“Hi, Mrs. Abraham.”
Mom sits down on the couch, looking around at the computers and my Bullet Journal—I’ve been taking notes and writing ideas in it. “This is quite the battle station,” she says. “Any good ideas yet?”
“We’re a little stuck,” I say. “Everything we’ve tried so far has resulted in, like, two hundred extra bucks, tops.”
“And most of that was from your allowance, and from checks everybody’s parents cut,” Dua says, leaning across the table and grabbing a LaCroix.
“So now we’re setting up a fund-raising page online,” I say.
“People don’t want to donate?” Mom asks. “That’s disappointing.”
“Are you really surprised?” I say.
“Well…” She makes a noncommittal face. “Anyhow, I don’t want to blow up your spot. I know you’re itching for the parental unit to get out of Dodge.”
I laugh. “That is such a dorky-mom thing to say.”
“I aim to please, buttercup,” Mom says. “Later, kids. Have fun, and call me if you need me. I’ll be upstairs working.”
“What’s your mom do?” Dua asks once she’s gone.
“She’s a psychologist. Which you wouldn’t necessarily know by the pleasure she takes in negging me.”
“You seem pretty close,” Wells says.
“We are.” I shrug. “My mom’s awesome. Plus, we move a lot. There were some cities where I wasn’t there long enough to make good friends, so my mom and dad were all I had. I don’t have brothers or sisters. Your relationship with your parents is probably different when you’re an only.” I think about how close I used to be with my father, and my stomach tightens.
“Only child.” Dua sighs. “Dare to dream.”
“Seriously,” Wells says.
She looks at him. “Siblings?”
“Younger brother. With a mission in life to annoy me.”
“He’s always buried in a video game when I see him,” I comment. “I’ve barely heard him speak.”
“Believe me, he speaks. But only to beg for money for snacks and video games and new baseball caps and God knows what else.”
“He doesn’t get an allowance?” Dua asks.
“He does, but…” Wells’s face tightens. “My dad’s kind of weird about money.”
Dua doesn’t know Jack Henderson is Wells’s dad. I mean, I know I should tell her. But she’s already being supercool by accepting Wells, period. Would that tolerance extend to finding out how intolerant his dad is? Doubtful.
Baby steps, right?
* * *
After dinner, I’m in my room doing homework when a notification pops up on my phone. It’s an Instagram message from a random girl at school. Her name is Mikayla, and we’ve interacted precisely zero times.
Hi Allie! I saw you at school recently and I hope you don’t mind me reaching out. Have you ever been exposed to Jesus? You always seemed like such a nice girl and it would genuinely make me so sad if you weren’t able to experience salvation. Can I send you some information about the Good News? Hugs!
There’s so much here I don’t know where to begin.
Let’s unpack.
I draft a reply:
Hi Mikayla! Thanks so much for reaching out! I DO mind the insinuation I’m going to hell, actually … but you always seemed like such a nice person, too, so I’m going to forgive you this one time. (Like Jesus!) My mother was born a Christian, so I am already aware of the Good News, but thank you. I’m a Muslim, I’m happy, and I don’t need to be saved. If you ever want to hear about Islam and the divine revelation of the Qur’an, I’m here for you. If not, no worries and see you around school. Xo, Allie. PS: Jesus is a messenger in Islam, too.
This is the kind of reply I’ve always wanted to send but never would. I should delete it and write something generic.
Or take a selfie of myself making a grinning thumbs-up, and Photoshop flames around my face with arrows pointing to the words me and in hell. (That probably wouldn’t go over well.)
Or ignore her altogether.
Mikayla’s trying to be nice—even though she slid into my DMs like a literal gift from God—and I’m sure her intention is good.
Intention is really important in Islam.
But I’m done. I’ve had it up to here with people’s thoughtless, offensive, and harmful good intentions.
I press SEND.
* * *
A couple days later, Dua cracks up when I mention the exchange with Mikayla.
“Did she reply?” Dua asks.
