It was deeply uncomfortable.
Someone was playing with my hair.
“Darius,” Mom said. “Wake up. Time for dinner.”
I sat up and banged my knee on the table, rattling the bowl of tokhmeh and knocking over my empty teacup.
“Sorry. I’m awake.”
“Come on. Let’s eat something and then you can go back to sleep.”
“Okay.”
Mamou had made ash-e reshteh, which is a sort of Persian noodle soup.
It was not my favorite, but I couldn’t tell her that.
We all scooped soup up with our crusty Persian bread, while Babou interviewed Laleh in Farsi. She kept up fairly well, though she switched to English a few times, like for “meatball sub” and “airport.”
She seemed to be telling Babou the entire saga of our journey through the space-time continuum.
I didn’t know where she got the energy.
I kept nodding off, shaking my head, until Mom finally said, “Darius, why don’t you go to bed? It’s okay.”
“Um.”
“It’s the time difference, maman,” Mamou said. “It’s okay. You can go to bed.”
This is why I hate time travel.
Mamou led me back to my room.
“Thank you for getting the robe for me, Darioush.”
“Oh. It was mostly Sohrab. I just went along.”
“Babou says you are going to play football tomorrow.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m happy for you. I’m glad you made a friend already.”
“Yeah,” I said. I had made a friend.
And I was actually looking forward to soccer.
I really was.
“Me too.”
SOCCER/NON-AMERICAN FOOTBALL
By the time I woke up the next morning, Mamou had already taken Mom, Dad, and Laleh into town.
The kitchen table was still laden with breakfast: a basket of toasted bread, bowls of nuts, jars of jam, a platter of cheese, and a few slices of some sort of melon. Babou was in his room with the door closed, and the house was quiet and still.
I wondered if mornings were always like this in my grandparents’ house.
