Internment

by Samira Ahmed

  I lie across my bed, mindlessly flipping through pages of a poetry anthology my dad assigned me. My nanni made my bedspread as a gift for my mom when I was born. I guess it was really a gift for me, though. She quilted it together from her old cotton saris, and even some that had been worn by my great-grandmother. Much of the multicolored fabric is faded now, the color worn away by time and sunlight, but it’s the softest, most comfortable thing in the world. She passed away two years ago, but when I’m wrapped in this quilt, it’s like her arms are reaching out to hug me when she knows I need it most.

  I’m reading Macbeth for AP English—a class I am no longer taking. My father is homeschooling me, and he insists we follow the curriculum. He also likes to add his own flourishes, hence all the poetry—right now it’s Wordsworth and Emily Dickinson and Faiz Ahmed Faiz. My parents pulled me from school because they were too scared of what might happen to me, terrified that my suspension could lead to much worse. I put up a giant fight, but a part of me was scared, too.

  Homeschooling doesn’t mean slacking off, though. Not to my parents. I still have the syllabi from all my classes, and David’s been bringing me assignments. And since my dad lost his job, he’s been taking his commitment to my learning seriously. I think it gives him something to do besides worrying about finding employment. He can’t. At least not as a professor at any school that receives public funding.

  My parents haven’t said anything to me about money, but I know they’re worried. My mom is still treating patients in her chiropractic office—she’s known some for years—but in the past couple of weeks, I’ve noticed her coming home early. Last Friday, she didn’t go into work at all.

  I grab the poetry anthology and flip to an Emily Dickinson poem and read the title out loud: “Hope is the thing with feathers.” The wind kicks up and whirls, and the leaves of the old oak outside my window brush up against the pane, stealing my attention. I put the book down. An eighties teen movie might not be what I need right now, but I’m also too agitated to read a poem about hope being a bird. I can’t concentrate. All my feelings are churned up, and I’m not in the mood to be inspired.

  A car pulls up outside the house. A door slams, then another. I roll off my bed onto the worn blue dhurrie rug that feels almost slick under my feet and step to the window to see who could be coming to our house this late.

  Below my window, two men in dark suits are walking toward our front door. My throat gets thick and my pulse quickens. Are they here for me? This can’t be for me. Dudes in suits seem excessive for a girl breaking curfew. If anyone were to come to arrest me, wouldn’t it be the police? But nothing is what it should be anymore.

  A dark van with a black-and-white logo emblazoned on the door parks behind my mom’s sedan. I squint to make out the van’s logo, lit only by streetlamps: EXCLUSION AUTHORITY. A door of the van slides open, and four white men in sandstone-colored uniforms step out and flank the sidewalk leading to our house. Behind their van, the police chief pulls up in his squad car and steps out.

  Run, I say to myself. But I can’t move. I try to scream to warn my parents, but no sound comes out of my mouth. Run. You have to move, to run. The doorbell rings, immediately followed by a loud pounding at the door. I hear my parents; they’re already in the foyer.

  Run.

  Hide.

  Scream.

  There is no running or hiding or screaming. I’m frozen. One of the Army guys (are they the Army?) turns and sees me at the window. I drop to the floor. My breathing is loud. Short, quick breaths. I crawl across the floor of my bedroom, the wood boards under my rug creaking ever so slightly. I open my door a crack. Then more. Not that I need to. Suit #1’s voice bellows through the house.

  “Identify yourselves,” the voice says. “Are you Ali and Sophia Amin?”

  What the fuck? Mrs. Brown. It had to have been her who reported me. Or maybe Jim from Patriot’s Alliance didn’t buy David’s lie about Ashley. God. I did this. What have I done? I stand up, and my body moves forward in a jerk, then another, and then I’m flying down the stairs. Both men are in our foyer, facing my parents. These men—the Suits—they’re both white and broad-shouldered and expressionless. One of them has his hand near his hip. I narrow my eyes. It’s a gun. His hand hovers near a gun.

