Love from A to Z(26)

I don’t know if I like this.

My parents will. Ayaan will.

Fencer will too.

Topic changed.

? ? ?

Ayaan’s Instagram, usually active, had come to a standstill. It looked like she’d stopped posting last Thursday, the day I got suspended.

I sent her a DM, I’m so sorry, and then immediately regretted it.

So I followed it up with a sad crying emoji.

And then, disgusted at my behavior, I tossed my phone under the bed.

But what about when Adam texted?

I dove under the bed, retrieved the phone, and turned my volume on to make sure it would ping audibly when a message came in.

When his message came in.

I returned the phone to its temporary home under the bed again and lay on the floor, on the cold marble floor, staring at the ceiling.

It was a pretty fancy ceiling, moldings crisscrossing in twirls and flourishes.

It reminded me of Ayaan’s dress, the one she wore last Eid.

My hand, with a will of its own, reached for my phone and opened Instagram and sent Ayaan a heart. Four hearts. Ending with a broken heart.

Agghh.

I threw the phone so far under the bed, it came out and hit the baseboard on the other side.

Ayaan was super important to me. She was older, but, because she’d spent a year abroad in Somalia with her grandparents at the end of middle school, she ended up in the same year in high school as me.

When we’d met as freshmen, she’d acted like a big sister immediately. Even though she’d been trying to figure school out too.

I showed up in the foyer on the first day of ninth grade, clutching my schedule, eyes scanning for Kavi instinctively, even though I knew she was in India on a family trip, her flight delayed.

“Are you Mansoor’s sister? Mansoor Malik?”

I turned to a girl shorter than me with curly hair clipped back, an inquisitive look in her wide eyes. She wore a roomy sweatshirt over light blue, super-faded jeans.

“Yeah?”

“Mansoor’s a friend of Abdirahim, my brother. That makes us friends.” She smiled. “I’m Ayaan. Let’s check if we have any classes together?”

And, just like that, she’d stuck by my side. Even though, as the years went on, she got involved in tons of stuff at school, running-the-school stuff, and I got involved mostly in the yearbook committee and newspaper club, because I liked making CAPITAL LETTER captions and titles for things and Kavi was also there making graphics and designing pages. Ayaan went on to become a rightful school star.

My phone pinged.

Adam?

I crawled under the bed, only to realize how stupid that was when Auntie Nandy opened the door to see my legs, wearing pajama shorts, sticking out in view, the other half of me hidden, but still too far from my phone.

“I promise I knocked,” she said. “What is happening?”

“My phone.”

She went over to the other side of the bed and passed it to me underneath it.

It wasn’t a message from Adam.

It was one of the Emmas—Emma Domingo—asking if I wanted to meet the three Emmas at the mall, the BEST MALL IN DOHA, she wrote, tomorrow. Apparently, there was a Fenty makeup shop pop-up happening, and only Fenty had stuff suitable for Emma Domingo’s brown skin, her being part Filipino and part black.

It might be good for your skin too? she offered kindly. I imagined her texting this with some sort of peel on her face, cucumber slices on her eyes.

Which I’ve always wanted to try, actually.

“Is it okay if I go to Villaggio Mall tomorrow with some of the girls I met at the party at Adam’s house?” I asked, emerging from underneath the bed.

“Actually, that would be perfect. I’ve got some appointments I want to get done before your mom comes on Sunday. I’ll try to fit them in tomorrow.”

I sent a yes to Emma Domingo. And then checked if there was anything from Adam.

Just leave me alone. I’m not mad at you. I just want to be left alone, k?

Ayaan. She’d finally answered me.

I went back under the bed.

“Dinner is on its way.” Auntie Nandy sat on the bed. “Then what do you want to do tonight? We can drive down to the water if you want?”

“I’m kind of tired from visiting the shelter,” I lied.

“Oh yeah, how was that?” She peered at me. “Is there a reason you’ve got your head down there?”

“It’s cool down here,” I lied again, staring at Just leave me alone. “The shelter was sad. But good.”

“Aren’t you scared of dogs?”

“I’m working on getting over it.” Boy, I was on a lying spree.

I clicked out of my DMs and saw one of the Emmas’ posts. Emma Phillips, in a white T-shirt and shorts, doing yoga on a white rock, exactly like the rocks scattered in Adam’s backyard. She must live in his neighborhood.

She looked like a cool pretzel, one arm twisted over a leg twisted on another leg.

I pressed like.

Yoga was peaceful.

I rolled out from under the bed. “There’s a gym here, right?”

“An entire fitness center, including your favorite, a swimming pool. A pretty big one too,” Auntie Nandy said.

“Are there yoga classes?”

“Each morning at six a.m. I go sometimes. Wanna come?” Her face lit up. “That could be a great idea. Call it an early night tonight, then hang out at yoga before I go to work tomorrow?”