The Brevity of Roses Page 3

  He sneered. “Pop psychology.”

  “Yes,” she said, smiling. “I thought so too.”

  Jalal looked up from his plate. “So, Meredith, did you work in Iran?”

  She shook her head. “I visited only once. Briefly.”

  “I am surprised you learned the language for only one visit.”

  “Actually, I didn’t. Linguistics was my degree emphasis.”

  “I am impressed.”

  Embarrassed, she felt the need to explain. “I don’t speak Farsi well.”

  “I do not speak Danish at all,” he told her.

  Until she caught the quirk at the corner of his mouth, she thought he mocked her. She smiled. A man with a sense of humor always intrigued her.

  “Tell me,” he said, “how did you become interested in anthropology?”

  She opened her mouth to respond, then paused. Though she had always known the answer, she had no memory that any non-academic had ever bothered to ask her the question. “I was raised in a ... sheltered environment—racist, to be honest—and I struggled with that. In my heart, I felt that despite our varying skin colors, religions, cultures, our commonalities outweighed those differences. I think I just needed to find the truth.”

  “And what did you find?”

  “My instincts were right.”

  He gazed into the distance for a moment, as if considering her statement. “But, men and women, in all cultures, are quite different from each other,” he said. “Do you agree?”

  “I’m not sure I do.”

  For the second time, his face registered equal parts surprise and amusement. He pushed his plate aside, picked up his glass, and eased back in his chair. “You are wrong, Meredith.” He swallowed the last of his wine and set the glass on the table. “For example, the way we handle sexual attraction. Whereas I am quite open with my desire, you are drinking far more wine than you ever do at lunch, and hoping the effect does not wear off before I take you to bed—because if it does, you will never have the nerve to allow us that pleasure.”

  He had read her perfectly. She had done her best to drown her cultured reserve, but she would never admit it. Instead, she slid aside her glass and looked him in the eye. She smiled. “Let’s go,” she told him.

  Jalal signaled for the check.

  Meredith lay next to Jalal. Through the open window, she watched twilight smudge into night. They had spent the dregs of the afternoon and the full of the evening in her bed, and now, though her body was deliciously relaxed, her mind zinged. Shocked—finally—that she had brought this stranger into her home, she tallied what little she knew about him.

  He had paid for her lunch; he had driven her home in his Lexus; he dressed well, wore a TAG Heure watch and his messenger bag was Gucci, so he certainly had the appearance of money. But what did that prove? He could be a gigolo, or whatever they were called now. Boy toy? It was entirely possible he had been—or still was—the companion of another wealthy woman who lavished him with gifts. He was charming and seemed educated, but then so was Ted Bundy. My lord!

  She glanced over at him. His eyes were closed, but she sensed he was not asleep, and if he was, what did it matter? She had too many questions. “Jalal?”

  “Mm-hmm?”

  “Were you born here, in America?”

  “No.”

  “When did you immigrate?”

  He yawned. “We left Iran soon after the revolution, but we lived for about a year with relatives in Lebanon, and then four years in France. We came to America twelve years ago. I was eighteen.”

  So there! She was not twice his age.

  Still, you are old enough to be—Meredith hushed that voice again by asking if he emigrated with his parents.

  “Yes,” he said, “and two brothers, four sisters, and one grandfather.”

  “Where does your family live?”

  “My grandfather has since died. The rest of my family lives in Seattle.”

  “Do you see them often?”

  “No. My brothers and sisters are all married with numerous children. I am not missed.” He rolled to his side, facing her. “And, before you ask, I have never been married, nor do I have any children.”

  Where does your money come from was what she almost blurted out. Before she could think how to rephrase the question tactfully, he spoke again.

  “I am a computer genius,” he said. “I have more money than Bill Gates.”

  “Really?”

  He laughed and snuggled up to her. “Of course not, but if you let me get a little sleep, I will tell you the whole boring tale over breakfast.”

  His answers had not stilled her mind. She had failed to ask him the right questions. What answer might he have given if she had asked why he did not dismiss her on sight, as other men his age would have done? Or how often, at first meeting, he took a woman home after lunch and stayed for breakfast.

  Or what he really thinks of a woman who allows that, offered her mental mother.

  Funny, this situation should shock her. After all, fall into bed first, get to know each other later, if ever, was typical of her generation, the “love” generation. Though, to be honest, she had barely claimed membership in that before she met Stephen. And her afternoon with Jalal bore no resemblance to that meeting.

  The first time she saw Stephen had been at graduate school when she ran into him—literally. Late for class, as usual, she had burst through an exit of Denton Hall and nearly knocked him down the steps. As it was, she scattered the papers he carried. She apologized and tried to help in their retrieval, but he only laughed and waved her on.

  “You’re obviously in a hurry,” he said.

  She felt worse that he had taken it so well and apologized again before turning to leave.

  “What’s your name?” he called after her.

  “Meredith Dahlberg.”

  “I’ll look you up,” he said.

  And he had.

