Everything Sad Is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri

Author:Daniel Nayeri
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Levine Querido

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I DON’T THINK EITHER OF them was lying.

My dad has a goat skin with all the family tree on it. He jokes that it goes all the way back to Shem. That’s Noah’s son. He laughs when he says it.

When I was really little, I remember old people would come to our door to have me touch them, like I could give them a blessing or something. Cause I was a double sayyed. Really, it was one lady this one time. I don’t even know what it was about. I was playing video games when my mom called me to the door.

The old lady standing there was little, with a crooked back and a black chador framing her face, so you couldn’t even tell if she had hair. Her face was craggy like my Baba Haji and in my memory she reaches out to cup my face in her hands.

Just like him, she stared into my eyes and smiled.

I just remember that one thing. I never knew if either of them got what they wanted from me.

I realize maybe those aren’t even two different memories. Maybe I gave the memory of the stranger to my grandpa so he’d have a good one. Or just blurred them a little into each other.

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

Knowing about yourself, about your family, knowing the name of a grandpa and saying it out loud so he can hear it. It’s probably the thing kids in Oklahoma treasure most. They hide it, of course, the way you should hide your most valuable thing. But I bet they walk around with a treasure chest full of clear memories. And the chest has their family name engraved on it. And the chest is their chest. The memories are in their heart. Their hearts are full. I bet. Full of something that isn’t dripping away into nothing.

A patchwork memory is the shame of a refugee.

I don’t even know if the strange old lady at the door was a relative or something. All I have is her touching my face. The rest is flushed and gone.

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