Love from a to Z

by S. K. Ali

  “Doha does this to you,” I said, sinking back into the bed, deciding to swallow the murky-water bitterness from earlier.

  I’m talking to Kavi, my best friend, acceptor of the real me, messiness and all.

  I tossed my hair. “Soak in the glam, Kav.”

  “Tell me you’re at home. That you haven’t suddenly become a non-hijabi.” She squinted into the screen, trying to figure out my surroundings.

  “Of course not, scarf for life.”

  “That’s my Zay! Loudly, proudly Muslim!”

  “You realize that that’s like saying ‘long dresses for life!’ or ‘boyfriend jeans for life!’ means ‘loudly, proudly Muslim,’ right? Covering your hair is just one part of believing in modesty in dressing, not the only part.”

  “Right, you periodically give me these lessons, but I guess I remain a poor victim of cultural narratives popular round these parts,” Kavi drawled, accentuating her deep Southern accent that she’d almost lost after five years living in Indiana. She’d been born in Alabama. “Right. Hijab does not necessarily mean more Muslimy. It could mean more Muslimy, and it could mean not more Muslimy.”

  “I’m sorry, but this really interests me. This discussion. Okay if I jump in?” Someone popped their head into the frame, in front of Kavi.

  It was Noemi of the blond bangs, of the lacrosse team, of the muttered “asshole” directed at Fencer.

  I hadn’t even known there was someone in the room with Kavi.

  In our room.

  Noemi did a double take at my hair, having never seen me without my scarf, and then waved at me. “How does all that hair fit under your scarf?”

  “It’s a fine art. Which mainly involves the purchasing of the proper tools for tying it back and then stuffing it all suitably in.” I swept my hair away from my face, wound it into a bun at the nape of my neck, and secured it with the scrunchie tie I had on my wrist. “Like so.”

  “Right, I feel so stupid.” Noemi rolled her eyes. “Of course that’s how you do it. It just hit me. It’s like if I’d asked you how you put on a jacket over your arms or something. Or how you get socks on over toes.”

  I laughed. “Well, yeah, it’s just like another item of clothing. To cover yourself. Like no one asks people who wear pants to school, Why do you have to cover your legs? No one makes a big fuss when there are mall entrance signs that say ‘Shirts Required.’ No one acts like that’s oppressive.”

  “So, wait. If a head scarf is just another item of clothing, why is there so much controversy around it?” Noemi leaned against the back of Kavi’s chair.

  “Because it’s come to stand as a symbol of being Muslim. And that’s trouble because there are a lot of people who hate on Muslims like crazy.” I shrugged and undid my hair and let it fall onto my shoulders again, looking at Noemi, wondering if she was as genuine as she appeared to be. “There’s also another kind of hate from people, mostly from women who are into white feminism, who think they’re helping Muslim women by finding this way of dressing oppressive. They act like if they quote unquote free us from our religious teachings, which they believe they’ve become quote unquote smart enough to figure out are oppressive, that then they’re saving us.”

  I waited. Was that too much? I’d said it in a rush.

  Was she going to think I was blaming her? As a white person? Well, as a white woman?

  Impulsive-klutz me.

  Again.

  “Okay this is the part where I admit I used to be one of those people. I’d see these pics from around the world, of women-not-like-me, and I’d feel so sorry for them.” Noemi sat back and propped her legs on the table in front of her. “I’d be like, I am such a lucky person I’m not her, when I’d see, yes, a girl or woman different from me. The Kool-Aid was full to the brim in me.”

  I smiled. I was warming to this Noemi, she of the blond bangs, she of the open mind.

  “Do you want to know what, or I mean who, changed my mind?”

  “Kavi?” I asked, glancing at Kavi, sitting smugly with her arms crossed. “Because you became friends with the original, authentic Kavi?”

  “No, though that’s been great. Hanging out with Kavi the last few days.” Noemi turned and smiled at Kavi. “No, it was Fencer. Who broke me out of my white feminism like oh snap.”

  I blinked. What in the world?

