But it’s not. It’s real. The map is shifting red, and suddenly I feel like I’m in one of those cartoons, where Wile E. Coyote thinks he’s standing on the edge of a solid cliff—except when he glances down, there’s only the nothingness of air.
Because that’s what we have now. Nothing.
The next forty-five minutes pass in a haze as everything shifts. Then the final numbers flash on the screen: fifty-one point eight percent for Newton. Forty-eight percent for Rossum.
All those doors we knocked on. Every flyer we handed out. Every sign we put it up. It doesn’t matter. We lost.
The restaurant is silent. Sara slides over and hugs me. Gabe leans forward, staring at the screen, as if he’s willing it to change the results by the force of his expression. Jordan Rossum . . . he looks as devastated as I feel.
Jamie squeezes my hand. I fight back tears. I glance over at Imam Jackson and my mother—they’re whispering to each other by the back wall. Lauren’s on the phone talking to someone in a hushed voice.
It’s like someone died.
Rossum heads outside with his team. Journalists hurry behind him. The people on the television are dancing in red T-shirts and fist pumping. It settles in me like a sinking brick—H.B. 28 is going to pass in the senate. It’s going to become law.
My stomach feels like there’s quicksand inside—my heart spiraling down.
After some time passes, Jordan returns. He stands in front of the restaurant. And then he concedes the election. Tears fill my eyes. I glance at Jamie—he looks shattered.
Rossum is eloquent and charming. He thanks all of us volunteers for everything we’ve done. Hannah’s mother, Lucia Adams, gets a shout-out for her election protection work and her fight to keep polling stations in minority areas from closing. There’s a smattering of applause from the audience.
But I don’t feel like clapping.
“I just don’t get it,” Jamie says quietly.
“Sorry, guys,” Sara says gently. “I know you both put your hearts and souls into this.”
I shrug, but yeah—we really did. And for what? We got close. But we lost.
“Hey, sweetie.” It’s my mother.
I drop Jamie’s hand from under the table and straighten. Did she see us? If she did, she’s got a complete poker face about it.
“You both doing okay?” she asks Jamie and me.
“Not really,” Jamie says.
“Not sure how to feel okay when everything we worked for blew up in flames,” I tell her.
“It’s normal to feel disappointed right now,” she says as Lauren joins us.
I don’t know if my mom has figured anything out, but judging from Lauren’s huge smile as she glances from Jamie to me, she definitely can tell.
“I just don’t get it,” I say. “How could they do this? How could they want him to represent us after everything he’s said and done?”
“I know. But we came close,” my mother says. “The closest anyone came in this district in almost thirty years, actually.”
“Close isn’t winning. He lost.”
“You’re right. But don’t forget, this was a special election—this seat will be up for grabs again in sixteen months. Now we know it’s winnable.”
“And you see that woman over there?” Lauren nods to Hannah’s mother, who’s talking to a reporter right now. “There’s quite a bit of buzz about her. She might run.”
“But in the meantime, H.B. 28 passed in the House this morning.” I sigh. “And there’s a supermajority in the state congress now. So it’ll become law.”
“Oh yes.” Lauren nods. “About that. There’s a group of lawyers from Austin and Byrne who are teaming up with the ACLU to get ahead of that constitutional mess.”
“Austin and Byrne?” Jamie tilts his head. He picks up a glass of water. “The one with the billboard up by The Temple?”
“The one and only.” Lauren smiles slightly. “Our family friend Mark Plummons said he found information about it in a bathroom at Sophie’s bat mitzvah. Isn’t that the strangest thing?”
Jamie spits out water.
“Really?” I ask her. “They’re already planning to fight the bill?”
“Hoping to scare them off before it goes any further, but no matter what happens, they’re going to fight it to the end.”
I glance at Jamie. He looks back at me and smiles a little. There’s a team of lawyers working to squash this bill. We played a part in that. It’s not much—hardly anything, to be honest—but it’s something to hold on to. It gives me hope.
Imam Jackson approaches my mother just then—a few journalists want some comments from the masjid. Once she leaves, Jamie and I use the opportunity to slip into the back of the restaurant.
“Feeling any better?” I ask him.
“Still hurts like I got run over by a train,” he replies.
“Same here. All that work . . .”
“For nothing.”
I look at Jamie’s crestfallen face. I take a step closer to him.
“I mean, I guess it wasn’t for nothing,” I slowly say. “Like our moms said, we got really close. Next time we’ll get closer. Next time we’ll win.”
“But we could do it all over again and have the same result.”
“Next election, there’ll be more of us. You and I can vote by then. So will Drew, Felipe, Nolan, and Shelby.”
“Yeah,” he says. “Still . . .”
He’s right. We don’t know what will happen. We could get back out there next year. Knock on doors and put up signs, hand out water bottles to thirsty canvassers. Vote.
And we could still lose.
“We might give it our all and crash and burn.” I take a step closer to him. “But we might win. We might actually change things. And maybe that makes it still worth going for, don’t you think?”
I lace my fingers in his as he looks down at me.
“You’ve really thought this whole thing through, haven’t you?” he says with a small smile.
But I don’t reply. I kiss him instead.
Authors’ Note
In November of 2016, we watched in horror and panic as Donald Trump was elected president of the United States. Like many people, we were anxious about the type of world our children would now grow up in. Trump’s hatred had given full license to others who shared his racist and bigoted views, in a way that felt very personal to us as Muslim and Jewish women. Antisemitism and Islamophobia rose sharply and vandalism of mosques and synagogues grew commonplace. In our home state of Georgia, a state representative proposed a bill that would have effectively banned Muslim women from wearing hijab in public. Days later, a high school in the Atlanta suburbs was graffitied with Trump’s name, a swastika, and several racist and homophobic slurs. The bad news was relentless—and here in Georgia, it felt like we were drowning in it.