  “Stop!” I yell. “It’s my fault. My parents had nothing to do with it.”

  My mom turns toward the staircase, eyes wide. Suit #2 draws a gun, and suddenly time slows down, like it’s viscous, and my entire body is drenched in sweat. I can’t feel my limbs, and the edges of my vision begin to blur. The only thing in focus is the gun. Pointed at me. My mom screams, and my dad yells my name, but the sound is muffled, like they are far away. So far away. And I can’t get to them.

  My dad moves forward to try to reach me, but Suit #1 grabs him and throws him to the ground, twisting his arm behind his back. My dad’s glasses fall off and slide across the floor. There is more screaming. Earsplitting, unnatural animal sounds, and I realize they’re coming from me.

  Then there’s only silence and the weight of the air in the room pressing on our bodies. And my short, shallow breaths, forcing my chest to rise and fall too fast, making me light-headed.

  Suit #1 nods at Suit #2, who points his gun away from me and reholsters it under his suit coat.

  Suit #1 releases my father’s arm and pulls him up.

  I’ve never seen this look on my father’s face before. It’s terror or fear or confusion. No. None of those are the right words. We’re all small, scared, helpless animals, our legs caught in the teeth of a steel trap. I understand; this has nothing to do with me. How stupid am I? This isn’t about breaking curfew. It’s about something far, far worse.

  Suit #1, obviously the one in charge, pushes my dad toward my mom, whose face is wet with tears. She reaches out for my dad, her arms, her entire body, shaking. Suit #1 speaks, his voice a taut wire. “Under order of the Exclusion Authority and by the powers vested in the secretary of war under Presidential Order 1455, we are here to serve notice and carry out your relocation.”

  Relocation. What does that mean? I turn from the Suits to my parents; my mom is sobbing into her hands, and my dad looks like the house is burning down around him.

  “Relocation?” I repeat. “For us? To where? Why?”

  Suit #1 turns toward the stairs, narrowing his eyes at me. “Near Manzanar. And you would do best to keep quiet.”

  I clamp my mouth shut and bite my lip. The looks on my parents’ faces. I clutch my stomach; I’m afraid I might throw up.

  Suit #1 addresses my dad. “You are the author of this book, Nameless Saints, correct?” he says in a gravelly voice, gesturing to the book in his hand. Suit #2 has barely uttered a word since the pair marched into our house.

  “Yes,” my dad answers slowly, uncertainly.

  His poems. They’re coming after us because of poetry? I rack my brain to try to think what could be in these poems that would get us in trouble. His last book was published a couple of months before the election. But my dad—his poems—they’re not fire-and-brimstone political. His poems are about people and moments and polishing tiny nuggets of truth.

  “And this poem? ‘Revolution’?” Suit #1 asks, showing my dad a page in the book.

  “Yes,” my dad says, his voice low. It’s probably my dad’s best-known poem. When it was published in the New Yorker, my mom and I had Mrs. Brown make him one of those picture cakes, with the cover of the issue his poem was printed in. Mrs. Brown, the woman who was off to burn my dad’s books. Dad once came to school to do a writer’s workshop with us in English class. I memorized his poem so I could recite it that day.

  Revolution

  By Ali Amin

  Speak to me with your tongue while it is still free,

  while your body is still yours.

  Let your words travel through the air,

  uncontrolled

  spontaneous

  necessary

  tumbling through clouds of dust tha
t dim the sun.

  Until they reach my ear

  and so many ears, spilled onto the table,

  waiting.

  Speak the truth while it is still alive, while lips, cracked and bleeding, can still move.

  Time is beholden to neither lover nor tyrant.

  Say what you must.

  I will listen.

  Ten minutes.

  That’s how long we’ve been given to pack up our lives, to leave our home. To prepare for relocation. How do we even begin? That’s not even time enough to say good-bye.

  Suit #1’s voice blasts at us as we begin to walk upstairs to collect our things. “Only the necessities. One bag per person.” He turns away, stops, and yells back, “Guards are posted in the front and back.”