  Kavi nodded, patting Noemi on the shoulder encouragingly. “The moment has come for you, oh Noemi, to reveal to your hero, Zayneb, her true part in your blossoming.” She leaned closer to the camera and whispered, “Your suspension was Noemi’s awakening.”

  “My master you are, Zayneb,” Noemi said, Yoda-like. “I am your Padawan.”

  “How?” I leaned back against the headboard, eager for Noemi to continue.

  It was evident that she was an interesting person.

  “For the past couple of months, I’ve been doing this art project on sexual assault, high-profile cases. It’s called Buried, and it’s focused on that word and how it ties in with sexual violence. Like how stories about girls getting hurt are buried, how even victims’ testimonies are buried, or how they’re literally buried, in the case of those criminals who keep their victims in cellars or dungeons to prey on them.”

  “Ugh.”

  “Like in the movie The Lovely Bones, which was based on a book, which was loosely based on true events. And that Austrian man who kept his daughter in a dungeon, raping her, for over twenty years.”

  I closed my eyes.

  I opened them because there was silence.

  “I’m sorry,” Noemi said, wiping away tears. She took a breath. “So, I’m working on this project, and, in the midst of me doing a painting of the entrance to the Austrian girl’s prison, built by her father, I remind you, Fencer gives us the handout about the buried Turkish girl. And while I was reading it, I thought, yeah, I could use this in my project. And then Fencer goes and makes it a Muslim problem. I just lost it inside. How the fuck are you saying this is a Muslim problem, to be cruel to girls, when I’ve just literally spent hours amassing evidence that it’s a world problem, Fencer? Then you spoke up in class and confirmed what I’d been thinking, that it’s not a part of being Muslim. At that point, I knew that Fencer was an asshole, a racist, a . . . a . . .”

  “Islamophobe,” Kavi helped.

  “An Islamophobe.” Noemi dropped her legs from the table and crossed her arms. “And then I realized I’d drunk the Kool-Aid, thinking that somehow some women were more oppressed than others due to their background.”

  “She came running to me. To apologize.” Kavi laughed. “Because, you know, I’m a brown woman, and I stand for all brown women?”

  “Well, I gotta start somewhere!” Noemi laughed too, though her eyes were still glistening from tears. “Apologies to you, too, Zayneb. Because the first time I saw you in class, I did feel sorry for you. Because of your scarf.”

  “Fencer? It was Fencer?” I shook my head, a smile breaking out on my face. “I can’t believe Fencer woke you. All this time I’m burning up in class, thinking he’s using his own hatred to make more Islamophobes out of the other students, get them riled up against Muslims, and then this happens?”

  “Zayneb, hate to break it to you, but Noemi is a special case,” Kavi pointed out. “Most of the other people in class just sit there like sponges. Best-case scenario is if they’re tuned out, so then they’re sitting there like rocks. The stuff Fencer spews just circulates around them. They don’t question it.”

  “True.” Noemi nodded. “Really true. The only reason I didn’t fall for it is because I’m doing this art project.”

  “I don’t know how I’m going to survive two and a half more months of Fencer.” I drew my legs up and wrapped my arms around them. I couldn’t even think of seeing his face again.

  But I’m supposed to change myself. Like, learn to process things without overheating.

  “Anyway, I just need to chill. That’s why I’m here.” I let go of my legs and crossed them. �
�I’m on my suspension vacation.”

  “I get you, Zayneb. You taking Fencer on like that,” Noemi said. “Every time he talks in class now, it grates on my nerves. I feel like a wrecking ball, ready to smash his lesson plans.”

  “Wreck-it-Noemi,” Kavi deadpanned.

  “Well, children, don’t be like me. Give peace a chance. Kumbaya and so forth,” I reminded them.

  “Yeah, that’s not happening,” Noemi said. “EatThemAlive version two is going live soon.”

  Kavi looked at Noemi pointedly, then witheringly, but Noemi didn’t see it. Or pretended not to.

  When Kavi turned to me, I gave her the same look she’d given Noemi.

