The first time she notices it, she’s in the produce aisle shaking a cantaloupe to see if the seeds are loose — a sure sign of a ripe, sweet melon.

A tall, blond man with a baritone voice chuckles. “Does it sound OK?”

Certain he’s making fun of her, she just smiles back, raising the cantaloupe with two hands. “It’s a good one.”

Placing it in her cart she moves along feeling his eyes at her back. It happens again at the butcher. A muscular fellow with gleaming blue eyes and a dark mustache holds her gaze a little too long — long enough for her to blush and look away. Yet his eyes stay on her. When she returns home with the leg of lamb, there is a note slipped into the package, written in neat penmanship on a square of white butcher paper. It reads, You are beautiful. Please come back again.

It seems to be happening often. She just goes about her business, and suddenly the postman is visiting twice in a day, claiming he forgot to bring by a beauty supply catalog the first time he made the stop.

She loads the groceries into the trunk of her used Honda Accord. The whole way home she’s so distracted she doesn’t remember driving the three-mile stretch along Park Street or turning left onto Cedar Lane. She doesn’t even recall navigating the left turn at the intersection of Cedar and Gallows Road, which is always too busy. She revives at the narrow access roads in her townhouse condominium development. Rows and rows of attached homes, each with a bank of numbered parking spaces grouped in front. She must have driven this route from the Safeway to her townhouse at least one-hundred times in the year she’s lived there. Her old life in the Tudor Revival with her ex seems a world away.

As she carries the groceries inside and places them on the butcher block, she considers how much she’s looking forward to having her children, her sister, and her family around her for Thanksgiving. Her daughter graduated from school, works for a management consulting firm, and dates Mark, a nice fellow she met while flying home from a business trip. Her son will graduate from community college in the spring. He earns extra cash as a waiter at a bed-and-breakfast out in Front Royal.

Thrilled they agreed to let her host each Eid, each Thanksgiving, each Persian New Year, and even each Christmas — which they’ve taken to celebrating, since, in their new country, it’s a national holiday. They never put up a tree or anything like that, but they exchange small gifts, eat, drink, and celebrate.

Now will be Thanksgiving. And preparing an American-style feast of turkey, corn bread stuffing, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie energizes her. She, of course, adds a little Iranian flair to the feast by including baklava, dried apricots, and dates to the dessert table, as well as stuffed grape leaves to the hors d’oeuvres. She’s celebrated Thanksgiving so many times; her family looks forward to the cranberry-pomegranate sauce that traditionally accompanies the roasted turkey on her Thanksgiving table.

She stares at Mark’s exotic look — hair the same shade as the sweet flesh of butternut squash, along with the rounded, speckled, upturned nose is such an exotic look to her. Iranian men don’t look like that. Her daughter has found a handsome suitor. She enjoys seeing them together. They gaze at one another on the damask white sofa, fingers intertwined, giggling at private jokes. Her daughter’s sparkling eyes shine even brighter when her son sits on the sofa next to her, forcing her to move even closer to Mark.

She returns to the kitchen and tends to a large pot of soup on the back burner. She reaches for a carton of salt, holds it over the pot, and pours.

Mark’s voice from the doorway makes her shoulders flinch. “How can you tell if you put in the right amount? In my family, you’d never catch my mother without a measuring spoon, carefully leveling each ingredient.”

“I never measure. I cook more by feel. A pot this size? I sprinkle the salt for a slow count of four.” She stops pouring salt into the soup and tastes. “Perfect. Would you like to test it?”

Mark moves in close while she blows on a spoonful of soup. The two stand toe to toe. Mark swallows the soup and releases a satisfied “yum,” extending the “mmmmm” while he locks his eyes on her. She has the strange feeling that Mark wants to kiss her. This isn’t the first time he’s gazed at her with this intensity. She brushes it off, pretending she doesn’t notice, turns to the pot of soup, and averts her eyes to send a clear message.

Mark clears his throat. “So, four seconds of salt in the soup.” He gently pats her shoulder. “How many seconds of sugar in the baklava you made last time? Best dessert I’ve ever had.”

Without looking up from the soup, she continues to stir and lies. “My daughter made the baklava.”

She ladles a few servings of soup into bowls and hands Mark the tray. “Go back in the dining room; put these on the table. I’ll fill the rest and bring them myself.”

