Anne Tyler - Digging to America

I hope Maryam doesn't feel this bad, she said.

She didn't drink all that much that I noticed.

Oh, great, was I the only one?

Well, Brad was putting away quite a bit, and it seemed to me that Pat and Lou were fairly Downstairs, the doorbell rang.

Sami stepped out of the bathroom and sent her a questioning look.

Don't answer it, Ziba told him.

But a moment later Susan called, Mama? Mari — june's here. Ziba said, Oh, God, and fell back on her pillow.

I'll go, Sami said. He set two aspirin on the nightstand, along with a paper cup of water, and left the room. After a pause, Ziba heard his chipper Hi, Mom! and then murmur, murmur normal morning voices that made Ziba feel even worse.

Well, no getting around it; she would have to show herself. She sat up to swallow the aspirin. Then she hauled herself out of bed and went to the closet for her bathrobe.

By the time she arrived downstairs, Maryam was seated at the kitchen table watching Sami fill the kettle. Whether or not Maryam had drunk much champagne, she had the drawn, unhealthy look of someone who had stayed up too late. Her black blazer turned her skin almost yellow, and she wasn't wearing lipstick.

Morning, Mari june! Ziba said. She tried to sound fresh and energetic.

Maryam said, Good morning, Ziba. Then she said, I was just telling Sami that I feel horrible.

Oh, do you really? Me too. I don't know what I could have been This is the worst mistake of my life.

Excuse me? Ziba said.

She looked over at Sami. He was standing to one side of the stove now, waiting for the kettle to heat. Mom didn't mean to say yes, he told her.

Didn't mean…?

Maryam said, I was trying to be. . She let out a little breath of a laugh, although her expression stayed grim. I was trying to be polite, she said.

Polite! Ziba echoed.

Well, what would you have done? If someone put you in a spot like that, asked you in front of everyone? Funny, Maryam said. I've always wondered about those very public proposals. The men who propose on billboards or hire a plane to fly a banner past. What if the women have no wish to get married? But there they are, trapped. On public view, and so what can they say but yes?

Ziba was speechless. After a moment, Sami cleared his throat and said, Well, ah, but it's always been my assumption that those couples have arrived at some understanding beforehand, so that the men feel fairly sure of their answer. Are you saying that you and Dave never discussed the subject?

Never, Maryam said. Then she hesitated. Or never in so many words, at least.

Sami cocked his head.

It's true we have been… a couple for some time, she said. I admit that he means a great deal to me. And my first reaction yesterday was 'yes'; I won't deny it. But not two minutes later I thought, My Lord, what have I done?

She looked at Ziba when she said this. Instead of responding, Ziba sank onto the chair across from her. She didn't know whether the hollow in her stomach came from her hangover or from dismay.

He is so American, Maryam said, and she hugged herself as if she felt cold. He takes up so much space. He seems to be unable to let a room stay as it is; always he has to alter it, to turn on the fan or raise the thermostat or play a record or open the curtains. He has cluttered my life with cell phones and answering machines and a fancy-shmancy teapot that makes my tea taste like metal.

But, Mari — june, Ziba dared to say. That's not American; it's just… male. Then she shot a quick glance at Sami, but he was too focused on his mother to take offense.

No, it's American, Maryam said. I can't explain why, but it is. Americans are all larger than life. You think that if you keep company with them you will be larger too, but then you see that they're making you shrink; they're expanding and edging you out. I could feel myself slipping away. I was thinking so for a while now! And then before I could say that, he did this thing in public.

She was speaking in an unusually stilted manner, Ziba noticed, and with more of an accent, perhaps to prove that she herself was not American in the least that she was the opposite of American. And her huddled posture, so unlike her, did make her seem to have shrunk.

All his fuss about our traditions, she said. Our food, our songs, our holidays. As if he's stealing them!

Oh, well, but, Mom, Sami said. That's a good trait, his interest in our culture.

He's taking us over, she said, unhearing. Moving in on us. He's making me feel I don't have my own separate self. What was that sugar ceremony but stealing? Because he borrowed it and then he changed it, switched it about to suit his purposes.

Even though she had had nearly the same thought herself, Ziba said, Oh, Maryam, he just wanted to show he respects our way of doing things. She was suddenly filled with sympathy for him, remembering Dave on his knees and his eager, open face. You can't object to his Americanness and then fault him for trying to act Iranian. It's not logical.

It may not be logical, but it's how I feel, Maryam said.

The kettle was boiling now, and Sami turned to lift it off the stove. Ziba didn't know how he could take this so calmly. She asked Maryam, Couldn't you give it a little more time? Maybe it's just a case of, what do they call it. Wet feet.

I have given it time, Maryam said. Otherwise I would have told him last night. But no, all I said last night was that it was late and I was tired; he should drop me off at my house and I would see him in the morning. And then this morning I came to you two first to explain the situation, because I know everyone will be angry at me. All of you, and I don't blame you. It will cause an awkwardness in your friendship with Brad and Bitsy.

Oh, don't worry about that, Sami said, although Ziba herself was worrying about exactly that. Here they'd been just about to join ranks, become one big happy family! Would the four of them stop being friends now? And what would they tell the girls?

But Sami was saying, If you can't marry him, you can't. No two ways about it.

Thank you, Sami jon, Maryam said.

She looked next at Ziba, but Ziba said nothing.

Then Maryam told them she had to go I want to get this over with, she said and she refused a cup of tea and collected her purse. Goodbye, Susan, she called as she passed the living room. Sami followed, but because he had no shoes on he didn't see her out to her car. He stopped at the front door, with Ziba some distance behind. Drive carefully, he said. Ziba kept quiet. She couldn't fight down her sense of outrage. None of this should have happened, she wanted to say. She wanted to shout it. This was all so unnecessary, and so cruel, and there was no excuse for any part of Maryam's behavior from start to finish.

Maryam was descending the steps, walking toward the street with her purse clutched tight against her. She seemed much smaller than usual. In her black blazer and slim black pants, she was a single, narrow figure, straight-backed and slight and entirely alone.

Jin-Ho's little sister had a pacifier in her mouth about a hundred hours a day. The only time it came out was when she was eating, but she didn't really like to eat so that didn't take very long. On account of her not eating she was itty-bitty, teeny-tiny. She was two and a half years old but Jin-Ho could still lift her up. So Jin-Ho's mother said they would have to get rid of the pacifier. Maybe then Xiu-Mei would take more interest in food.

Except it didn't work. Binky! Binky! Xiu-Mei howled. (That was what she called pacifiers, because that was what Grandma Pat called them.) Jin-Ho's mother said, The binky is all gone, sweetheart, but Xiu-Mei wouldn't hush. She screamed and screamed, and Jin-Ho's mother went upstairs with a headache and closed her bedroom door. Then Jin-Ho's father carried Xiu-Mei around the house and sang her a song called Big Girls Don't Cry, but still she went on screaming. Finally he said a bad word and put her down on the couch not very gently and went into the kitchen. Jin-Ho went too because the screaming hurt her ears. She colored in her workbook while her father unloaded the dishwasher. He made a lot of noise, enough to drown out Xiu-Mei's noise, and every now and then he would absentmindedly sing another piece of his song. 'Bi-ig girls… don't… cry-y-y,' he sang in a high thin girly voice. Usually when Jin-Ho's parents sang it made her crazy because they didn't land on the notes quite right. This time it was okay, though, because he was just clowning. 'Do-on't cry-y,' he sang, and the don't went so low that he had to tuck in his chin to get down there.