Shine, Coconut Moon

by Neesha Meminger

  My eyes bulge out, and I’m about to let him know exactly what else he’s supposed to do, when he opens the door. There’s a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniels on the seat next to him.

  He staggers out onto the sidewalk and wraps his arms around me. “I miss you, babe.”

  I clench my teeth and squirm away. “Mike, get off me.” But he has my arms pinned against my sides as he gently pulls my head back. He drops his mouth on mine and tries to push my lips open with his.

  I turn my head to the side, so he catches my ear between his teeth. “Mike! Get off.” Finally, after he makes no move to let me go, I kick him as hard as I can in the shin.

  He lets go and shouts, “Aw, f—!”

  When he reaches for me again, I take off, power-walking through lawns and staying away from the road. I’m not afraid that Mike’s going to hurt me, but I am totally weirded out by the fact that he sat outside Molly’s house until I came out.

  When I get home, Mom takes one look at my face and says, “What’s the matter?”

  I let the door slam behind me and lock it. “Mike…”

  She wrinkles her brow, and stops flipping through her O magazine. “Mike what? Did he do something to you?”

  Against my better judgment, I start babbling. “He’s doing really weird things…like he sat outside Molly’s house the entire time I was there, then followed me, and—”

  “He what? He’s stalking you?” Mom grabs the phone, pulls aside the curtain, and examines the street outside our window.

  “Yes, I’d like to file a restraining order,” she says into the mouthpiece.

  A restraining order? I try to stop her. “Mom…”

  She holds up a finger and drops the curtain. She puts an arm around me, walking me to the couch in the living room. “No…no…this is the first time, as far as I know….” She covers the mouthpiece with her hand. “Sammy, has this ever happened before?” I shake my head. She continues into the phone, “No…What do you mean? Repeated attempts? You’ve got to be joking…. Since when? Proof? What kind of proof?” She listens for a few more minutes, then quietly clicks the phone off.

  “Mom, I don’t think he was going to hurt me….”

  “That’s not the point,” she says firmly. “He sat outside Molly’s while you were there, then he followed you. That qualifies as stalking. Who knows what else he’s capable of doing?”

  I stare at her reflection in the blank TV screen as she paces the kitchen, breathing heavily and crossing her arms in front of her chest. True, I’m a bit creeped out by Mike’s impaired judgment…but a restraining order?

  She picks up the phone again. “I’m calling that boy’s mother.”

  I head up the stairs as Mom dials Mike’s number. She covers the mouthpiece and calls after me. “Honey, if you’re hungry, there’s eggplant—still warm!” I go to my room and stare at my books in a daze, then pull out my cell phone to call Molly.

  “Hey,” she says after the second ring.

  “Mike sat outside your place the whole time I was there.”

  She gasps. “He what? No way. How do you know—did you see him?”

  “He followed me when I left.”

  “Did he do anything? Oh, Sammy—I knew we should’ve called your mom, or waited till my parents came home so they could give you a ride!”

  I lower my voice. “Yeah, right. That way, they could’ve gotten a real good whiff of all that ‘studying’ we were doing.”

  She groans. “I know…are you okay? What happened?”

  “He got out of the car and was all over me. He was wasted, Moll. I saw a bottle of Jack Daniels on the seat next to him.”

  “He was driving drunk? What a genius, driving while impaired, and underage…. He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

  “No. But how weird is that? It’s just so creepy to know that someone’s following you.”

  “And sitting outside—waiting for you to come out!”

  “My mom went ballistic.”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “She’s downstairs right now, calling his mom. She called the cops before that.”

  “Wow, the cops…I guess that’s good. Bobbi’s right, what the hell is it with these guys and the word ‘no’? Everything’s fine till you use that one little word, and then they go insane. I bet Mike wouldn’t be so freaked out if he was the one who dumped you.”

  Mom calls up from downstairs. “Sammy!”

  “Gotta go, Moll.”

  “’kay, call me later.”

  Mom holds the phone out to me as I come down the stairs. I approach it cautiously. “Who is it?”

  “Michael’s mother.”