The clan of immigrants sits around the Thanksgiving table.

Her sister waves a napkin in the air and lets the linen drift to her lap. “Mark, help teach us some real American Thanksgiving traditions.”

Mark, obviously flattered by the attention, holds his head high and smiles wide. “In my family, I’m the youngest. So I’m never looked to as an authority on anything!”

Her daughter laughs louder than anyone else. She’s glad Mark returns her daughter’s smile and squeezes her daughter’s knee under the table before pointing to the feast. “Let’s see. Well, you’ve got the basic food groups here: turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce. And you’ve got the football game on the television in the other room. Those are the important things.”

Her daughter’s giggle rises above the rest. Mark leans in and kisses her cheek, but then gets serious, fidgeting, looking through his pockets. “Oh, but the one tradition that really gets to the heart of this holiday, is my family goes around the table and each of us shares something we’re thankful for. Sometimes we go all out and recite a poem.” He retrieves a sheet of paper from his shirt pocket and holds it up. “Do you mind?”

Her son snickers with an exaggerated sneer. “You wrote a poem on purpose?”

Mark winks. “Sure. What’s wrong with that?”

Her son’s eyes remain dull and unimpressed as he slurps his soup. Her daughter’s eyes, in contrast, glisten with love as she hangs on every word.

Her sister clasps her hands in front of her heart and grins, intensifying her dimples. “I love poetry. Go ahead.”

Mark smooths the wrinkled page. “My first Ghaffari Thanksgiving. Surrounded by turkey with pomegranates. A twist on traditional fare. I’m happy to be surrounded by this amazing family….”

She leans back admiring how Mark’s lips look as delicate as saffron threads when he stretches them around the long e’s in turkey and family, and how Yassi’s smile is so wide that her nostrils flare and her ears lift.

Mark continues, reciting his poem. He includes a line about each of them at the table in his verse. His eyes glued to the page for the most part, he glances up at each person he mentions as he goes. “It may be true that Yassi is tall, lovely, and fair, but her mother is a beauty beyond compare….”

Nobody notices that when he makes eye contact with her, he lingers. She curls her toes inside her shoes, willing her blush to stay at bay. The corners of her daughter’s eyes crinkle with joy. So what if he sees beauty in his girlfriend’s mother too. So long as he treats her daughter well.

“Here’s another package for you.” The postman’s familiar drawl rings in competition with the sleigh bells on the door as he lugs a brown cardboard box.

She sits at the reception desk double-checking the appointment book. Winter holidays are proving to be very busy. Customers need nails done and hair styled for festive parties for Christmas and the Western New Year. “Thank you so much. How are you doing today?”

But when she locks eyes with this man — the postman, who she’s conversed with hundreds of times, he radiates desire. Him too?

Once he places the package down on the reception desk, he shoves his hands into his pockets. He clears his throat, stares at the floor, shuffles his feet, and stammers. “See you tomorrow.”

He tries to maintain eye contact. Checking the growing flattery heating her face, she takes the package and turns away, waving good-bye, refusing to meet his gaze. She buries the mental picture of herself in bed with the postman, and replaces it with the notion that living under her ex’s rule may have kept her from becoming a nymphomaniac.

“Did you see the way he looked at you?” Her sister bounces her brows up and down before winking.

She busies herself unpacking the box filled with bottles of astringent, a case of honey almond scrub, a dozen jars of cucumber massage cream, four twenty-ounce tubs of wax, and something bundled in Bubble Wrap. “Not interested.”

“Why not? He seems so nice.”

She’s struggling to tear open the plastic Bubble Wrap. “I’m through with love.”

Her sister hands her a pair of scissors. “That’s ridiculous. You’re the most loving person in the world. Besides, nobody’s asking you to fall in love. What’s wrong with sharing dinner with a man?”

“He didn’t ask me.” She snips through the plastic and pulls out a promotional Queen Helene pen holder.

“You didn’t give him a chance.”

Fighting off the feeling that her ex’s hands are strangling her neck, she finishes stacking supplies in the cabinet and grabs her coat and keys.

“I have to go. I’ll be late for my class.”

Sara shakes her head and sighs. “What is it this time? EST?”

Hands on hips. “No, Landmark Education Forum Curriculum for Living.”

