As part of our class mark, we also had to sign up to write a post each term. I’d written one in first term about Ramadan, the holiest month of the Islamic calendar. Kids at school couldn’t believe I fasted every day for a month. As weird as it sounded to them, I liked fasting. A little discomfort at school meant a big payoff at home. Mom spent the day in the kitchen, cooking food for when we broke the fast each night at sundown. Last year, to mark the end of the fasting period, Mariam’s family had joined us for Eid al-Fitr, and we all ate together. It had been my favourite Eid since we’d moved to Canada.
“Do we get the cameras today?”
“Your parents have to email the form back to me and then you can take them home.”
Despite the complaints from other kids, a lot of ideas about what I could photograph ran through my head. Basketball, to start with, my runners, some of Mom’s rizz bi halib, the best creamy sweet toast ever!
“This is stupid,” Mariam mumbled beside me. I thought she’d be excited about the project.
“I think it sounds fun,” Carmina said.
“Me, too.”
“There’s nothing cool in my life,” Mariam replied. “It’ll just be a bunch of boring pictures of me at home. My parents don’t let me do anything,” she whined.
“You like to sew. Maybe you could take pictures of some of the stuff you’ve been making?” Mariam shot me a look like I didn’t know what I was talking about. I tried not to let it bother me, but between the de-jabbing and the attitude, I didn’t need a new perspective to see that Mariam was pushing me away. What I didn’t know was why.
Chapter 2
I ate my lunch so quickly I was finished before most kids had unpacked their sandwich. “What’s the rush?” Mariam asked. She lazily opened a container of leftovers: rice and lentils in curry that she’d heated in the microwave. The smell wafted over and I took a second to enjoy it. Mariam’s mom was a really good cook. Going to her house for dinner was like eating at a gourmet Egyptian restaurant.
“Basketball tryouts,” I told her, sucking the last drops out of my juice box. The carton crumpled in my hands.
Mariam looked at Carmina and grimaced. She’d played basketball last year when we were in middle school, but not with much enthusiasm. I think she gave up before the season finished.
“Why would you want to play basketball, anyway?” Mariam asked. She looked at Carmina, who was staring across the cafeteria at her grade ten crush.
“Why wouldn’t you?” I shot back.
“Boys don’t like girls who play sports.”
I held my tongue, sure that if I said anything, I’d regret it. Then I stuffed my lunch containers back in my bag and stood up. “Whatever. I’m going. See you.” I didn’t look back, but I’m pretty sure I heard her and Carmina giggling as I walked away.
When I got to the gym, it was almost all boys. “You’re here early,” Josh said as I went past him to the girls’ change room. He was sitting on a bench, tying his shoes. New white-and -silver Air Jordans.
“So are you.”
“Got to get a jump on the competition,” he said with a sly grin.
Josh stood up and jogged over to a wire basket of balls Mr. Letner had put out for us. He picked one and dribbled it, then ran past me and did a layup. I laughed to myself. If Mariam really liked Josh, she’d know this was where she needed to be.
I walked into the change room. The other girls were getting changed into shorts and T-shirts. I went into a stall and took off my regular outfit — long pants and long-sleeved shirt — to put on my sweats and a different long-sleeved shirt. The head scarf had to stay on, and when I came out of the stall, I took a quick look in the mirror and then found a spot on a bench to put on my basketball shoes. Being in there gave me a minute to get focused and concentrate on what I had to do to make the tournament team.
More girls came in and I did a quick head count. There were eight of us trying out and there would probably be about twenty boys. Mr. Letner said he’d take a team of twelve to the tournament, but the rules were that at least a quarter of the team had to be girls. That meant at least three girls would make it. I said a quick prayer that one of the three would be me.
Most of the boys were already bouncing balls and taking shots on net when I got to the gym. My stomach did a flip and my fingers tingled. I couldn’t wait to feel the bumpy rubber of the ball and the slap as it hit the floor and bounced back into my hands. Mr. Letner blew his whistle. The thumping of balls stopped and we hustled toward him. I grabbed a ball and held it against my waist.
“Okay, everyone,” Mr. Letner said. “We’ll start with some shooting drills. Girls on one side and boys on the other. Then we’ll do some one on one. Ready?” He blew his whistle again and I ran to the hoop and took my first shot. It went in with a swish, which I thought was a good sign.
“Nice one,” a voice piped up behind me. Jillian Triggs sent her shot sailing through the air and it went in, too.
We took our spot in line and waited for another turn. “Which guys do you think will make it?” Jillian asked. She wasn’t in Mr. Letner’s class and hadn’t gone to my middle school, so I didn’t know her well. She was a head taller than me, and I could see her fluorescent pink sports bra peeking out from under her tank top. “Josh, Rory, Thomas, Lukas … and maybe Allan,” I added as he missed his shot from the free-throw line to a lot of jeering. “But after that, they’re all kind of the same.”