  My heart falters as I raise the receiver to my ear. “Hello?”

  “Sammy, I’m so sorry for Michael’s behavior. He’s stressed out at work, trying to help me get these damn bills under control, and I guess he’s taking your breakup pretty hard. I’ll have a talk with him. Don’t worry, he won’t be following you home again.”

  “Okay.” I’m not sure what else to say.

  Mom takes the phone from my hand. “Thanks again, Sylvia. Mm-hmm…will do. Bye.”

  She turns to me. “I still want you to watch it, Sammy. Poor Sylvia is doing her best, but young boys Mike’s age are pumped up on hormones and very unpredictable.”

  I nod and grab the banister. As I walk back upstairs to tackle my homework, I wonder if Mom is overreacting, or if I’m underreacting. My own judgment seems to be a bit impaired lately.

  Chapter 14

  The weeks race toward the holiday season. At times I wish they would slow down so I could untangle some of the feelings inside me. Other times, I wish it would all just hurry up and be over with already.

  Today we’re having more Healthy Discussion and Debate in Lesiak’s class. She picks up a pile of papers and walks slowly to the front of the room.

  “I’m handing back some of your papers on the attacks in September. I’d like you to read a few paragraphs out loud to your classmates so that we can generate dialogue. Shazia, here’s yours….”

  Just as I’m praying that I won’t have to read mine, she sets it down on my desk. “Samar…”

  Wonderful. The last thing I need right now is to bare my soul to my classmates.

  Lesiak goes back to perch on a corner of her desk. “Samar, why don’t you start us off?”

  No, thanks. I look down at my paper for a long moment.

  “Go ahead,” she gently prods. “We’ll be hearing from others as well. You’re not alone.”

  I stand up and swallow what feels like a plum pit in my throat, scanning the paper for the part I want to read. “I never thought before about who I am—”

  A girl at the back interrupts. “I can’t hear!”

  “A little louder, please, Samar.”

  I sigh and begin again. “I never thought before about who I am and what my history is. Then 9/11 happened. I would have felt awful about it anyway, just like every single one of us, but it was even bigger than that for me, because my uncle showed up on my doorstep a few days later. The last time I saw him was when I was two.

  “My Uncle Sandeep is Sikh and wears a turban. Ever since 9/11, he’s been harassed, yelled at on street corners, had garbage thrown at him, and been mistaken for the current Public Enemy Number One: Osama bin Laden.

  “Being with my uncle puts what happened in New York City on September eleventh in a whole different light. He’s one of the gentlest, coolest people you could ever meet. He wouldn’t hurt a fly, but he constantly gets linked to one of the most violent and destructive images of our time.

  “Seeing what he goes through reminds me of…” My voice cracks and I drop my paper. It flutters onto my desk.

  “Just finish that paragraph,” Ms. Lesiak says softly.

  I take a breath and continue. “Seeing what he goes through reminds me of some of the things I went through when I was younger. Things I had shoved way back to the dusty, shadowy parts of my mind. Being with him makes me want to know
who I am, where I come from, and what the rest of my family is like. He’s kind of like a road map for me. If I look at him real close, listen, and tread carefully, I’ll find my way home.” I blink back tears as I float back into my seat.

  “Thank you, Samar. I know that wasn’t easy,” Ms. Lesiak says. She looks at the rest of the class as I sit down. “None of these papers were easy to write, were they?”

  Lots of nods. “They’re not going to be easy to read out loud in class, either,” someone mutters loudly.

  More nods and mumbles of agreement.

  “It wasn’t easy to write, or read out loud, I’m sure,” Tina Volpe agrees from the other side of the room, “but hearing Sam read hers really made me feel better somehow…like I’m not the only one who’s having a hard time with it.”

  Lesiak nods. “Anyone else?”

  Shazia speaks up with her deep, silky voice. “It’s good,” she says resolutely. “This class is like a microcosm of the world with all the different opinions. It’s vital to hear what other people think. At least that way, you can address it and get closer to the truth. If no one talks to each other, all we know is what we hear from the media.”