“It’s time for you to stop taking classes about life and start living it, my dear sister.”
“Good-bye. Lock up, please.” As she leaves, the bells on the door clang.

Throughout the lecture, paranoia makes her itchy. She scratches a spot on her upper arm, turns to her left, and notices a tall man blushing before looking away from her. She dismisses it at first as she did the other men buzzing around her like hummingbirds in search of nectar. The information session ends and everyone starts filing out. Intent on tuning out the tall man, she scans the crowd and heads toward the exit. However, his strawberry hair and friendly, round nose under a Stetson fedora detain her. How similar to Mark he looks.

A binder slips from her hands and crashes to the floor. He bends down to collect it. “Let me get that for you.”

“Oh. Clumsy me. Thanks.”

He tells her his name is Harry. When he repeats her name, he uses perfect pronunciation. He scrambles to pick up scattered papers that came loose from her binder, handing her a pamphlet for a Wednesday night meditation class she’s considering. “You go to this center?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

“I highly recommend it. Whenever I’m struggling to find an answer, I meditate, and the answer comes to me.”

She shoves some of the loose papers back into her folder. “You’re lucky to have it so easy.”

“Well, I was meditating a moment ago and you landed here. You might be the answer.”

“You’re struggling with a problem, are you?”

“Not a problem, really, just answers — meaning. Strange, though, I’m beginning to find the search itself meaningful.” His eyes soften as he smiles.

She closes the binder and presses her palms on the cover to tamp down the inexplicable jitters swirling in her soul. “Did you like today’s orientation? Did it sell you on the class?”

“I think so. Maybe I could take you to dinner before the next session, and we could go to the lecture together. What do you think?”

Her hands shake as she prepares to accept an invitation from a man, something she hasn’t done since she dated her ex as a teenager. She fights the instinct to look around the lobby to see if anyone is listening. But the symphony of background music, murmured conversation, and shuffling feet fade to silence, leaving only panicked thoughts blaring in her ears. A date? It’s been a lifetime.

Her mouth feels like one of the containers on the manicure table filled with dry cotton balls. She has trouble peeling her tongue off the roof of her mouth. She bites the edge of her lower lip for a second before a coy smile finds its way to her lips. “Yes. I would love to, Harry.”

He removes his hands from his pockets, clenches two fists in front of him, squeezing his eyes shut, and smiling wide enough to reveal the edge of a gold filling on one of his molars. “Great! I’m so glad.”

Trying to act casual and relaxed as if she’d done this a million times, she writes her address and telephone number on a slip of paper and hands it to him. “You can pick me up at home.”

Their first date, he’s taking her to Filomena Ristorante in Georgetown. She spends twenty minutes on her hair and makeup. When the doorbell rings, she opens the door to find him standing there with a bouquet of zinnias. She squirrels away the memory of her ex picking posies for her on the way home from school and smiles.

She doesn’t lie to him. When he says something like, “How is it that a beautiful woman like you isn’t taken?” she gets a pit in her stomach and says, “That’s sweet. But I’m afraid I was taken. And my ex took so much of me, there’s barely anything left.”

He’s quiet for too long. She wants him to know that she’s not put off. “What do you do for a living?”

“I own a couple of salons.”

“Really?” She tries to sound impressed, but instead her too-loud response comes across haughty.

“What? It’s honest work — an honest living. Everyone needs a haircut now and then. My dad likes to call it a barbershop.”

She chuckles and checks her volume. “No. It’s not that. I’m not criticizing at all. It’s just that I own a salon too.”

“We have more in common than I thought.”

From that moment on, their conversation is easy, relaxed. At dinner, they sip Chianti while watching two women roll gnocchi on a flour-covered farm table in the corner. They sit next to each other at Landmark. Part of the time, she finds herself trying to decipher the notes he’s taking instead of listening to the lecture. His penmanship is quick and scrawling, but easy to read. He boils down an entire segment of the lesson into the following statement: Don’t stay in the shadows of your past. Move on and live!

At the end of the evening, he walks her to the door of her townhouse. A brief memory surfaces of necking with her ex outside in the entry of her parents’ house so long ago. She shoves it to the back of her consciousness as she stares into this kind man’s American-apple-pie, freckled face. He is not her ex.

He stares at his feet, scuffing the soles of his shoes against the ground. “I really had a wonderful time tonight.”