But then we stumbled upon a bright spot: a special election for a newly vacant seat in our district for the US House of Representatives. Georgia’s Sixth District had been firmly Republican for as long as we could remember, but now an Atlanta man named Jon Ossoff hoped to change that. He demanded accountability and vowed to stand up against bigotry and hateful rhetoric. After weeks of feeling helpless against an onslaught of national horrors, this was exactly what we needed. His announcement was a raft in a sea of bad news.
We immediately threw ourselves into the campaign. Neither of us had knocked on doors for a political candidate before, and we were nervous—but it felt like something tangible we could do. The process was strange, sometimes tedious, and often thankless, but it was also uplifting and rewarding. And it was the first time we truly grasped the power of local activism. Ultimately, Ossoff lost his race—but the results in our deep-red Georgia district were remarkably close.
For us, these moments felt like the beginning of a story—one about joy, heartache, resistance, and hope. Maya, Jamie, and Yes No Maybe So were born from our belief that activism and love can heal and connect us, even in the most dif
ficult times.
As for Georgia’s Sixth District? Less than eighteen months after Ossoff’s narrow defeat, Democrat Lucy McBath defeated the Republican incumbent in the 2018 midterm elections. She’s the first Democrat to represent our district in forty years.
There is hope. Hold it tight, and keep fighting.
Acknowledgments
Just like a political campaign, Yes No Maybe So wouldn’t be possible without the team of passionate people who believed in this story and made magic happen behind the scenes. We’re filled to the brim with gratitude for the many people in our corner, including:
Our brilliant editor, Donna Bray, who is changing history one book at a time.
Our phenomenal team at HarperCollins and Balzer + Bray, including Tiara Kittrell; Suzanne Murphy; Jean McGinley; Andrea Pappenheimer and team; Nellie Kurtzman, Audrey Diestelkamp, and team; Sari Murray; Patty Rosati and team; Alison Donalty and Chris Kwon; and Alessandra Balzer.
Soumbal Qureshi for the gorgeous cover art.
Our squad of rock star agents: Taylor Martindale Kean, Brooks Sherman, Wendi Gu, Stephanie Koven, Mary Pender, Kim Yau, and our teams at Full Circle, Janklow & Nesbit, UTA, and Paradigm.
Lucy Rogers and our incredible team from Simon & Schuster UK, Leonel Teti and his fellow superstars at Puck, and the rest of our amazing international publishers, who took a chance on a book about US local elections.
Stacey Abrams, for literally everything.
The booksellers, librarians, teachers, Instagrammers, bloggers, and YouTubers, who help our books find their readers. You deserve the world.
Our expert readers, who made this book so much better with their thoughtful feedback: Mike Reitzes, Celeste Pewter, and Jennifer Dugan—and a special shout-out to Amie Herbert for bar mitzvah consultation!
The friends who offered their wisdom, talked us through titles and covers, and kept our heads on straight: S. K. Ali, Sakib Qureshi and Sameera Fazili, Adam Silvera, Jasmine Warga, David Arnold, Angie Thomas, Emily X.R. Pan, Nic Stone, Mackenzi Lee, Meg Medina, Rose Brock, Dahlia Adler, and so many more.
Matthew Eppard, Diana Sousa, and Sharon Morse, as well as both Phil Bildner and Cristin Terrill at the Author Village, who keep the world spinning.
Our biggest champions: Kalsoom and Anwar Saeed, Eileen Thomas, Jim and Candy Goldstein, Ali Saeed, Aamir Saeed, Caroline Goldstein, Sam Goldstein, and the Albertallis—with next-level, holy-fork gratitude to Kashif Iqbal and Brian Albertalli, who held down the fort during all the hours at Intermezzo and the Target patio session.
The kiddos who make the whole fight worthwhile: Waleed, Owen, Musa, Henry, and Zayn.
The volunteers, staffers, canvassers, protesters, resisters, voters, and all of you who have your representatives’ numbers on speed dial. We see you, and we appreciate your efforts with all our hearts.
The organizations who have been fighting the good fight all along. There are far too many great ones to mention, but here are a few of our favorites. Check out their websites to learn more about them, and consider donating if you can.
American Civil Liberties Union: www.aclu.org
Southern Poverty Law Center: www.splcenter.org
Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services: www.raicestexas.org
Rock the Vote: www.rockthevote.org
Fair Fight: www.fairfight.com
About the Authors
Photo by Cylinda Parga
AISHA SAEED and BECKY ALBERTALLI are award-winning, New York Times bestselling authors of books for teens and young people, including Becky’s Morris Award–winning Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda and Aisha’s South Asian Book Award–winning Amal Unbound. Their books have been listed as the best books of the year by Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, the Washington Post, Goodreads, NPR, and more. In their spare time, you can find them chasing their boys at the park, eating chocolate cake at Café Intermezzo, or watching romantic comedies. Becky and Aisha live in Atlanta, Georgia, with their respective children and spouses.
VISIT THEM ONLINE AT
WWW.BECKYALBERTALLI.COM
WWW.AISHASAEED.COM
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Copyright
Balzer + Bray is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
YES NO MAYBE SO. Copyright © 2020 by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Cover art © 2020 by Soumbal Qureshi
Cover design by Chris Kwon and Alison Donalty
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Library of Congress Control Number: 2019950097
Digital Edition FEBRUARY 2020 ISBN: 978-0-06-293705-6
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-293704-9 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-0-06-297776-2 (int.)
ISBN 978-0-06-298379-4 (special edition)
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