“Yeah. Mohammed’s pretty good, too. He’s on my street and we play together in the summer sometimes.”
It was my turn again, so I dribbled the ball and took another shot. It bounced off the rim and back to me. I shot again. This time, it went in.
Mr. Letner wandered over with his clipboard. “Okay, girls. Show me what you can do.” Jillian took a shot that arced into the air and through the net like she’d buttered it. Mr. Letner whistled in appreciation. “Let’s play some one on one. Who’s up first?” My hand went up and I looked over at Jillian, who had also raised her hand, and grinned. “You two,” Mr. Letner said. Jillian rolled her ball to the wall and I took my spot at the top of the key. Jillian crouched down, her ponytail swinging over one shoulder. I slapped the ball and dribbled it a few times, turning my body to guard it. Jillian moved in, swiped for it, but I dodged her, driving up the left, and took a shot. It went in and I bit back a smile. My runners squeaked as I ran back to the top of the key. Jillian had the ball, but this time she drove right. I had my hands up, jumping to block her. My arm caught my hijab, which was loose after all the running and jumping. It fell over my eye and I was distracted. Jillian saw her moment and moved past me easily. She took her shot as I stopped to fix my scarf.
Mr. Letner blew his whistle. “Okay, Sadia?”
“Yes,” I groaned, frustrated. It was like having to stop to tie a shoelace.
“Next two girls, you’re up.”
My hair kept leaking out of the bonnet cap underneath my head scarf. I had to move to the side to fix it. The first time I’d worn a hijab, it had taken me five minutes to get it on my head properly. Now, I could fix it without looking in a mirror in a less than a minute. But not in the middle of the gym!
Mom and Dad had agreed I’d start wearing hijab when I turned thirteen. The first day of grade eight, Mariam and I had walked into school with the head covering and people had given us funny looks. They didn’t know hijab had always been in our future, so I guess they were surprised. I was glad that Mariam had started wearing her hijab at the same time. It made it easier having her beside me. I was proud of the hijab and of what it meant; that I was choosing to be modest. A lot of people thought that I covered myself to avoid a man’s gaze, but it was more than that. It was a way to express my spiritual connection to God, and it was how I had been raised.
But still, walking into my middle school wearing hijab that first day had been nerve-racking. I’d left grade seven as a tomb
oy, playing soccer at lunch with the boys, but I came back covered up and feeling older, more mature. None of the kids asked any questions, but I saw them looking at Mariam and me as if they weren’t sure we were the same people. I didn’t play soccer at lunch that day, worried that I’d mess up my hijab and not be able to put it back on properly. Instead, Mariam and I had stayed in the cafeteria. But when I’d seen the boys come in, sweaty and red-faced after lunch, Josh bragging that he’d scored two goals, my insides had twisted. Just because I wore hijab didn’t change who I was on the inside. The next day, I left Mariam at our cafeteria table with Carmina. I went outside and hung around the goalposts, waiting for the boys to notice me. When the ball was kicked out of bounds, I got to it first. “Are you playing?” Josh asked, running up beside me.
“Whose team am I on?”
“We get Sadia!” he shouted out. I lifted the ball over my head, tossed it to Josh, and ran into the game. After that, it was like nothing had changed.
My hijab didn’t bother me so much when I was playing sports outside. The rules were loose and everyone else had on their school clothes. But it was a hindrance now, when I was trying out for a team and everyone else was in their gym clothes. Sudden movements and running could make it slip out of place.
I gave a frustrated groan as I felt the scarf slide farther back and had to stop to fix it, again. “Do you have to wear that?” Jillian asked, coming up beside me.
“Yeah,” I said. “I can’t take it off, especially here.” Did she understand what I meant by here? In public, with a lot of people around, especially males who weren’t my family?
“It must be such a pain.” I was about to argue that it wasn’t, but who was I kidding? I couldn’t take a jump shot without the bottom of the scarf flying in my face. It wasn’t like it was my first time playing wearing hijab, but I needed to do more than just play to make the team. I needed to bring it.
“And aren’t you hot?” She stuck out her tongue like a dog panting. “I’m sweating and I’m wearing shorts and a tank top.” I looked down at my black sweatpants and shirt that covered my arms, all the way to my wrists.
“Yeah,” I admitted. Hot and irritated.
Mr. Letner blew his whistle. “Scrimmage time!” Everyone put their balls into the wire bin by the equipment room and met in the middle of the gym. Mr. Letner numbered us off: “One, two, one, two.” Allan kept dodging his turn to be counted until he was sure to get a number one, which was Josh’s team. I was number one, too, but Jillian was on the other team and so were a lot of the really good players. It looked like the teams were lopsided, but Josh didn’t care. He called a quick team huddle, assuming the role of team captain.
“Sadia, you’re small forward. Allan, point guard. I’ll play power forward.” He pointed to the other kids, assigning them positions. I looked at Jillian’s team, where she was doing the same thing. We all put our hands into the middle of the circle and shouted, “Three, two, one, Thunder!” at the same time. Half the kids went to sit on the bench, waiting to be rotated in, and the other five of us took our spots on court.
