Within an hour, the entire extended family had shown up. Two sets of aunts and uncles in addition to Ramin and Nasser, plus his daughter, Minu, from a previous marriage and Leila’s daughter, Ava, who’d spent the night with her as a sleepover, as well as Nasser’s Girlfriend of the Month from last night (whom Kaveh now knew as Anahit, and she was indeed Armenian). What he’d been told was “lunch with the family” was turning into a family reunion. So much for speaking English.

His family clearly didn’t know what to do with Cora other than ply her with crispy rice and ghormeh sabzi; they all knew who she was, what her claim to fame was, but didn’t know what to say about it, so ignored it, opting instead for the more banal questions like What did you study? and What are your plans for the future? Not like they could ask casual questions about her family.

Kaveh, on the other hand, they flocked to, jeering at him for being so distant and teasing him for being so buried in his obviously way-more-important-than-them work. She was obviously “on,” alert and quick to respond quickly and politely to the slightest bit of attention, but otherwise stayed quiet. After lunch wound down, he excused himself and took her out into the backyard.

“You seem sad,” he observed, taking a seat on one of the ottomans on the patio by the pool and patting the space next to him. His parents’ pool aesthetic was “natural,” a shale rock “formation” creating a waterfall that spilled into the pool, even though it was far too cold to swim this time of year.

“Sad isn’t the word,” she said, still tense as she sat down next to him. “Jealous, that’s the word.”

He frowned and wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

“I guess this is part of why your family has done so well here,” she continued. “They actually stick together and help each other. The whole idea feels genuinely, well, alien to me.”

He sighed and squeezed her shoulder gently. She was right, and it was an extension of what he’d told her the night the beeper guy had accosted her—your family is what shapes you. His supportive family had shaped him into the confident, secure person he was, and her neglectful family had turned her into this fearful creature that hardly trusted the ground beneath her not to collapse.

Kaveh heard the patio door close and saw that they had been followed. He smiled, beckoning his niece to approach. “Hey, daie,” he said. “What’s up?”

Ava eyed him, then Cora, clearly the object of her real interest. A raven-haired cutie with almost geometric bangs, she was already on track to skip her second-grade year. “Do you really know the aliens?”

“We both do,” said Kaveh, “but she’s the real expert.”

“How are you an expert?”