Darius the Great Is Not Okay

Later that evening, Darius’s father gets out his iPad. Darius, who’s making tea, asks him to wait to start Star Trek, but his father says Laleh is too impatient. This upsets Darius: “I knew Laleh was a replacement for me. I had known that since she was born. But I had never minded it before” (223). Darius takes his tea outside, wondering if anyone would care if he died. His father eventually follows, chastising him for not spending time with his sister, who misses him whenever he’s with Sohrab. Darius questions why Laleh needs to watch Star Trek with them at all, and his father retorts that he likes watching it with her. Hurt, Darius leaves to go to bed; it’s the first time he and his father haven’t exchanged “I love you’s” in the evening. 

Darius’s mother wakes him up early the next morning for their trip to the Towers of Silence, which are in the mountains near Yazd. Babou and Laleh are both in a bad mood throughout the drive—Babou because he resents being a passenger in his own car, and Laleh because she doesn’t want to go at all.