  My parents and I continue up the stairs quietly. There are no more words. I feel like a fish that’s been caught on a line and slapped onto a stone. My tail flaps; my body lurches. I’m about to be gutted, and all I can do is watch the knife coming for me.

  My dad silently ushers all of us into my room. My eyes scan this space that suddenly feels like it’s not my own, not the place I’ve spent every night for over a decade. The book left open on my bed, the disheveled kantha quilt, the long black cotton scarf with red roses embroidered on it, my phone plugged into the nightstand. My phone. David. I need to tell him. I stutter-step toward my phone.

  Boots stomp up the stairs.

  “No,” my mom whispers, snatching the phone from my hands. There’s no time to protest, let alone tap out a text. I can only watch, wide-eyed, as my phone falls to the ground, hitting the carpet with a soft thud and a bounce that lands it on the bare wood floor under my bed. I drop to my knees to reach for it amid the dust and detritus.

  “I’ll take your phones now.” I look up. It’s the Boots. A man in a khaki Army uniform steps into my room, hand extended. His jaw juts out, showcasing a prominent underbite.

  My dad reaches into his pocket and turns over his phone. He doesn’t make eye contact with the guard, or with me or my mom.

  “My… my phone—” Mom stumbles over her words, then clears her throat. “It’s on the small table in the foyer.” She takes my dad’s hand, and they step a little closer to me. My mom reaches for me. I take her hand and let her pull me to standing. She nods at me. I look down at my phone, the bejeweled rubber case, the scratches on the glass surface, the screensaver of David and me—a selfie of us on a hike not far from here. His arm is around my shoulders, I’m flashing a peace sign, and we both have these goofy grins on our faces. There’s a tightness in my chest. There’s a deep coldness in my bones, and my blood is like ice.

  My mom turns to me and carefully unwraps each of the fingers that clutch my phone. My knuckles are white. Without another word, she gives my phone to the guard.

  “Ten minutes,” the guard barks at us, and then turns and walks out my door.

  My dad pauses, then quietly shuts the door. We’re alone, the three of us, in my room. I burst into tears. My parents surround me, wrapping their arms around each other and me. One of them kisses the top of my head; I’m not sure who. The other kisses my forehead.

  I don’t know anything anymore. I don’t even know if this is real. I can’t feel my body. It’s like I’m watching all of this from outside myself. And it seems like it should be science fiction.

  “We only have a few minutes,” my dad says, his voice cracking as he releases us from his embrace.

  “Take what you think you’ll need, beta,” my mom says, stepping back.

  A vise grips my heart. What I need? I need all the things I can’t have.

  My dad takes my mother’s free hand. They look at me, ashen-faced, red-eyed. They are about to walk out, but my mom returns to me, grabs my hand, and motions for my dad to take the other. In this small circle of our family, my mom turns first to me, then my dad, silently, her eyes glistening with tears. She starts to whisper a prayer.

  My Arabic isn’t so good, besides memorizing duas for daily prayers. But this one I know because it was always on Nanni’s lips. She even carried a copy of this verse in her purse, on a little laminated card. The Verse of the Throne. The protection prayer. My nanni used to tell me that this was one of the most powerful verses of the Quran. That whoever recited this verse would be under God’s protection. My dad once told me about the poetic symmetry of the verse. You should imagine yourself walking through the verse, he said, stopping at the chiasmus, the middle line: He knows that which is in front of them and that which is behind them. When you read the four lines before and the four lines after, you’ll see how, thematically, they are concentric circles that loop around that middle line.

  I may not be the most stalwart of Muslims, and my practice may waver, but this dua—maybe because of how I remember Nanni reciting it as she would blow the prayer over me—this one always gives me a sense of calm, but something more, too. Like my nanni’s voice endowed each of the words with the strength of her belief, like the words were tangible. I reach out for that peace right now, that strength, but it feels like grasping at air.

  “We have to hurry,” my dad says when my mom finishes the short verse.

  “Can you do this?” my mom asks. “Do you need me to help you?”