“Nope. Although, she looked freaked out when I saw her at school yesterday, like maybe I had some secret Muslim superpower and was going to zap her with it.”
I pretend to shoot spiderwebs from my hands, and Dua mockingly puts her hands up to her face. “Noooo!” she says.
I reach into the bowl of veggie chips and munch on a stack. “These are way too good.”
“Mom insists they’re healthy,” Dua says. “She’s obviously deluding herself. But they’re delicious, so I’m not complaining.”
She pulls up another YouTube video, crunching on a chip as she continues my musical education. (Which, I think we both know, is more for her enjoyment than mine.) “Okay. Elissa—have you heard of her? She’s superfierce and kind of controversial. This song was popular back in the day, and the guy in this video is soooo cute.”
This is something funny about a lot of Arabic music videos. The women look like Kardashians, the guys look like movie stars, and there’s always more skin than you’d expect—but even conservative Muslims eat it up.
The door flies open.
“Did you take my hair dryer?”
It’s a tall, beautiful girl with long, glossy black hair almost to her waist. She has soulful eyes, like Dua’s father, and dimples, like Zak.
“I already told you no,” Dua says.
“I doubt Mom took it,” the girl says, “so you must have it.”
“Are you serious, Amina? It’s probably lost in your room.”
Amina stands in the doorway, looking irritated. Her glance lands on me, but she doesn’t say anything else.
“This is my friend Allie.”
“Hi!” I say, and smile.
“Hey, Allie.” She raises a hand in greeting, quickly smiling at me before looking at Dua again. “If you find it, let me know, okay?”
“Okaaaay,” Dua says. “For the fifth time. Byeee.”
Amina starts to shut the door behind her, but then her gaze moves to something on the bed. It’s the Qur’an we were flipping through earlier.
“Are you teaching your friend Islam? Dua, c’mon. Don’t bore her.”
“I’m Muslim,” I say.
“You?” Amina gives me the once-over. “Really?”
“Yes.”
She looks skeptical. “Are you in that band of revolutionaries together?”
“Yes, now please go away,” Dua says. “You’re annoying me.”
“What do you think, Allie? About that nonsense your leader spews.” She leans against the doorframe.
“Um, what nonsense?” I say.
“You can’t remake a religion in your own image. It doesn’t work like that. Either you’re Muslim or you’re not. I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but what that Samira chick is teaching you isn’t reform: It’s Islamophobia. Junk-food spirituality. I went to one of the meetings with Dua last year. Haram. Total garbage.”
I look back and forth between Dua and her sister, unsure what to say. What’s ironic is that she seems to think Dua is some wild liberal, when I find Dua kind of conservative.
“Amina thinks just because she’s one year older, she’s smarter,” Dua says.
“Never said I was smarter,” she says. “But it’s not smart deluding yourself that your misinformed study group is bringing you closer to Allah. You should spend less time worrying about changing Islam and more time worrying about changing yourself.”
It’s interesting watching the two of them
square off: Dua, who’s continued wearing a hijab, getting accused of being a raging liberal, against clearly more conservative Amina, who looks like she’s about to go model for Pantene.
Amina laughs. “Cognitive dissonance?”
“Huh?” I say.
“You’re sizing me up. Looking at my hair. Don’t judge a book by its cover, okay? Or by whether it covers, period.”
Dua rolls her eyes at Amina’s religious pun, pantomiming vomiting.
“You judged me,” I say quietly.
“Sorry?”
“You assumed I couldn’t be Muslim because of the way I look.”
Dua looks over at me, grinning. “Yesss,” she whispers.
I expect Amina to clap back, but instead she says, “Ouch. Not cool of me. Sorry, Allie.”
“I’m sorry, too.” I say.
“Anyhow, gotta run. Don’t fall for their propaganda,” she says to me, pointing her finger in my direction. “There’s a Sunday study group at the masjid over by Georgia Four Hundred if you want to do it properly. Later.”
As Amina closes the door behind her, Dua groans. “She’s so annoying.”
“She didn’t seem bad.”
