At a Jidda wedding, young women would have cinched scarves around their hips; they would have danced Egyptian-style with one leg poised outward, or flipped their long hair side to side. Here, the girls sat demurely at the round tables, their purses set in front of them, chewing on mints and pieces of allspice they’d plucked out of the bowls on the tables. Mama set herself down at a table where two girls, one in a dress the color of the bougainvillea flowers outside and the other in peach and green, took turns whispering to each other.

“They were too made up,” she says.

As she inspected the guests, Mama took several mints and cupped them in her hand, closing her fingers over them and slipping them into her purse. A woman in green sequins and bright blue pumps grabbed her by the shoulders and kissed her cheeks. Lama’s sister Lena.

Mama shows Muneer where Lena’s lipstick rubbed off on her skin.

“God bless you for coming. You are the only one from Jidda who has blessed us,” Lena said.

“Oh, of course my dear, it’s nothing. Where is your sister?”

“At the hotel, getting the bride ready. God bless you for coming.” A little bit of the lipstick had come off on Lena’s front tooth. She kept licking it but her tongue didn’t budge it. She moved on to the next guest, repeating her kissing performance and her lipstick-fixing.

On the stage, women in white were singing songs about the prophet and beating drums. Mama sat for a few minutes, but her legs wanted to move. She floated around the room, among the tables, leaning from time to time on her cane, staring openly at the young women. A few stared back.

“Which family are you?” Mama asked, and if she liked the answer, “Who’s your father?”

She set her sights on two young women holding hands, their hair curled into ringlets and held back with garlands of white flowers, gardenias Mama could smell three tables over. Their fingernails were unpainted, their faces fresh, with a hint of rouge, no lipstick or mascara or eye shadow. Their modest satin dresses fell to their ankles. Was it the bougainvillea outside or the gardenia in the girls’ hair that caused Mama’s nose to itch, her eyes to water? She instantly knew she’d found perfect brides-to-be, the way she knows how much rose water to put in syrup, how much spice lamb soup needs. Mama could see they were pious, modest girls, suitable for Muneer.