“So did I.” She leans in to kiss his cheek. The nerve endings in her lips against the skin on his closely shaven cheek come alive in a long-forgotten sizzle, like cool water popping in a hot frying pan.

He squeezes her hand. “I hope you’ll let me take you out again sometime.”

“Just ask me the next time we run into each other at Landmark, and you’ll see.” She bats her eyelashes for effect.

“Damn, why don’t we have a lecture tomorrow?”

“If you can’t wait, feel free to call me.”

“How about dinner tomorrow night? Have you ever been to Evans Farm Inn?”

She can’t relax her cheeks. They’re locked in place by her elated smile. “Or you could just ask me now. No need to call later.”

“Well?”

“Sure, why not? I close the salon at six o’clock on Sundays. I’d love to have dinner with you.”

“How does seven o’clock sound?”

“Seven sounds perfect.” He kisses her on the lips, a little braver this time.

She allows it but keeps the palm of her hand against his chest to avoid closer contact. She’s sure to smile so it seems less of a rejection than it might have come across. Without inviting him in, she closes the door. Before it clicks shut, she catches a glimpse of Harry. He looks lost or disappointed. She’s eased when she hears him whistling, Send her your love with a dozen roses, as he strolls down the stairs to the parking lot.

For weeks, they attend the classes together, spending hours after each session applying what they learned. Sorting through their pasts together, becoming more aware of how the reality they know based on past experiences can limit what is possible in their lives.

As the course progresses, they sit with one another, closer and closer. By the fourth week, they walk from the classroom together, holding hands.

As they reach the door, the instructor clears his throat. “Don’t put a ring on her finger. The key to her heart is giving her freedom.”

Later that evening, Harry rubs her knee. “Why rob yourself of joy now? Haven’t you suffered enough?”

Fear sets in. If he pushes too hard, she’s ready to break it off. “I see you when I want. We make love only when I say. Take it or leave it.”

He backs off. To her surprise, he seems fine with it. “I understand completely. I’ll follow your lead. I’ll wait if you want to wait. Just say the word.”

The first day of spring, Persian New Year, she cooks a traditional Persian dinner for Harry. He praises the wheat pudding with raisins, asking for seconds of the grape leaves stuffed with seasoned ground lamb. She likes to watch him eat. It’s even more satisfying to watch him eat her home cooking than to watch him at Evans Farm Inn or Clyde’s or Da Domenico. He places a forkful of food in his mouth, and his lips close around the tines enveloping the morsels. He then closes his eyes, and takes pleasure in the bite; he makes that noise — the very same noisy exhale of satisfaction that her baba made when enjoying her mother’s cooking. One of her customers at the salon taught her an old American cliché: The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. She’s not trying to win his heart. However, the contented sound he makes with each bite indicates that she’s gaining favor with every taste he savors.

Finally, after he finishes his third helping of wheat pudding, he leans back and pats his belly with a smile. “That may very well be the best meal I’ve ever eaten.”

“Would you like to top it off with a glass of brandy? Or cup of coffee?”

The minuscule creases on the outside of his eyes turn upward. “I have an idea—how about coffee with a shot of brandy in it? If you’ll let me in the kitchen, please, I’ll show you a special secret family recipe of my own.”

“Sure, why not? What will you need for your special recipe?”

He rises from the table and follows her to the kitchen. “Point me to your coffee percolator and a bottle of brandy.”

She opens a cabinet next to the kitchen desk to find the coffeemaker. “Here are coffee beans and a grinder too.”

Harry opens the refrigerator, pulls out a carton of cream from the top shelf, and looks right at her. “Exactly what I was looking for.”

She knows he’s talking about the cream. But, somehow, she feels romance in the statement. It isn’t an emotional longing for attachment she feels. Instead, it’s an inkling that physical contact will nourish her dead soul.

She places her hand on his. “Do you need my help?”

“No, no. You just relax right here.” He leads her to one of the stools at the breakfast bar in the kitchen. She sits, legs crossed, hoping she looks alluring. She watches as he putters around the kitchen. He scoops a few tablespoons of coffee grounds into the percolator, pours cold water into the vessel, and puts it on the burner. He pours some brandy into a snifter and sets it aside. They make small talk. She doesn’t even care about the topic. What other restaurants might they try together? Whether she has any interest in seeing a Washington Bullets game? She ignores the reference to bullets, not wanting to cast blight on the seed of something resembling happiness sprouting within her gut.