“Wrong. She’s such a know-it-all. She started going to these classes over the summer, and now she won’t shut up about it. What’s hilarious is her friends are on her case for not wearing a scarf, and then they get into these arguments about scholarly positions on hijab.”
“Maybe I should start studying with her instead of you.”
Dua throws a chip at my head.
But as the two of us go back to watching YouTube videos, I fret. Am I being Islamophobic? Is that why I want to keep dating, and why I think Islam has room to be modernized?
Instead of nourishing my soul, am I feeding it junk?
* * *
On Fridays, the holy day in Islam, Muslims gather at mosques after noon for the Jum’ah prayer. The Prophet reportedly once said that those who pray on Friday will have their wishes granted.
This is one of the most rewarding aspects: learning all these new traditions, hadiths, and guidelines.
The thing I’m struggling with is trying to keep my Islam from being like a buffet: cherry-picking the cool parts I like, ignoring the inconvenient parts I don’t.
I like the emphasis on family.
I don’t like the exclusion of LGBTQ people from the narrative.
I like the Qur’an’s support for women’s rights.
I don’t like the men who alienate women in the name of Islam.
I like the framework for how to be a compassionate, kind, charitable person.
I don’t like that every single guideline from the seventh century must hold true in the twenty-first.
Maybe if I’d been a practicing Muslim from the beginning, I wouldn’t feel as tentative questioning parts I’m not enthusiastic about. Houri was raised in a much more by-the-book family than mine and is married to a wonderfully devout man in Rashid, yet she’s unapologetic about being lapsed. But for me, who came to the party late—I feel like if I don’t do it perfectly, I’m not allowed to do it at all.
It’s spring break, so Samira is taking us on a field trip to the mosque in downtown Atlanta. Mom knows the truth, but Dad thinks I’m going to a museum with friends.
“Baking is so annoying,” Shamsah says after Fatima tells us she’s gotten into a new course at the cooking institute. “But congrats, obviously.”
“Baking isn’t annoying,” Fatima says, looking over at her. “Baking is amazing. It’s like a series of tiny, precise math problems where you get to eat the results. It’s edible perfection.”
“Except it’s never perfection,” Shamsah says. “It’s always too soggy, or too flat, or too dry, or too whatever. Baking is totally setting you up to fail. If you make a tiny mistake, screw you, thanks for playing.”
Next to me, Dua laughs. “So is the problem with baking, or is the problem you’re the worst at it?”
Shamsah frowns at her. “Thanks.”
“That cake you made for my birthday was pretty good,” Leila tells Shamsah, looking at her kindly. “I really liked it. I had two pieces.”
“What, you mean the Betty Crocker cake? The box I bought at Publix and mixed together with eggs, water, and Crisco? Ugh,” Shamsah says, sinking down in her seat.
“I agree, baking is impossible.” I smile supportively at Shamsah. “Cooking is way better. You can make it up as you go along. If you have the magic mix—this spice, that seasoning, a lot of love—it can still taste good. It doesn’t have to be perfect.”
Shamsah nods. “Allie gets it.”
“No metaphors here,” Dua quips.
“Speaking of food, Ramadan is coming up next month,” Samira says, looking at me in the van’s rearview mirror. “Of course, you’ll have your family for support, but we’ll all be here, too. The first one is always the hardest.”
“Um…” I clear my throat. “Actually, my dad doesn’t know I’ve been practicing. So…”
Dua makes a frustrated noise. “Seriously, Allie? Tell him already.”
“I can’t. I’ve been lying to him for months. He’s going to be upset.”
Samira looks at us in the rearview mirror, eyebrows raised. “Your father doesn’t know you’re practicing?”
“Erm. No.”
“He converted when he married your mother?” she says.
“No, the other way around. My mom is the revert. My dad was born Muslim.”
“Ahh,” Samira says, nodding. “I understand.”
“You do?”
“It’s not unheard of. Many people raised in religious households rebel by rejecting their faith as adults.”
