“I am,” I said.

“I knew it! I knew it when you walked in. What’s your name?”

“Amir.”

“Amir,” Jahan repeated. “Befarmah, welcome. Take a seat. What would you like to drink?”

I sat at one of the tall barstools, my feet dangling above the ground, and rested my elbows on the wet bar. “A beer?”

“What kind of beer?”

I glanced up at the ceiling. “Oh, I’ll drink anything.”

Jahan gave me a funny look. He could definitely tell I had never ordered a beer in my life.

“One beer, coming up. So how did you find us?”

“I was at this bookstore earlier today,” I said, “and the bookseller recommended this bar. Well, specifically he recommended you.”

“You met Neil! Oh, I love Neil,” Jahan said. “He’s the sweetest person in the world.”

“Jesus Christ, he’s friendly, too?”

Jahan laughed and filled up a tall beer glass for me. “Congratulations. You have eyes,” he said.

I felt embarrassed, knowing that Jahan had figured out that I found Neil attractive, and I took a long sip of my drink. I was pleasantly surprised by how nice it tasted compared to the warm PBRs in Jackson’s car.

Jahan kept tending the bar, humming along to the song that was playing overhead.

“What song is this?” I asked.

He looked at me like I came from Mars. “You don’t know Nina Simone?”

“That’s the name of the song?”

Jahan’s jaw dropped. He turned to the two women at the bar and threw his hands up. “Hopeless! This boy is hopeless! Either he’s under twenty-five or a flaming heterosexual.”

My ears turned red, and my natural instinct was to brush off the comment. I mean, my whole life, even the tiniest gay joke could dig under my skin and make me feel self-conscious. But then I realized I didn’t have to brush off Jahan’s joke. It didn’t have to be awkward. So I replied, “Sorry, but I’m only one of those things.”

Jahan grinned so wide you could actually hear it, the soft smacking of spread lips and caved dimples.

“So, where are the Italian people in Rome?” I asked. “Between you and Neil, I’ve only met other Americans.”

“With the state of the economy, they all seem to be fleeing. Young people can’t get jobs, there’s a rising far-right movement—but hey, at least we still have pasta.” Jahan sighed. “Don’t get me wrong. Italy is a lovely place to visit, but you’ve got to be out of your mind to want to live here.”

I expected this to be Jahan’s cue to move on to his other customers at the bar, and he did—there were beers to pour, fancy drinks to mix—but Jahan also kept doing the most wonderful thing: he’d pull me into his conversations. “You’ll have to check that out while you’re in town, Amir,” he said after telling one tourist about the Sistine Chapel. “Oh, in America, they hurry you out of the restaurant,” he said about the slower service in Italy, winking at me. “Our people, they’ve been around for a long-ass time,” he bragged, comparing the Persian Empire to the European monarchies.