A tapping sound in the background starts slowly and then accelerates. The boiling water bubbles up through coffee grounds, becoming darker and more intense in flavor with each tap. Right in the middle of telling her he wants to take her to see An Officer and a Gentleman at the movies, he gets up and moves the coffeepot from the hot burner to a cool one on the range. He sets two mugs next to a snifter full of brandy and fills them with coffee. As he pours, the bold aroma washes over her. Then he digs into his back pocket and retrieves his cigarette lighter.

“And now for the grand finale.” He spoons out some brandy from the snifter and drizzles it into the coffee, simultaneously clicking his thumb against the friction wheel on the lighter.

The blue-violet flame flows like a waterfall into the first cup of coffee, and then the second. She’s hypnotized by the fire. When it goes out, she applauds. As he places the mugs on the breakfast bar, he’s about to sit on the stool next to hers.

She touches his forearm. “Let’s move to the sofa.”

He raises his eyebrows and grins, taking her hand. The friendly chatter, which had filled their evening, suddenly lulls to silence. She guides him to the next room like a lead pony escorting a thoroughbred to the starting gate.

She notices her copy of Power vs. Force on the sofa cushion and tosses it out of the way. She makes the first move. He waits for her. She likes that. It makes her feel safe. He wraps his arms around her, and she kisses him gently on the lips. His breathing deepens. She feels the hot breezy rhythm. She untucks his shirt; he untucks hers. The whole time their lips are locked together. They kiss like hormonal teenagers on the sofa for over an hour. He fondles her under her shirt but over her brassiere. She lets him. With her nose nestled in the crook of his neck, the hint of the musky smell of sex petrifies her. When his fingers begin to fumble with the hooks on the back, she squirms and sends a signal to cease with a small grunting, “Nuh, uh.”

She’s not ready for any more than this yet.

He whispers in her ear. “OK. It’s OK.” And then he asks, “Can I hold you?”
She molds her body to his. “I’m sorry. I want to. I mean, I thought I did.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“I’m afraid to be trapped again.”

“Trapped?”

“With my ex, the real me couldn’t get out — like I was in prison.”

“I would never put you in prison.”

He wraps his arms tighter, and for some reason, she doesn’t know why, she starts to cry. He holds her tight, kissing the top of her head. Tears stream down her face — cold tears of fear. Her body is rigid against his. She tries to enjoy his comfort, but while she forces herself to let him comfort her, her skin contracts against her muscles, her muscles against bones, as if shrinking away from his loving gesture. She’s afraid he’ll lash out like her ex, but she fights the impulse to flee. Burying her face into his shirtsleeve, she weeps. A whiff of her ex’s Old Spice aftershave brings on an involuntary flinch.

She hears the voice of the Landmark instructor in her head. The voice whispers in her ear. “Push away your expectations based on the past.” And, “be powerful in the face of what has stopped you before, and you are free to rediscover and pursue the passions in life.”

She sees the lessons from Power vs. Force. The printed words from the book, detailing emotional energy levels, sail through her brain like a ribbon of letters blowing in the wind.

They read, “Energy Level 20, Shame. Energy Level 100, Fear. Energy Level 125, Desire. Energy Level 200, Courage. Energy Level 310, Willingness. Energy Level 500, Love.”

She’s been exploring philosophies, searching for answers. It’s time to pursue passion. It’s time to move beyond fear, through desire, and show courage. I’m willing. She unbuttons his shirt and rests her cheek on his bare chest. The skin-to-skin contact awakens a craving. I’m willing. She wriggles out of her blouse. I’m willing. She ignores that his eyes scan her body, including her scars. She’s exposed. I’m willing. She takes his hands, places them on the button of her skirt, and nods. He smiles as he undresses her. I’m willing. She unbuckles his belt too. I’m willing. She shoves aside her past. I’m willing. She kisses him and tastes his saltiness. I’m willing. She hears his heart drum. I’m willing. She feels a kaleidoscopic swirl of magenta, turquoise, and gold. I’m willing. She wants to feel love. I’m willing. I’m now. I’m willing. They are one.

I…want.