Pillow Talk
PILLOW TALK
When Shirin shuts her eyes, memories of the night before creep into the recesses of her mind. She remembers how she and Kian struggled to sleep. They lay in bed, under the duvet, the sheets smooth and crisp against her bare legs, her arms, which were outside the covers, cool from the winter chill. Kian lay with his arms behind his head. His biceps looked good, and she considered how different he had looked at school, how slender he was then compared to now. She ran her finger along the tattoo on his arm, and he shifted it so she could see it better.
“It’s a Hafiz quote,” he said. She pulled a face, about to lightly rip into him, but he raised a finger to stop her. “Before you say anything—I was eighteen and drunk.”
“Who gets a Hafiz quote when drunk?” she exclaimed. “That’s even worse than if you got it earnestly.” He pushed her playfully, and she bounced back up to read it properly. “What does it say?”
“The sun never says to the Earth, ‘You owe me.’ Look what happens with a love like that, it lights up the whole sky.”
“That’s beautiful.”
He was almost bashful and shrugged, putting both his hands back behind his head. “I was young. And to be honest I later learned that it wasn’t even a real quote from him.”
Shirin shrugged. “That doesn’t matter. It means something to you, though, doesn’t it?”
“Not really, I was just being pretentious,” he said. Shirin didn’t believe him but didn’t push it. “How are things at work now? Last time we spoke you said you were struggling.”
She finds it hard to articulate why the things that bother her at Hoffman increasingly get to her so much. Aloud, they sound small, insignificant, like she is making a big deal out of nothing. But the little things build up inside her. It damages her soul and she is tired of it.
So she told him everything. She told him about Florence—about how she is in competition with Shirin but already has a head start. That she took Shirin’s project from her, though it was her manager’s suggestion. She told him that she is often expected to be a diversity and inclusion officer, even though the only “experience” she has in the role is that she is Iranian, as though her simply not being white means she can speak for every ethnic minority, every LGBTQ+ person, every working-class person, every disabled person—even people who encompass all of these categories. “It’s too much pressure,” she told him. “My chest feels so tight sometimes. It’s only really been during Christmas, going back to Tehran and seeing my maman bozorg, that I’ve been able to breathe again, to wake up and not feel this dread.”
He stroked her back, a look of concern on his face. “You should leave,” he said.
“I can’t.”
He looked confused, his dark brows scrunched downward. “Why not?”
“It’s my dream,” she said.
“Well, dreams can change. Is it still your dream?”
“I don’t know. It isn’t always this bad. I used to really enjoy it—like, I’d get up excited to go to work at the beginning. I love editing and brainstorming book ideas and speaking to authors. It’s the other things, like the microaggressions and structural issues, that taint it all for me.”
Her job is like a relationship that she knows she should leave but can’t. Every time she considers quitting and moving back home or finding a job in a new field, she cannot help but think how ungrateful she is. How there are thousands of people who want her job—that she was one of them, as a new graduate. “I don’t know if it’s because I’m depressed, you know? Like maybe that’s the reason nothing in my life is what I want it to be. I have everything I once wanted, and it’s not making me happy.”
“I mean, it could be. But it could also be that what you wanted isn’t what you want anymore,” he offered.
“That feels even scarier. Because then I have no idea what I want at all.” She thought Kian saw the sadness within her, though also her reluctance to discuss it further. “It’s fine, honestly.”
“I got the Hafiz quote to feel something. I was acting out because of my brother,” Kian said suddenly. “I wasn’t even drunk. That was a lie.”
She looked up at him and frowned. “What do you mean?” He sighed, opened his mouth to speak, but then shut it again. He shifted his position on the bed so that he was sitting straighter and was able to look at her directly.
“You knew about my brother back then,” he began. She nodded.
“I didn’t tell you the truth about it all at the time.”
She noticed a familiar look in his eyes. He was deciding whether to tell her the whole truth or a more palatable version of it. She knew this because she also presents different versions of herself, depending on who she is talking to.
“You didn’t?” she said.
“No, but now I want to.”