Love from A to Z(7)

She had on a hijab that was almost exactly the same shade as the azurite I’d bought for Hanna. Brilliant blue.

I’m pretty sure that’s why I noticed her. That and how she didn’t take her eyes off the phone in her hands, the one she was speed-clicking on, not even to check if the seat she took was clear, not even when her carry-on suitcase fell over, with her coat on the handles, and lay on the floor in a pile.

She left everything there, and then even let the flowery purse on the crook of her arm slip down and join its mates on the floor.

The handles on the purse sprung apart to reveal its jammed contents.

An orange book sticking out caught my eye. In big, bold, black handwritten letters it said MARVELS AND ODDITIES JOURNAL.

I think I must have made a sound, because she looked up, her eyes inquisitive.

I looked down at her feet. At the jumble around them.

She looked down herself and gave a start, setting her phone on the seat beside her to gather everything up and set them properly.

I took my laptop out and opened it on my knees—but I’d be lying if I said I was browsing online.

Instead, shielded by eyes staring at the log-in screen, my mind was in scrambles, wondering how, sitting across from me, was someone with a journal exactly like mine.





ODDITY: SECRETS


The kind of secret that punches people in the gut.

The kind written on the folded paper in my duffel, ready to be carried onto the plane to Doha.

The reason I avoided flying back home for Christmas holidays. The reason I stopped going to classes.

After I received it, in November, I spent too much time incessantly unfolding it to pore over it. Then, one day in December, I folded it up for the last time and kept it that way.

I haven’t looked at that bit of news since then.





ZAYNEB


THURSDAY, MARCH 7


ODDITY: RUMORS


I’D WANTED TO GET AWAY—maybe even find that elusive thing called peace—but everything followed me.

Exhibit A: The messages I got on every social media platform when I landed in London.

Somehow someone had gotten a picture of my note—Fencer is not going to be here. I’m going to make sure of it. (Bad knife drawing flanking #EatThemAlive)—and shared it with others who were then sharing it on and on.

Some people thought it was funny, but those people were few. Fencer wasn’t exactly popular, but he wasn’t considered mean, either, so most students were giving my suspension a thumbs-up.

And then i and t words started showing up underneath my profiles.

She’s ISIS.

ISIS girl should have been expelled.

I can’t believe Kerr let the terrorist off.

You terrorist cunt.

Then it became crazy stuff.

Heard your father is in ISIS.

Someone should tell the cops to check her house.

I already did. Told my dad who’s a cop.

They already found stuff on her.

Then I got a slew of private messages from Ayaan: What did you do?

I mean Kavi told me.

But what did you do?

SUSPENDED?

AND you blew everything.

And you take off for Doha?

WTH Zayneb

These messages came flooding in as the plane taxied on the tarmac at Heathrow and my phone got service again. After disembarking and walking to the gate for my connecting flight to Doha, I was able to start answering Ayaan once I found a place to sit.

I clicked apology after apology to her, imagining her sad, sad face looking at all the evidence she’d been collecting on Fencer for so long going up in flames.

Kavi had already told me this morning, after apologizing in tears to me last night for her contribution to getting me suspended, that she’d apologized profusely to Ayaan for writing #EatThemAlive, possibly alerting Fencer to what was going on.

If he googled those words, I’m pretty sure he’d come upon the hashtag and then see the many people who’d been removed from their jobs for their racism. He’d get a whiff that he himself was being tracked, and, poof, he’d delete his online presence.

The one Ayaan’s been researching.

The one she needs to turn over to the school board, because they’d probably not believe her screenshots, so easily photoshoppable.

Yes, I did blow everything.

I kept sending a string of apologies, but deep down I knew Ayaan would never trust me again.

? ? ?

And to think, I’d considered what had happened on the rest of the flight to London with Hateful Woman had been bad.

When she saw the Arabic I wrote in you, Marvels and Oddities, she pressed the flight-attendant call button incessantly.

“Either I move or she does,” she hissed at the attendant who came by. “She’s threatening me. Writing something about me the whole time.”

The flight attendant, a guy with dark hair and white glasses, looked at me.

“I’m just writing in my journal. I don’t get how that’s threatening,” I offered.

“Move me now.” She began gathering her things.

I swept my stuff together, put my tray up, and stood to let her pass. She stepped out in front of me, into the aisle, her eyes on other passengers, her head shaking hard in an attempt to solicit sympathy for her plight.

“Ma’am, please stay seated. I haven’t found a spot for you yet.” The attendant put his hands on his hips and looked down the aisle.