To my three fierce, creative, and kindhearted daughters, Layla, Rayhan & Tasneem
Don’t let anyone or anything in this crazy dunia stop you from being you.
Mommy loves you more than words can say, so go out there and conquer the world
(but first you must conquer your nafs).
Dear Mr. Epstein,
I’m writing you because you know me. U.S. mail is the only safe way I could think of to get in touch. Weren’t you the one who told me that the federal government was mostly just a postal service at first? A funny fact from a music teacher. I’ll miss those funny facts.
I have to ask two favors.
First, you know that I am not capable of doing whatever it is they say I’ve already done, and whatever is about to come next. So please tell the federal government or anyone else who comes knocking on your door that I am not the bomber of May 3. They are.
Second, you have to promise me that you’ll watch over Salma B. Her life is in danger. If you trust me as much as I trust you, then you already know that she is even less capable of this insanity than I am. Although right now I honestly don’t know what I’m capable of. I’m sure that’s what they wanted.
And I don’t care about incriminating myself with that thought, because it’s too late.
I keep thinking of the word you always use to get me to practice scales, to play the way I wanted to play, so that one day the instrument would almost feel like an extension of my body. “Discipline.” That’s what they have, on a level that I still can’t understand. Their instruments are human beings, and their music is death. I know how crazy that sounds, but if you remember it in some way, it might be enough to keep you safe. And if you think I’ve lost it, maybe that will keep you safe, too. Either way: please tear up this letter and the envelope when you’re finished and burn the scraps.
I guess that’s three favors.
Take care,
A
WE NEVER SEE the world exactly as it is. We see it through whatever lens we choose. I never understood the difference until that sunny Thursday afternoon, the last day of April, when I stood face to face with Mariam in her driveway. In that moment the world became clear in all its stark ugliness. I was losing my best friend. Mariam Muhammad: my soul sister, lifelong neighbor, and general co-conspirator in all things.
My eyes fell to the driveway. It was ridiculous; even the pavement made me want to cry. We’d played hopscotch here. And there was no use spinning it as “Oh, she’ll come back to Arlington all the time.” We knew better, both of us. Seeing each other from now on would involve passports and expensive airfares, clearances and checkpoints. Also, eight time zones. The truth was that she wasn’t moving. She was fleeing. She and her whole family were now refugees—off to Dubai, the new Promised Land—an escape from Mason Terrace, a cul-de-sac so ridiculously safe and suburban that local real estate sites featured it to prove the entire neighborhood’s safety and suburban-ness.
Comical, if it weren’t so depressingly false.
When I looked up, Mariam was smiling, of course. Mariam the brave. Mariam the good. Cheery in the face of stress and sorrow. I lurched forward to hug her, the bright side of the Salma-Mariam moon. We were a unit in that way: visible yet detached, maybe a bit mysterious (we hoped)? Yes, we’d stay in touch. Through Twitter or WhatsApp or whatever. “Even old-fashioned letters!” she’d said. Mariam wouldn’t let me slide, even though videoconferencing was illegal in the UAE. Which didn’t help diminish the sudden and intense loneliness. Our moon would be all darkness now.
How am I going to survive the rest of senior year at Franklin without you?
“It’s going to be okay, Salma,” Mariam whispered in my ear.
I stepped away, wiping my eyes. “Can’t you just stay through till the weekend, till the grand fundraiser? I was thinking of raiding the mosque’s funds. Pay off your parents’ mortgage or at least get y’all a ticket for later in the month. I’ve never celebrated an Eid without you.”
“Yeah, pretty sure stealing from the masjid won’t go over too well with the Lord of the worlds,” she joked, trying to snap me out of my funk. “Besides, if you wanted me to stay that badly, you should have hacked into Air Emirates. Gotten us cheaper tickets.”
If you only knew, I thought miserably.
“Hey, look at it this way. Now you get to spend more time with Amir.” Mariam gave my hand a final squeeze. “And that brother is way too cute for you to be so sad.”
She was right about that, at least.
* * *
—
Amir and I began several months ago at one of Vanessa Richman’s legendary “Hey, my parents are out of town” parties. We were packed in the basement with thirty other kids from Franklin, mostly Vanessa’s friends, though I’d brought a couple of mine: the usual twosome, Lisa and Kerry. Or as they jokingly referred to themselves, “Dora and Boots.”
Lisa de la Pena happened to be my physical therapist’s daughter, but she had recently become my go-to party pal. Kerry Morrison, a willowy redhead with a Southern cowgirl style, was basically Lisa’s Mariam: like Mariam and me, they were a unit, BFFs since toddlerhood. The self-made Dora the Explorer nickname came in middle school. Apparently Kerry had come up with it after some idiots had bullied Lisa for being Latinx and accused her of being an “illegal.” (According to Lisa, Kerry was also unafraid to use her cowboy boots for “butt-whoopings” of bullying idiots, though I’d never seen her be anything but likeably goofy.)
Mariam’s parents had a sixth sense about parties and road trips and generally all things “haram”—so as far as Mariam was concerned, Vanessa’s place was never an option. But Lisa and Kerry were always game.
Point being: It’s always better to arrive with a posse. And Lisa and Kerry were in fine form that night. Maybe that’s why I was already feeling more comfortable than usual. Plus, after months of hounding, I’d finally convinced Vanessa to screen Fight Club for the obligatory 72-inch surround-sound feature presentation. I’d claimed I had a shameless crush on Edward Norton. Which wasn’t false. (He always looks so lost and vulnerable.) But the secret truth was that I’d wanted to share with Vanessa—a less judgmental friend than Mariam, I admit—this treasure I’d only recently discovered on the more secure chatrooms. Fight Club was the cult classic every hardcore anonymous online activist revered.
As it turned out, Vanessa had been hiding a hidden agenda of her own.