Love from a to Z

Islamophobia is the thing keeping it okay to kill people like us without
repercussions.
Then, with this realization, I fell asleep, exhausted.
• • •

---

Auntie Nandy was sitting at the edge of my bed when I woke up. “I’m sorry
to be sitting here like this, but do you want to eat something with me? It’s
past dinnertime.”
I nodded, my eyes on the ceiling. “The Emmas bought some food. It’s on
the table.”
“Zayneb, I couldn’t help seeing your phone when I came and sat down,
and there are a few messages from Adam.” Auntie Nandy cleared her
throat. “Totally didn’t read them. Just thought you should know.”
I nodded again, too heart tired to care whether Auntie Nandy had seen
them, or about Adam messaging me.
She left the room to set up dinner, and I stepped into the shower and into
a decision.
I’m not going to let up on Fencer.
I don’t care if they expel me.
Because that isn’t worse than having my grandmother taken from me.
• • •
“Are you okay going out tomorrow?” Auntie Nandy passed me the tray of
sushi rolls.
I took two and said, “Where?”
“Well, there’s a concert happening at Katara. Again, if you’re up to it, we
can go earlier, look around, then sit for the concert. It’s the Qatar
Philharmonic Orchestra, but, because it’s spring break and Katara will be
full of kids, they’re playing popular movie soundtracks.”
“Okay.”
“Some friends of mine will be meeting up there for the symphony part,
but we’ll be on our own to wander Katara,” she assured me.
“I’m fine with anything,” I said, mixing wasabi into my soy sauce
puddle.
“Maybe it will be good for you to go out. Just feel the air.”
I kept swirling the wasabi with my chopsticks, staring at it instead of
Auntie Nandy’s face. “Did Mom tell you why I was suspended?”
“Yes, that you drew something that the school thought was threatening.”
“There’s more to it.” And then I told her. About #EatThemAlive.
Everything about Fencer. And Mom and Dad wanting me to lie low.

---

And how it felt like Fencer and his kind had killed Daadi. “Am I
reaching, Auntie Nandy? Am I crazy? For wanting my grandmother not to
have died? Not to have died like that?” I began sobbing, covering my face.
I felt Auntie Nandy’s arms around me, then heard her voice. “You’re not
crazy; you’re in pain. You have a right to feel pain. And you know what?”
She paused and waited for me to move my hands away from my face before
she reached up and lifted my chin until I looked at her. “You have every
right to want justice.”
“But then why do Mom and Dad act like I can’t feel this?”
“They just want to protect you from the consequences you’ll get for
fighting for justice. Because there will be consequences when you shake the
world.” She pulled out the chair closest to me and sat in it. “But here’s a
secret: If you plot and plan wisely, the consequences are less unexpected.”
“You mean to plot quietly? My friend Ayaan did that, and she, too, got in
trouble.”
“You plot so quietly that no one knows anything, then you spring, armed
with the facts, like I did with Marc at the pool.” She reached across to her
plate and picked up a sushi roll and popped it into her mouth, chewing fast
before speaking again. “I’m going to say something really radical now. That
you have to promise you won’t tell your mom came from me.”
I paused, a roll on its way into my own mouth. “I promise.”
“If everyone listened to their parents who feared the consequences of
fighting for justice, this world would be a more awful place than it is now.”
“It’s already an awful place.”
“Imagine if it were even worse? If Nelson Mandela had feared the
consequences of fighting against apartheid? If Malcolm X and Rosa Parks
and Martin Luther King had?”
“If their parents had held them back?”
“No, if they’d listened to their parents, or anyone else for that matter,
holding them back.” Auntie Nandy turned to face me fully. “That itch in
your heart for justice was put there by God. Your bravery, too. Don’t let
anyone squash it—it’s like squashing the source of it.”
I leaned over and hugged her.
She made me feel proud of my angry self.
But yeah, I had to learn to be quietly angry.
Spring without a roar.
And spring I will.

---

Insha’Allah.