Watched

by Marina Budhos

  My eyes swing between them, bewildered. “I don’t go to the mosque,” I mutter. “Not anymore. Not even my dad.”

  “That’s okay. There’s lots of other things you can do.”

  “Like?”

  He glances at the folder. “Chat rooms. Friends. That’s very helpful to us. Student groups. Muslim student associations.”

  “I don’t join any of that stuff!” I protest. “I don’t like politics.”

  He grins. “Even better.”

  I jam down in my seat. If I go very still, like a lizard that changes color, they’ll lose sight of me. Forget I’m here. That’s what I want. To not be seen. To not be so noticed. I’m a loser, a kid who’s wobbling through senior year. Just a smudge in their calculations. Close the folder, mister, please, and walk away. Let me go.

  But the blue-hoodie guy is smiling at me. He scoots his chair a little closer, rubber tips skidding on the linoleum. His eyes are like small, moist figs. “My partner here thinks you’re a good kid. I don’t know, myself.”

  Taylor asks, “You know what we’re asking you to do, right?”

  I can hardly breathe now. My teeth hurt. This is a test, only this time, I’m not confused. I know exactly what he’s asking of me.

  Watcher.

  Both men get up, as if on cue. Taylor’s hand drops on my shoulder. It’s warm, almost tender. “Come. We’ll get you something to eat. You must be starving.”

  Watcher. Mosque crawler.

  Abba always looked forward to his time at the mosque, especially Friday-night prayers. That was when we fit snug, as best we could: my abba, my half brother Zahir. My stepmother stayed at home to pray and cook. Abba palmed on his skullcap, his long white kurta. He looked elegant. The seam threads glinted fine in the sun. We’d walk several blocks with Zahir, my little brother’s hand light in mine. He was so sweet, so trusting. Sometimes Abba and I would hoist him up between us, let him swing high, until he gasped with laughter. We were good, then.

  A few blocks before the mosque, Abba grew somber, quiet. Sometimes they set out a small speaker, the call to prayer rolling out into the street. You’d think it was the center of the universe, the way people came streaming out of buildings, off the stoops, palming on skullcaps, like my abba.

  All around us a blue-black twilight lowered, the streets a dark river of frenzied action, everyone rushing home at the end of the week, picking up their dollar loaves, the Chinese ladies pushing carts of bruised vegetables the stores sell at the end of the day. We were a school of fish, going in a different direction, swimming toward this ugly building that used to be a senior center. I joined the others, kicked my sneakers off, washed my feet under the spigots, folded myself on the carpet. Then I’d dip my head down and dive inside, letting the prayers roll over and through me. After, it was like coming up for air, sun and shiny teeth, joking, regular talk. We joined the flow again. We’d stop for a few minutes, chatting with the men who hung around outside. Then Abba would take us for ices down the block—the drizzled, bright-colored cones sold by the Mexicans on Roosevelt Avenue. Zahir and I had a contest—who could gulp the ice down faster and not cry from the cold. We laughed so hard then, tears scalding our cheeks. We were ourselves, but changed somehow.

  About a year ago, soon after the detectives came and asked questions at the store, we came out of the mosque blinking and Abba said, “We’re not going anymore.”

  “But why?”

  “We’re not.”

  He jabbed a thumb in the air, did his shaky head-tilt. Even in the dark I could see the low outline of a car parked across the street, a blue Chevrolet. “You see that? Plainclothes police. All the time.” He shrugged. “I don’t want any trouble. Store is hard enough as it is.”

  Crazy old man, I thought. Abba loves to stay up late and watch the American police shows, especially reruns of Law & Order or Miami Vice. He likes The Good Wife, though he doesn’t approve of the character Kalinda’s behavior—wearing her skirts too short and kissing both girls and boys.

  So I checked it out for myself. The next day, after school, I looped around the block near the mosque. The car was still there. I could see the man’s forearm, freckled, reddish hairs lit up in the sun. Mashed-up Dunkin’ Donuts bags on the passenger side. I couldn’t believe it. It was exciting, in a way.

  I went back the next day: a different guy, same car. Same crumpled garbage tossed on the grooved rubber mat. I stood there, amazed by these shadow guys threading through our neighborhoods. Secret-agent men. How could we be so important? We’d been given some kind of celebrity status, but in all the wrong ways.