“Plus, Allie’s dad is a professor,” Shamsah says. “He’s allll about science.”
“Were your teta and jido strict?” Samira asks.
I snort. “What grandparents aren’t?”
Leila laughs.
It’s not a divine revelation. It’s pretty freaking obvious, in fact. But I feel silly for not understanding until now: As much as I’m reacting against my parents, Dad’s reacting against his. “You think this is because my teta and jido were too hard on him growing up?”
“I’m not a therapist,” Samira says. “I have no idea.” She smiles gently at me through the reflection. “But parents are people, too, you know.”
I lapse into silence as the van navigates through the traffic on I-75. I’m clutching the amethyst headscarf I’ve brought to wear. I haven’t worn a hijab since trying it at school last week. I’m happy I did, but it’s not for me—at least, not right now.
As Dua and Shamsah start talking about a new cruelty-free halal makeup line they’re both obsessed with, I think about Dad.
I need to tell him.
He deserves that much.
“I had no idea this existed in Atlanta,” I say as we get out of the van. We’ve reached the masjid, a beautiful, majestic domed structure. “Have you been here before?”
Everybody but Fatima and Samira shakes their heads no.
There are mosques closer to home in Providence—more than you’d expect, considering how pervasive Christianity is around here. Although Providence is full of transplants from the North and the Midwest, this is still a town where a third of the cars flash bumpers with John 3:16 stickers and Jesus fish. I pulled up one of the local Islamic center websites a few nights ago, after Amina called me out, and I was scared off after only a few minutes of clicking around.
The website was clean and cheerful, advertising a youth halaqa and clearly trying to draw in more young people and women. But in the community forum, somebody wrote: Masjid is for praying, not for socializing. Women should not be sitting here every afternoon talking instead of praying.
So, yeah. Yet another reason why I’m scared of going to the mosque. I get enough of feeling unwelcome in my daily life.
We wrap our scarves around our heads before entering and make our way to the women’s prayer section, putting our s
hoes in the cubbies and performing wudu in the footbaths. I follow Fatima’s lead.
“When was the last time you went to a mosque?” I ask Dua. She runs her hand back and forth across her soles, letting the water wash over them.
She grimaces. “It’s been a loooong time. Don’t worry, Amina makes sure to guilt me about it daily. It’s not always the most welcoming place, despite what my parents say. I prefer praying at home.”
To hear that Dua feels that way is both surprising and comforting. I’m not alone.
“It’s called being ‘unmosqued,’” Samira explains quietly as we dry our feet. “A lot of young women feel out of place at the masjid.”
“Some guys, too,” Dua says. “My brother, Zaki, feels the same, and he’s good about sticking to his prayers. Sometimes it feels like the mosque is only for old men.”
“The masjid is for everybody,” Leila says. “Besides, women aren’t separated from men in Mecca or Medina.”
“But that’s exactly it! It’s like, do I want to hang out in the basement like a second-class citizen when I don’t have to?” Dua says. “It feels like a club and you don’t belong. Like, everybody’s upset about building walls, but we have our own walls between the men and the women. Plus, our area is so much smaller. I’d rather pray privately with y’all … with people who understand me and share my views and don’t stuff me away as an afterthought.”
Leila sighs as we walk into the women’s area. “C’mon. Do you really want the men staring at us? I prefer being separated. It’s more private, anyway.”
“There are women’s mosques popping up around the country now,” Samira says. “One in the Bay Area, another in Los Angeles. Change is slow, but it’s coming.”
I’m mildly irritated we’re separated from the men, but as the imam begins the khutbah, I’ll admit there’s also something nice about being free from prying male eyes. I’ve been lucky to have wonderful men in my life, but I know that’s not true for everybody. I understand the appeal of wanting a safe space, a respite, a male-free sanctuary—if only for forty-five minutes.
However, as the prayers start and I raise my hands to my ears, setting my intentions, I think, I’d rather we had the cavernous room and the men were somewhere else, a location of our choosing.
All-American Muslim Girl Page 20