  Stephen, seven years her senior, with his hair and beard grown halfway between Ivy League and counterculture, amazed her by how much they had in common. For a start, he was a PhD candidate in the anthropology department. They talked for hours—before classes, after classes, on the common, in the coffee shop—and soon they talked late into the night, smoking pot or drinking wine. Afterward they lay curved and layered together like an intricate jade carving. These details, she kept from her parents for as long as possible. Although her father approved of Stephen’s lineage, and her mother found him charming, they both would have voiced displeasure at their daughter behaving like one of those damned, immoral hippies.

  Meredith had savored a secret pleasure in her acts of rebellion.

  Aware of Jalal, even in her sleep, Meredith woke several times during the night. Each time, before dozing off again, she worried about how to deal with the situation in the morning. Finally, though it was still dark, she slid carefully out of bed, trying not to disturb him. Minutes later, he joined her in the shower. Good lord. She could blame the wine for her irresponsible behavior yesterday, but now she was completely sober, standing inches from him—naked. His fingertips touched her lips, traced the curve of her throat, and slipped lower still. Mmmm, yes.

  As dawn’s light washed rosy gold over her kitchen, Jalal brewed the tea and cooked their omelets. Due to her lack of culinary talents, she had volunteered to make toast. She carried it to the table and sat down. “You promised to tell me about your work,” she told him.

  “Ah, yes, my credentials.” He paused to slip the second omelet from the pan. “My father is a successful businessman, my grandfather was even more so. Their connections enabled them to move some of their assets out of the country before the revolution. When the time came, they paid my tuition at university. I got my MBA, and then,” he spread his arms wide in a grand gesture, “I went out into the world.” He gave a wry grimace. “New York City, actually.” He set their plates on the table and took a seat opposite hers.

  “Where did you work in New York?” she asked. />
  For a moment, he only looked out the window, watching the hummingbirds at the feeder. Finally, he picked up his fork. “Crain-Harris,” he said. “I was good at it, but I hated the work. It was not what I had wished for myself.”

  “What did you wish for yourself?”

  He paused for another thirty seconds, then looked directly at her. “I wanted to be a supermodel.”

  Struck silent, she debated his seriousness. With his looks, not for a second did she doubt he could have been a model, but …

  He laughed. “Oh, the look on your face.”

  “Well, not because I didn’t think you—”

  “A writer,” he said, “a poet. I wanted to write.”

  A poet, imagine that. She took a bite of her omelet and waited for him to tell her more. He said nothing. She looked up to find him gazing out the window again, so she waited still. The silence grew longer than she could stand. “And now you’re here in California,” she blurted.

  “Indeed,” he replied. “I warned you my life story would bore you.”

  She kicked herself for opening her mouth, for giving him the out. Why had she let him skip over years of his life without telling her anything that happened during them? Now, he thought she simply had no interest.

  “And you, Meredith? Have you always lived here in Coelho?”

  “What? No. But, Jalal, I didn’t mean to—”

  “Have you always lived alone in this house?”

  With a sigh, she accepted he would tell her nothing more about his past that morning. “No,” she said, “I wasn’t always here alone. I was married for thirteen years … to a fellow anthropologist, actually. His name was Stephen.” She bit her lip, surprised at her recklessness in saying his name, calling up the ghost in her life.

  Jalal refilled their cups. “Why are you no longer with this ‘fellow anthropologist’?”

  She studied his face. He had asked the question gently, almost as though he anticipated the answer. “He died,” she said, then lowered her gaze to her teacup as though she might divine some alternate memory in it. “That was fifteen years ago.”

  “You never remarried?”

  “No. I was …” Was what? She shook her head. “I just didn’t.” She rose from her chair intending to carry her plate to the sink, but at the sight of her barely touched omelet, she sat back down.

  Fifteen years. It had shocked her to say the words. To admit she had now lived longer without Stephen than she had lived with him. She had expected so much from marriage. Too much. And Stephen had his own expectations. But at the beginning, she honestly believed she could meet them. She could give it her all.

  One month after Stephen received his doctorate, she had become Meredith Dahlberg-Lang. She gave in to her parents’ insistence on a traditional church wedding, but ignored their suggestions for the honeymoon. Besides, that was out of her hands. Stephen had accepted an invitation to present at a symposium in Marrakesh, and all that mattered was they would be together.

  Though only twenty-two, she had already accumulated more than a year’s worth of days spent in Europe, but this was her first trip to Africa. Enthralled with Morocco’s utter foreignness, she drank it in with all her senses. Her nights were Stephen’s, but for most of the daylight hours she was on her own, and took advantage of all the “exotic Moroccan experiences” offered by the hotel concierge.

  On their arrival home, Stephen wore a pale saffron djellaba, and Meredith wore an embroidered violet kaftan. Despite the North African dress on this couple of obvious Nordic descent, almost no one stared—it was, after all, 1970—but her parents, waiting at the gate, were horrified.

  “Welcome home,” said her father, his mouth grim, like a bloodless slash.

  Her mother, ever the model for the prim and proper stereotype, stood wringing her hands. “Why are you dressed in these … costumes?”

  Meredith refused to let her narrow-minded parents strangle her joy. “Aren’t they beautiful?”

  Her mother skewered Stephen with a look.

  “It wasn’t my idea,” he said, laughing, “she fell in love with the bazaar.”