  Then I felt a sharp nudge to my back. I whirled around to see the imam, brow furrowed. Boy, he was not happy.

  “What are you doing here, Naeem?”

  Shame flooded through me. “Just hanging. Messing around.”

  He pulled me across the street, so angry I could see his lip quiver, which it did when he took us boys aside for a scolding. “Do not joke like that. This is not funny. These men are serious.”

  I tried to rearrange my face, make it seem as if it were no big deal. But inside I was pretty shook up. Maybe he was right. This wasn’t a TV show or a comic book. “Sorry,” I mumbled, and slunk away.

  Soon Abba heard they’d put a camera right near the entrance to the mosque. Some community leaders complained, but the little boxy camera is still there, bolted to a telephone pole a few feet away, a black security insignia glinting like a tiny crow in the sun. My cousin Taslima, who runs a human rights group, walked around the neighborhood, trying to get people to come to a community workshop about what to do if an FBI man comes to your door. Some argued, said it’s a good thing. “They are protecting us.” Most nodded and turned away. Like Abba, they were frightened. As if they’d already been caught on film, overexposed, grainy.

  “Come on, Uncle, we have to fight this,” Taslima urged Abba when she stopped by his shop.

  He shook his head, firm. “No fighting. We do not fight.”

  I knew what lay behind Abba’s dimmed eyes, the stiff shoulders: the war that made Bangladesh. How his own older brother, Rasul, slipped away in the middle of the night with a rucksack to join the Mukhti Bahini, the Freedom Fighters, to fight Pakistani rule. No more war, Abba often said.

  Now I swear I see cameras everywhere—on the street poles, clicking inside cars. And Abba, he rolls out his rug, prays in the back of the store. Sometimes he joins the men in the alley masjid, not far from our store. Not even for Ramadan did he go to the big mosque. When he goes to watch the soccer games in Flushing Meadows Park, he unfurls his rug on the grass, adjusts it under a tree just so, to make sure he’s facing east. The bottoms of his feet are dusty, callused ovals. I’m proud and angry, watching him do his prayers, even as the guys from Ecuador are kicking a soccer ball nearby, or some white women are power-walking in their skimpy tank tops. I’m furious because he won’t go back to the mosque. He lets himself be out here, on the scruffy lawn, the cars from the Grand Central Parkway thrumming past. His forehead has a leathery imprint, the shape of a thumb, from all his hard work to Allah. It’s not the same, of course. That hole of calm we used to step through twice a week, it’s shut tight now.

  “Tell me about yourself.”

  We’re sitting at a diner in some neighborhood I don’t recognize because we came by car, bumping down so many streets I got confused. Taylor is doing most of the talking, acting as if this is a regular job interview. The other guy—Sanchez, I’ve learned—stays out of it. He’s busy dabbing his fries in ketchup, popping them into his mouth. “You like school?”

  Outside, a light drizzle has started, and a pretty girl has paused to snap open her umbrella. She’s wearing a raincoat, and she has to tilt a little, hold her arms out, to make the cheap handle work. For some reason, it hurts to see this. As if she’s off-limits, as if I’ll never be out on the Queens streets again, loose, doing what I want.

  “Some. At first I thought maybe I could be an engineer. Finance. But forget co
llege. The math is killing me.” I remember with a pang the brochures Amma set down on the breakfast table.

  “So what do you like to do?”

  I shrug. “Acting and stuff.”

  “Really?” There’s a trace of a smile around his mouth, showing his very straight teeth.

  I nod. “I was Kenickie in Grease.”

  “I can see that,” he laughs. “Not bad.”

  For a second, I flash on Ibrahim—Mr. Business Major—and a soreness scrapes up in my throat. He used to promise to be my manager. Or we’d watch YouTubes on his iPhone and he said he’d make a video with me. My hand flits to my pocket for my phone. Then I remember I’ve got nothing on me.

  “When I was in high school,” Taylor comments, “all I wanted to do was play basketball.” He shakes three sugar packets into his coffee and stirs.

  “That’s not very healthy,” I tell him.

  He smiles. “You’re observant.”