  “I told her about it. Because I want to keep it going,” Kavi said firmly. “We need to help Ayaan. Prove that she was doing something right.”

  “But that’ll just get everyone in more trouble!” I stared at Kavi. “One suspension, one removal from student council . . . do you want an expulsion next?”

  “Zayneb, we’re not involving you, so don’t worry about it!” Kavi said. “Just enjoy your vacay.”

  She tilted her head and stuck her jaw out.

  That meant not to mess with her. Kavi is the kindest friend in my life, but she can also be extremely steely.

  But you only see that when you come close to her sacred truths. Like justice.

  She isn’t loud about it like me, but she’s consistent.

  Like a determined beaver chipping away at a tree, I don’t doubt her ability to fell Fencer.

  MARVEL: AUNTIE NANDY

  Exhibit A: The swimsuit Auntie Nandy held out after immediately knocking on my door when she returned home.

  “Why didn’t you tell me what happened at the pool this morning?” she asked, holding a billowy, black diving suit up in front of her.

  “What’s that?” I’d been trying to finish watching Little Women and pressed pause on Jo arguing with a circle of men on a woman’s right to vote and slid my headphones off.

  “This is what you’re going to wear to swim from now on.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Try it on.” She beckoned me. “It took me a long time to dig it out of my closet—your mom left it here on her last visit.”

  “Auntie Nandy, why are you giving me this burkini?” I held it up. It was almost like the one I’d worn swimming in middle school, except my old one had two rows of purple stripes running along the sides. This one had a broad blue square extending from the neck to the waist. In the middle of the square was a brown clamshell with a pair of closed, long-lashed eyes but no mouth. Slightly strange. And sad.

  “Because you love swimming. And, when I left yoga this morning, Marc at the fitness desk told me that you needed a proper swimsuit to use the facilities.” She raised her eyebrows and then walked to the bedroom door. Turning around to face me before she exited, she added, “There’s your proper swimsuit. Completely fits the fabric requirements of swimwear suitable for a pool.”

  I clutched the burkini to me as it dawned on me what Auntie Nandy meant.

  She wanted me to challenge the fitness center’s expectation of what proper swimwear was.

  She wanted me to fight?

  She actually wanted me to challenge something?

  A little spark ignited in me as I imagined Marc’s face.

  As I imagined tattle-telling bobbing man’s face.

  As I imagined the white-capped woman swimming laps who might be there again, who might high-five me for making it to the pool again.

  I looked down at the burkini and saw it as a superhero outfit. One that I’d be wearing for a mission the next day.

  I went into the bathroom, held it against myself, and smiled serenely at my reflection in the mirror.

  “Yeah, you will do just fine,” I whispered to the sad clamshell on my superhero suit.

  Kavi and Noemi had #EatThemAlive, and I had a burkini ban to take down.

  But, this time, I’d do it serenely, as serenely as the smile that greeted—and accepted me—in the mirror.

  ADAM

  TUESDAY, MARCH 12

  MARVEL: STRANGERS

  IN THE MIDDLE OF THE movie at Villaggio Mall my eyes clouded over.

  Like they were covered with a thick layer of jelly.

  I rubbed them, sure something had gotten into them, but nothing changed.

  The headache, present since this morning turned drill-like, boring into the back of my eyes as I turned them to check if it was the same peripherally.

  Peripheral was worse.

  Like multiple knife jabs at once.

  I felt nauseous with the pain.

  I got up and squeezed my way past Connor, Tsetso, Jacob, and Madison, almost stumbling in the aisle before I realized I should turn on my phone for its light. I then made it halfway before remembering Connor. He would stalk me like a tiger unless I let him know what was up.

  I backed up slowly, feeling my way along the aisle seat backs—not due to the dark but to my blurred vision.

  “Hey, just going to the bathroom, then sitting in the back,” I whispered in his general direction.

  He nodded. Or at least I think it was him.

  In the bathroom, after heaving emptiness and waiting for the nausea to ease up, I washed my face a few times, really rinsing my eyes out, examining them in the mirror.

  There was nothing there, but it literally felt as though I were looking at my reflection through a thick layer of Vaseline.

