anyway. “I work in publishing now.”

His expression changes at this; the slight sadness in his eyes is taken away and they are bright again, happy for her. He congratulates her on getting her dream job, on living the life she always said she wanted. “Not that I ever doubted you would. You were always determined.”

“I’m assuming you did study art at A-level then, in the end?”

He nods. “I did it at uni too.”

“Did you? I don’t know how you wangled that with your parents, but I’m very glad you did. I was being serious when I said you’re very talented, Kian. Obviously.”

“I wouldn’t have had the confidence to do it if it wasn’t for you, you know.” His voice is quiet and his words make her feel very warm.

They are skirting the obvious—around everything that is unsaid between them—and she is not sure what is worse: this feeling of being on edge in case it comes up, or just getting it over with.

She looks at the desk drawer, where the whiskey is, and wonders if she should have accepted his offer. This conversation would be easier if she had. She imagines pouring a shot into the bottle’s cap, bringing it to her lips, the icy liquid spilling onto her dress, ever so slightly. She can taste it, sharp, warm, searing, burning her throat, warming her belly.

Memories of them being called in by their head teacher, of their parents getting involved, of cold words exchanged in the heat of the moment. Everything, and then nothing.

He leans his head back against the wall, his profile appealing, the slight bump on the arch of his nose familiar to her. His complexion is darker than hers, likely because his family is from a different part of Iran than hers.

“It’s weird how we were the only non-white people in our year,” he says. “I’ve been thinking about that more lately, how messed up that was. For us, anyway.” He shakes his head. He is giving her an opening. But it is okay for him, she thinks, he has had something to drink, whereas she is sober. And she talks about her race enough at work; she is part of too many initatives trying to address the lack of diversity in publishing—labeled “POC” or “underrepresented,” everything other than Iranian—and she doesn’t want to go into it now, not even with Kian. Especially not with Kian. She also doesn’t want to leave. She wants to stay right here next to him.

She weakly acknowledges what he’s said, murmuring something like, “Yeah, it is weird.”

“I was sorry to hear about your parents, by the way,” he says. There is a slight frown on his face, and his eyebrows draw together once more, in concern or pity. He is so bold, she thinks, to bypass small talk and reach into her, bringing out all the things she would rather not talk about, things she doesn’t even speak about with Hana, not really.

“It’s a good thing, you don’t have to say you’re sorry.” Their separation was a long time coming. Her parents always fought—proper shouting matches and, growing up, she would put her headphones in, crank the volume as loud as it would go, and stay in her bedroom until it was over. Often, then, she would wish they had left her with her grandparents in Tehran. She wonders if her life would have been simpler if they had. Maybe she would have felt what it was like to be loved, rather than feeling like a burden her parents were obliged to love.

She wants to ask Kian about his family, about his brother, and how he’s doing now, but she hasn’t the words to broach this subject after so long. She is not as bold as he is.

There is silence, in which they can only hear their breaths. They look at each other and it is like they are speaking without words. She is thinking she wants to kiss him, and she knows he is thinking he would like to kiss her. Like magnets, they move closer unthinkingly and they are soon inches from each other. She can feel his warm breath against her face now. A long-forgotten flutter in her stomach returning. It is so long forgotten that she wants to run away from it, to prevent any buried feelings from the past rising to the surface. Her eyes move from his hazel eyes to his full lips, which are parted.

“Maybe he’s in here,” a posh voice outside says.

“Imagine if he’s in there, painting at his own party,” another male voice says.

There is laughter.

It is the saving grace she didn’t know she needed until it arrived. She moves away and stands up, smoothing her dress down. “I best be going anyway,” she says quickly, slinging her bag onto her back.

“Right, of course. It was nice to see you, Shirin. Take care.”

He looks down for a moment, then up again, and there is something in his eyes she cannot quite describe but knows very well. It reminds her of the old Kian, the Kian from 2008 who got into so much trouble for her and who she treated so poorly.