  I flush. “Sort of.”

  “That’s what we need.”

  “Guys who keep their eyes on things,” Sanchez adds. “That’s how I got recruited.”

  I turn to Sanchez. He has me on edge—he seems to flash from bully to distant observer. Underneath I sense a boiling temper.

  “Did you go to cop school?” I ask.

  “Cop school.” He grins. “I like that.” He dabs a fry into his ketchup. “No, I went to ambush school.”

  I give him a puzzled look.

  “Army. Deployed to Iraq two times, Afghanistan once.”

  “Oh. Wow.”

  “Saw a lot of stuff.” He stares off through the plate-glass window. Now I can see lines running down his jaw, turning him older. “So now I do intelligence.”

  “In your hometown.”

  “Brooklyn. Grew up in the Red Hook projects. How’d you know?”

  “It’s easy.” I point to his hand. “You’ve got a ring. A high school ring. Taylor’s is Fordham. College. But you probably went right to the army, straight after high school?”

  They try to hide it, but I can see the pleasure lighting both their faces.

  “How’d you do that?” Sanchez asks.

  “It’s nothing.” I shrug.

  “No. Really. Tell us.”

  It’s funny. For the first time I kind of relax. There aren’t many people I can talk about acting with. My parents would freak. It’s not a real job. “Drama class,” I explain. “We do these character workups. We have to know everything. Like what they eat for breakfast. Or who punched them in the face in third grade. Stuff that isn’t in the script.” That’s the longest string of sentences I’ve given these guys since this night started. I even feel good about it, and sink back in the booth.

  “Go ahead,” Sanchez says, crossing his arms across his chest. “Work me up.”

  Sanchez is all armor and heavy defense. I can imagine him in some massive tank, scanning a dangerous city. It’s like he’s still in that built-up vehicle, watching the world from heavy-lidded eyes. He’s someone who doesn’t trust, ever.

  “You probably had a whole gang you ran with in the neighborhood,” I try. “Got into some scrapes. Messed up. Then you thought the military might just do the trick. Secretly you kind of liked the cops who used to give you trouble. You admired them.”

  “Not bad!” Taylor elbows his partner. “What’d you think, Carlos? Got you pegged?”

  Even Sanchez gives a grudging laugh. “You’ve got talent, kid. Where I come from, you run with that. Otherwise life has a way of running after you.”

  This may sound weird, but my spirits lift. This is the first time in months, maybe years, anyone has said something nice about me. Especially these last few months. And especially coming from Sanchez. I’m so used to being the one who disappoints. After-Naeem. Mr. Screw-Up.

  “It’s true,” Taylor says. “There are things you can do with this. It’s a job. Could even be a career.”

  I cough at that, incredulous.

  “Seriously. You do well, you can take the exam. Maybe join the force. FBI. CIA. It’s a great future.”

  “We can even help you with getting on track, college-wise,” Sanchez adds. “You’ll need money, right? Your dad, he’s got a store? With this economy, I bet he’s not doing so well.”

  “He’s okay.”

  “There’s money. Four, five hundred a month.” He makes a bridge of his stubby fingers. “It can go up from there. Depending on how well you do. What you get for us.”

  I let this sink in. So they’re serious.

  “Hey, you haven’t eaten.” Taylor points to my plate.

  It’s true. I ordered a tuna on toast but have only managed to eat a couple of bites, the mayonnaise curdling sour in my belly.

  Sanchez slides out of the booth and stands, hikes up his jeans. He’s glowering, checking his watch, as if my little display never happened. His wrists are thick, strong, like his neck. I wonder if he wrestled when he was in high school. I should have put that in too.

  “We should go.” He looks down at me, irritated. Beneath his nylon Windbreaker, I can see a slight bulge. Doesn’t take talent to know what that is.

  —

  It’s thirty minutes later. We’re sitting in their car, silent, with a view of a dingy subway entrance. My elbows stay tensed at my sides. I’m not sure what’s next. Do they take me back to that room? Book me?

  To my surprise, Taylor’s handing my backpack to me. The zippers jingle a little. “Okay, kid.”

  “That’s it?”

  He shrugs.