  “I agree,” Nick Kiriakos says from the back. “It doesn’t make anything better, but it helps to keep you going.”

  Several other students read paragraphs from their papers throughout the rest of the class, and it’s true. Listening to the different ways everyone is struggling and coping helps in a way I can’t quite figure out. It’s like shattering little, brittle, glass walls between us or something and being able to breathe a bit better. Or like a huge group hug. There’s a real feeling of closeness and warmth in the room toward the end of class.

  Lesiak glances at the wall clock and stands. Her face looks like Mom’s when she’s trying not to hug me. “You have all done a fantastic job with these papers. We will keep this discussion alive and come back to it from time to time throughout the rest of the year. However, in the meantime, please read on in Fitzgerald’s Great Gatsby….”

  Balvir gives me a thumbs-up and an approving nod from her seat, a couple of rows over, before she heads out the door.

  I go through the rest of the day swinging in and out of the movie screen in my mind. So many things are swimming around in the soup that my brain has become.

  I gaze out the windows of my classrooms and see black Civics on the road. Sometimes I squint to catch their license plates, but usually they’re moving too fast. Ever since the incident with Mike, I’ve made it a point never to walk home alone, especially when it’s dark out, which happens to be really early these days.

  A couple of weekends before the start of the holidays, Molly and I make it to the mall for some retail therapy.

  “Oh my Gawd, Sammy, I am so in love.” Molly’s going on about Diego, the basketball player she has some serious hots for.

  “Oh yeah—how’d your date go the other night?”

  “Can’t you tell? You’d never know it from those big, rough hands, but he’s got this feather-soft touch.” She caresses her cheek with the back of one hand and closes her eyes.

  I grab her elbow and steer her toward Victoria’s Secret. I have a free panties coupon that I want to cash in, and this trip to the mall is supposed to help get my mind off going to Nani and Nana’s house next weekend. Not an easy task, since all the disastrous possibilities keep snapping back into my brain like a rubber band.

  “Shake it off, Wally,” Molly says sternly. Ever since I filled her in on more details about Mom walking away from her family, Molly has taken to using my childhood nickname more often. It does help a little.

  “Shake what off?”

  “You know exactly what,” she says, one hand on her hip. “We’re here for some retail therapy, and there’s no better place for that than here.” She waves around the store. “Vamanos.”

  We split up, and I halfheartedly browse the racks of teddies, slips, bustiers and bras. I give up when memories of Mike’s hands and mouth exploring my skin burble up in my head—when it was all good. I sigh and walk to the section where the free panties for the promotion are stacked up. I pick out a bland pair of tan ones and head to the cash register to meet Molly.

  She opens her bag to show off a red, flowery, satin slip with matching mules. I raise my brows. “What possessed you to get those?”

  She shrugs. “I’ve always wanted them, and these were just cheesy enough.”

  “They’re too big to fit in your little box of lingerie—how’re you going to hide them from your mom?”

  “I’ll separate them and slide them up top in my closet, along with my Reproductive Anatomy and Human Biology textbooks,” she says with a wicked grin. She looks at my bag. “What did you get?”

  I open the bag so she can see my underwear.

  “That’s it?”

  “Um, in case you forgot, I don’t have much need for lingerie right now.”

  “So? You will again, soon.”

  I shrug. “I guess I just wasn’t in the mood.”

  “Oh, Wally,” she says, draping an arm around my shoulders.

  We walk to the food court and Molly goes to Amato’s for pizza, while I go to the Big Fry.

  “Remember the last time we were here?” She slides into the seat across from me and dives into her garlic bread. “We did a pretty good job double-teaming Uncle Sandeep,” she says, coming up with a parsley mustache.

  There’s a commotion at the other end of the food court, and we turn to see what’s going on. An Indian girl, about our age, with a long braid down the middle of her back, is being dragged down the hall by her ear, away from a mortified Indian guy—also about our age.

  The girl screams, “Ow! We weren’t doing anything, Dad! We were just talking!” while the man says, “How dare you disobey me! Talking to boys. You’ll get a reputation and ruin the family name. Everyone will have trouble marrying their children off because they’re related to you!”