  I had to get home.

  • • •

  I took a taxi, one of the many assembled at the exits of the mall, praying that the door was not locked at home. That Marta, our cleaning person, had left it that way.

  There was no way I could fit a key into a keyhole.

  As it was, I could see shapes of things blurring by out the window, objects looming as we neared a stop, like now, at the traffic lights. I tried to concentrate on looking straight ahead, to reduce the pain that struck me every time I moved my eyes.

  “Are you okay, sir?” The driver turned to look at me.

  I shook my head. “I just have a headache.”

  “Okay, want to stop for water? Store right here. Tea or water. They’ll have it.”

  He must have meant one of the many chai stations they have around Doha.

  “No, it’s okay. I just need to lie down.”

  “I’ll get you home quickly, sir.”

  Maybe he could help me. Maybe I could ask him.

  He doesn’t know me.

  “Can you wait after you drop me?” I said, hoping my voice didn’t sound desperate. “I may need help with opening my door.”

  “Certainly I will.” He nodded at me. “My name is Zahid.”

  “Thank you,” I said, my shoulders relaxing. “I’m Adam.”

  I’ll have help.

  The front door was locked. Zahid used my keys and opened it for me. I turned to thank him so he could leave, but he didn’t let me. Instead, he held on to my arm and led me into the sunken living room, easing me slowly down the steps.

  I needed the help of his hands, as the tingling returned with a vengeance, running its fingers along my legs and arms as my eyes continued being assaulted by a thousand cuts.

  I wondered briefly if I’d leaned too heavily on him as he brought me to the couch.

  Grateful for him, for the cushioned welcome for my body, for reaching home, I lay down, afraid.

  Afraid of what else was to come.

  Zahid left but came back with a tall glass of water. “Drink this—maybe it is the heat. You need some hydration maybe.”

  I took some sips, wondering how you tell a stranger that you don’t want to be left alone.

  • • •

  Zahid helped me up the stairs to my room, where I paid him for the ride. He wouldn’t take the enormous tip I offered.

  “You hurt me to give me a tip for being as I should be.” He jotted down his number in case I ever needed his taxi again, then left.

  I slept and
slept. Whenever I woke, my eyes would fly open to check if it was gone, the thing covering my eyes, whether the pain had gone, but it was still the same, so finally, after the fifth time, I pulled the cover right over my head and slept more.

  At one point I heard Dad opening my bedroom door, heard Hanna say, “Why is he sleeping now? It’s seven o’clock.”

  “Shh, let him sleep. He’s been working in the room downstairs, painting, so he must be tired.”

  “Are we still ordering pizza? I want—” The door closed.

  I slept until the dark became light outside my window, until it was a new day. I listened for sounds to make sure Dad and Hanna had left for school.

  Then I got up.

  And fell.

  My legs weren’t legs. They were noodles.

  ADAM

  WEDNESDAY, MARCH 13

  ODDITY: SECRETS

  MY LEGS USELESS, I LAY crying on the floor of my room.

  Not from pain, though that was still there, still boring into the back of my eyes whenever I moved them.

  And I think maybe I hit my hip hard on the floor. It felt sore, bruised.

  But I mostly cried because it didn’t make sense.

  What had just happened didn’t make sense.

  I cried because I couldn’t see.

  I didn’t mean just literally, that my vision was affected, I meant I couldn’t see what was next.

  It felt like the way forward, what to do, was as clouded as my vision.

  I cried for so long, I was sure hours had passed.

  Then I thought of Dad and Hanna opening the door to my bedroom again.

  I thought about Dad’s bent head crying at prayer the other day.

  Of Hanna’s octopus hair bounding away with mischief.

  About Stillwater, Hanna’s panda, who’d become another presence in the house for her when Mom left us.

  I thought about the photo of Mom swinging in our backyard in Ottawa, when we’d returned home for a few months. Taken a year after her MS had gotten worse, a year after Hanna had been born.

  She’d been smiling wide, her light brown hair flying behind her.

  She’d been happy.