  “But what about—” I want to say, the shoplifting charge? your offer? my talent? An auto body and junk shop mounds across the street, broken shells of cars piled high behind a chain-link fence. “What’s next?”

  He grins. “You’re good at that stuff. You’ll figure it out.”

  “But—”

  “Get going,” Sanchez says in a low voice.

  I slide out of the car, then hurry, shivering, too scared to do anything but move forward. Just as I’m stepping down the subway stairs, I glance back. But their car has vanished, melting into the night.

  The next day at school, it’s like I’m an astronaut landing back on Earth. I’ve been to some weird planet I didn’t even know existed. Whisked into a version of The Matrix, only to be dropped into first-period homeroom. I catch myself scanning the other kids—the homeboys slumped down low during English; the Dominican kids flicking their long combs through their flattops. They look so young, silly. How many of them have ever been in lockup? Eaten fries with detectives? I can’t tell whether I’m weak or powerful, having this secret knowledge.

  But it’s Friday. I hate Fridays. That’s the day when everything I’ve been avoiding piles up. A guilty ice-drift slowly leaks into my stomach. The essay I was supposed to turn in, the quiz I have to take, the science lab I meant to write up. It’s the last quarter, and a trail of incompletes, no credits, and bad grades blots my transcript. It’s not that I don’t know this. It’s that I don’t know how to fight my way back.

  Ten minutes into third period the loudspeaker blares and the secretary calls my name for a conference with Mrs. Delarosa. I hate that word. Conference. Makes it sound so important. But at this point in the school year everyone knows. Who is borderline. Who had his parents called in a few times.

  “Mrs. D!” I say, trying to put on a grin as I saunter into her office and drop my backpack by the chair. I’ve done this before. It’s not the first time I’ve been called.

  Everyone loves Mrs. D. The girls cluster around her office at the end of the day, showing her their new shoes or nail polish, or she’s always got a group of us joking around, since she runs the drama club. She likes to ruffle my gelled hair, teasing, What’s in here? Cement?

  Today, no smile. Her eyes look drawn, her lips chapped and pale. She’s dressed for summer in a pretty sleeveless top—the color Amma likes, coral-pink—and it shows off her sunburned arms, her freckles.

  “What’s the matter?”

&nb
sp; “Oh, Naeem.” She shakes her head. “Hijo, what am I going to do with you?”

  My jaw goes stiff. “What?”

  “You think I’m stupid, hijo?” There’s a bright flush on her cheeks.

  Oh boy, I think. Mrs. D is going to launch into one of her outpourings, all in Spanish. She slides a folder across her messy desk. Inside is a printout of my most recent grades. D in English. F in math. I wince. I know all this. I just don’t like to look at it.

  She points a finger. “Naeem, it’s the fourth quarter. Fourth quarter!”

  “I know.”

  “You remember when we met with your parents in the fall? I spent an hour with you all! We went over everything! We signed a contract. How you had to have no less than a C in all subjects by April fifteenth to graduate. Remember? We joked about how you and the IRS have a lot in common? Deadlines?”

  Of course: we sat in the conference room just off this office. Abba looked stern and nervous—I could tell he understood about half of what Mrs. D was saying to him. And my stepmother, she kept translating, until Abba got annoyed and angry with her. He doesn’t like it when she embarrasses him in front of strangers. His English isn’t bad—he just didn’t understand this whole “contract” business. It’s a new get-tough policy at the school.

  “What happened?”

  “I sort of fell behind—”

  “Mijo! Why didn’t you call me? You get in trouble, you’re supposed to call me. Not do this on your own.”

  Mrs. D wanted to be an actress herself—she’s crazy and passionate about us all, especially the “second gens,” as she calls us. “Caught-between babies,” she likes to say. “And I catch you so you don’t hurt yourselves.”

  Now she leans toward me. “You had to do the work! I promised your parents I would keep an eye on you!”

  “I know, Mrs. D. But the quarter isn’t over. Mrs. Reale, the math teacher. She likes me! She’ll let me make it up.”

  “Naeem—”

  “Seriously! She says I have nice teeth!” I try flashing her my megawatt smile. It’s a stupid joke, I know, but usually Mrs. D laughs along with me, makes a few calls, and we work something out with the teachers.