  Meredith crossed her arms over her midriff and dug her nails into her ribs through the thin fabric. She had discovered that Stephen had a way of stepping aside, leaving her to take the blame. Like the time he promised to help her cook dinner for his friends, but instead called at noon to say he had volunteered to review a paper for a colleague, and would bring something home for dinner.

  “You’ll have to excuse the Chinese take-out,” Stephen said that evening. “Meredith decided to spare us her attempts at cooking.” His friends laughed, taking it as a joke, and she might have laughed too, might not have been offended, except it seemed an inside thing—as if, behind her back, she was frequently the butt of Stephen's jokes. And now, though he hadn't protested when they dressed this morning, he had given her parents the impression she had forced him to wear Moroccan dress.

  “Oh my lord, Mom!” She slashed a hand through the air. “Look around you. Everyone’s dressing like this now.” That was an exaggeration, of course, but she knew her parents. Just because they had coerced her into wearing a traditional bridal gown, they expected her to discard her bell-bottomed jeans and tie-dyed granny dresses, and chop off her waist-length hair. They wouldn’t be happy until she reverted to wearing designer ensembles, the way a respectable young woman should. It was time they accepted the truth. The Meredith they wanted her to be was gone forever.

  Her parents blamed this metamorphosis on Stephen. They were right. On her own, she would never have dared to defy her parents. Stephen’s influence had given her the courage to reject her narrow-moraled upbringing.

  On this morning, while she washed the breakfast things, she marveled how far that rejection had gone. Jalal was perusing her pantry and compiling a grocery list. Somehow, she had implied consent to him staying through dinner—at least. She was so far out of her comfort zone, she doubted she could find her way back. I should have left a trail of those empty wine glasses.

  Meredith dried her hands and walked to the pantry door. Jalal had his back to her and didn't notice, so she stood, silent, watching as he moved things from one shelf to another. He had apparently finished his list and was now rearranging items on the shelves. Occasionally, he shook his head and muttered. Who was this man making himself so comfortable in her home? She would let him to do his grocery shopping alone while she made some phone calls to find out.

  Three

  JALAL HAD JUST POURED a lemon rosemary marinade over chicken breast fillets, when the phone rang. Meredith, sitting across from him at the island, kept reading.

  “That is the third time today you have ignored your phone,” he said. “Are you avoiding someone?”

  “No.” She turned a page. “They’ll leave a message if it’s important.” There had been time enough for the gossip to spread. It would be one of her friends calling, but she had no desire to explain herself.

  “I am certainly not complaining that you have spent the last forty-six hours alone with me,” he said, “but surely you have friends … social obligations. I must be keeping you from them.”

  She marked her place and closed her book. “And what about you?”

  Jalal dried his hands and draped the towel back over his shoulder. “No one wonders where I am.” He carried the chicken to the refrigerator.

  “I’m sure that’s not true.”

  He shrugged. “I have not lived out here long.”

  “Do you write for a living?”

  He crossed to the stove and stirred the boiling pasta. “I write. I do not make a living from it.”

  “When did you leave New York?”

  “Earlier this year. February.”

  “You were still working in finance there?”

  “Not at that time.” Jalal fished a noodle from the pot and blew on it.

  “What exactly was your job at Crain-Harris?”

  “I was a financial advisor.”

&n
bsp; “Were you successful?”

  “I made good investments for a lot of clients … and did all right for myself.” He bit into the pasta to test for doneness. “Would you like a printout of my financial statement?”

  “Of course not!”

  Jalal smiled. “But you do want to know why I gave up a successful career to write.”

  He hadn’t posed it as a question and Meredith waited for him to continue. Jalal had answered her questions truthfully so far, but exactly why he quit that career was one thing about him her research had not told her.

  Jalal kept her waiting for the answer while he carried the cooked farfalle to the sink, ran cold water into the pot, dumped it into the colander to drain, and returned to the island where he began to sliver stacked and folded basil leaves.

  “I was not happy in New York,” he said, finally. “I was a ‘rising star’ in the company, but I hated the work. I was lonely, and I made all the wrong moves—too many lines snorted, too many martinis downed at desperate parties, too many selfish, vapid women drifting through my life.” He stopped work and looked up at her. “Are you shocked?”

  “No,” she said. Well, you should be. How do you know he’s changed?

  Jalal pushed the basil to one side of his cutting board and switched to slicing a red pepper he had roasted and peeled earlier. “And then my grandfather, my mother’s father, died. We had always been close, but I had no idea he had set up a trust fund for me. I received a small windfall and a blank leather journal from him. Inside the journal, he had written: Naveye azizam, be harfe delat gush kon.” He looked at her, eyebrows raised.

  “Listen to your heart, my beloved grandson?”

  He smiled. “Excellent translation.”

  “So, you quit your job and started writing seriously.”

  “I did.”

  “Have you been published yet?”

  “Yes. Several of my poems have been published in magazines, one in the New Yorker—I had a connection. And six of my stories are published in either a magazine, journal, or anthology.” He scraped the basil and pepper strips into the mixing bowl and reached for a zucchini. “I have some stories and poems on submission now, and I am working on a poetry collection.”