  No, I want to say. I can’t do this. I won’t. My heart is breaking, but underneath there’s this flickering flame of fury, too. How can we do this? How can you go along with this? I want to yell at my parents.

  But I whisper, “I don’t understand how this is happening.” My voice is barely a scratch. “How can we be dangerous to the state? A poet, a chiropractor, and a high school senior?”

  “It’s not about danger. It’s about fear. People are willing to trade their freedom, even for a false sense of protection.” My dad shakes his head. “‘There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.’”

  “What does that even mean?” Behind the terror, I can feel the flames of anger, burning, rising. How can we resign ourselves to this?

  “It’s John Adams. He meant democracy is fragile. All we can do right now is go along.” My dad turns to the window and raises his eyebrows. “They’ve stationed police outside the door. If we don’t cooperate, it will be much, much worse for all of us.”

  “Hurry, beta,” my mom says as she and my dad rush out to pack up their lives in suitcases.

  My head spins. My chest rises and falls, which is the only way I know I’m still breathing and standing here in the middle of my room. The bed’s not made. I can’t leave without making the bed. Who cares about the fucking bed? Why didn’t I text David? Does he know? How am I supposed to leave here without telling him? Will he think I’ve disappeared?

  Suit #1 told us where we are going. A relocation center. Near Manzanar.

  He used Manzanar like a landmark. Like the word was so everyday. Like “sun” and “grass” and “sky.” Words you use a million times without thinking. Like the irony wasn’t lost on him, because our world has no more irony in it.

  Only minutes are left, and I have to figure out what to take. But for how long? A couple of days? A month? The Japanese Americans were interned until World War II ended. Years. Shit. Could it be years?

  I grab the biggest duffel I have and start filling it with jeans, T-shirts, socks, underwear, pajamas. My black hoodie. A zip-up fleece. How cold does it get? Shoes. What shoes? A hat. Gloves. What do I need? How am I supposed to do this? Books. We can have books, right? I grab a couple of books from my nightstand, knocking over a digital frame currently displaying a picture of David and me at homecoming. I pick it up and hold it to my chest. I feel giant sobs coming on again, but I can’t. I don’t have time. I put the frame back on my nightstand, not sure if they allow pictures at… at wherever they’re taking us. What if they confiscate it? I’d rather have it here, at home, safe. Intact. From my desk, I snatch a handful of pens and a blank notebook.

  There’s a knock on my door. My mom.

  “Dad’s downstairs. We have to go.”

&
nbsp; I’m not ready. This is mad. I can’t go. “Mom.” My voice breaks. She moves toward me, but I hold up my palm, and she stops.

  “Make sure you remember socks and underwear.” She gives me a small, wan smile.

  Socks and underwear. I wonder if all moms do this—try to make the terrifying seem mundane. She steps away. She knows that I need a moment.

  I look around the room. There’s a little bit of space left in my duffel, so I take some rolls of washi tape and a blank journal I got in Paris last summer. The cover has a drawing of a girl and her dog curled up on a giant pot of red jam. The label says CONFITURE DE MOTS. I glance at my bookshelf—the yearbooks, my shoebox of notes and cards from David. I saved every note David ever passed to me in school. He laughed and called me a romantic when I asked him to write me notes instead of texting. But I love the notes. Each one is a little gift. A tangible surprise that doesn’t eat up gigs on my phone. And now I’m leaving them forever? For someone else to look at? What happens to our house? Will it be searched? Is it still ours?

  Too many questions and no answers. And I desperately want to take that box with me, but there is no room and no time.

  A door shuts downstairs, and my mom calls up for me.

  I pick up my duffel and turn off the light. But before I shut the door, I go back and straighten the kantha quilt on my bed. I see Fluffy—a brown stuffed dog with one ear almost falling off who joined me on my first day of nursery school. It was the only way I’d allow my parents to leave; he made me feel secure. My impulse is to take him. But I leave Fluffy on my pillow, where he has spent thousands of nights, in a place that was once safe.