  “Wow,” breathes Molly. “Talk about intense.”

  I look closely. Something about the girl looks vaguely familiar. The walk, the voice…I sit up straight as a jolt zips through me. I didn’t recognize her right away because she’s out of slutty, retro, alter-ego gear. Instead, she’s sans makeup, wearing muted browns and grays (totally covering all body parts), with her hair pulled tightly back in a braid and her eyes cast down.

  I whip my head toward Molly at the same time that she turns to me, mouth wide open with half-chewed pizza. “It’s Balvir!” we exclaim in unison.

  “I can’t believe it!” I say. “I didn’t even recognize her.”

  “How could you? She doesn’t look anything like the girl we know at school.”

  I shake my head in disbelief. “Could you imagine? Being dragged away, publicly humiliated, just for talking to a guy?”

  Molly’s eyes are wide as she stares down the hall where Balvir and her father were moments ago. “Not at all.”

  We sit quietly for a moment. I stare at my uneaten french fries.

  “I wonder if that’s what life was like for my mom with her parents.” I look up at Molly. “I wonder if she ever had any scenes like that…if that was the reason she wanted nothing to do with them.”

  She chews slowly. “Wow,” she says again. “I wouldn’t want anything to do with them either, if they were like that.”

  “What if they’re still like that? What if they’re awful tyrant dictators, just like my mom said they were when she was growing up?”

  Molly shrugs. “Well, then that’s what you’ll find out. And you don’t have to live with them like she did. You can come back home and never deal with them again.”

  My shoulders sag. “Then I’d be right back where I was before…before anything was even a possibility.”

  “Anything, like what?”

  “Anything. Now it’s all a possibility. I could possibly have a huge family waiting to get to know me, a place to go every year for holidays and celebrations…just like you do. Memories and c
ool cousins and funny pranks…” My voice falters. “Or I could have nothing. I could end up back home with Mom and our two-person birthday dinners, and Cornish hens for Thanksgiving. And this time, no Mike, either.”

  She tilts her head to one side, turning the corners of her mouth down. “Don’t worry,” she says, “it’s gonna be fine.”

  Somehow, I’m not totally convinced.

  The week leading up to the visit to my grandparents’ house is strange and surreal. My feet never feel like they’re making full contact with the ground. It’s almost as if I can’t really feel the outside world because I’m trying so hard to keep up with my inside world. And inside is a commotion that rivals tsunamis and earthquakes.

  Mom, on the other hand, is a complete wreck. The Saturday before the visit, Mom double-books not one, but two clients. Then, a day or two later, she leaves her wallet in the fridge.

  When she pours orange juice onto her Flax Power cereal, I say, “Uh, Mom…are you sure you want to do that?”

  She stops midpour and collapses into a chair. “Oh, dear,” she says, shaking her head.

  “Are you okay?”

  She gives me a weak smile. “I should be asking you that.”

  “I’m more worried about you.” This is true, but not in the way it sounds. I’m not worried about my mother; I’m worried how her reunion with her parents is going to go. I’m worried that it could blow up in all our faces. I’m worried that it could be a blast so bad that I could be worse off than before. That it could go terribly wrong and end up with Mom forbidding me to go anywhere near my grandparents—or Uncle Sandeep, even. I put my hand under my belly button to soothe the sudden feeling of tightness inside.

  “Thanks, sweetie,” Mom says, getting up to dump her cereal out. “I’ll be fine…I just need to relax a little.”

  I have my doubts, but I leave it alone.

  It’s not until she walks out of the house in her socks one morning that Mom finally calls her former therapist, Tina. As part of her training during the master’s program in social work, Mom had to go through her own therapy. Every morning I’d come downstairs for breakfast, and she’d be furiously scribbling away in her dream journal. This was supposed to help her “get in touch with her subconscious self.” Sometimes I’d walk in after school and see her speaking to a cushion on an empty chair. It gave me the creeps a bit, but she explained that it was all part of learning to “let go and move on.” Still, I’m glad she doesn’t do that anymore.