Jillian was centre and towered over Abby, the girl Josh had picked for the position. Abby was long limbed, but didn’t move quickly. Jillian got past her and threw the ball upcourt. Josh intercepted it and the play switched toward our zone. “Josh!” I called for the ball, holding my hands up. Mohammed got in my face, but I dodged and caught the pass from Josh, drove to the net, and scored. Josh came running at me for a high-five. The scrimmage kept going like that for the next twenty minutes. Every two minutes, we subbed in new players, but my heart was racing each time I took a break on the bench. Beads of sweat popped out on my forehead, and I wished I could have played in shorts like the other kids, or even just a short-sleeved shirt!
Josh and I ran on again for the last shift. We’d just scored and the point guard on Jillian’s team, Thomas, slapped the ball to put it in bounds. We all ran upcourt, ready to defend their press. Thomas was trying to toss the ball to Jillian, but we’d boxed her in and she couldn’t dart away. As the ball flew through the air, I jumped up and tipped it out of her hands. I didn’t see Abby’s elbow — my hijab blocked vision on my right side. The bone came down hard on my nose, and I felt a warm spurt of blood on my upper lip.
Mr. Letner blew his whistle and the game stopped. I cupped my hand over my nose and mouth. “Whoa! Whoa! Sadia, you okay?”
I nodded, but kept my head down. A few drops of dark red blood dotted the gym floor. “I’ll get an ice pack,” Jillian said and raced to the gym office. Josh took my arm and led me to the bench. Mr. Letner handed me a wad of tissues.
“At least we’ll get a free throw,” Josh said, trying to find the silver lining.
My nose throbbed. I knew that if my hijab hadn’t been in my way, I would have been able to see Abby’s elbow coming down and could have ducked.
“What happened?” Mariam asked when I came back to class. I’d been sitting in the office, waiting for the bleeding to stop. She had probably heard from other kids, but it was nice to see her concerned.
“I got hit in the face. I’m okay.” Every time I scrunched up my face, it felt hot and tingly.
“It looks kind of swollen.”
I gingerly touched the skin on either side of my nose. “Yeah. I hope it’s not broken.”
“And that is why I don’t play sports.”
I wanted to roll my eyes at her so badly, but I restrained myself. I didn’t know why she was acting like this. Did she really think sports were dumb?
I’d always been the sporty one, even though Mariam had three brothers and I only had one. She’d never understood why I’d rather play soccer at recess than sit on a bench and talk, but we had so many other things in common, that it didn’t used to matter.
Used to.
Mariam had arrived a year before me. Even if we hadn’t both been Muslim and attended the same mosque, we would have been friends. We used to stay up late watching movies and talking. She was so easy to be around and always had some new idea to try, like ambushing Aazim with water guns when he came home from school or baking cookies for the school bake sale. I missed that Mariam.
And it wasn’t like her friendship with Carmina was new, either. Carmina had always been our third — like, if we had to do a project with three people, she was the one we asked. We all ate lunch together and hung out after school, but lately, I’d noticed I was becoming the third. The two of them were doing things together while I was on the periphery.
“How’s the nose?” Josh asked as we packed up our books at the end of the day.
“I’ll live,” I said and tried to wiggle it to prove it to him.
“So, you and Josh were on the same team?” Mariam asked after he’d walked away. She pulled out the head scarf and tunic she’d stuffed into her locker. I walked with her to the washroom so she could change and we could catch the bus home. I nodded. “Did he ask you to be on his team or, like, what happened?”
“Mr. Letner chose the teams. It was a close game, too. We could have won if I hadn’t gotten hurt.”
Mariam pushed open the door to the girls’ washroom. We were the only ones in there, and in a few minutes, she’d slipped her tunic over her T-shirt and had her hair tucked under the stretchy bonnet cap. Her scarf was fuchsia pink and it made her skin glow. The ends were embroidered with white thread. “That’s really pretty,” I said, admiring it.
Mariam sighed and tossed an end over her shoulder. “If I have to wear it, it can at least be stylish.” She gave my hastily chosen hijab, as boring-beige as it could get, a pitiful look. I shrugged it off. Fashion had never been my thing. “Come on, we’re going to miss our bus,” she added.
Because I was waiting for you were the words I wanted to say, but I bit my tongue. Again.
Chapter 3
“Did you reply to Mr. Letner’s email about taking a camera home?” I asked my mom at din
ner. She’d made one of Dad’s favourite meals, a spicy chicken dish, and our lips and fingers shone with grease.
“Yes,” she replied. “He’s an interesting teacher. Always with a new idea. You like his class?”
I nodded. “He wants us to take photos,” I explained to Dad. “About how we see the world.”
Aazim grinned at me. “The only thing you see is the basketball court.”
Since he’d started university, Aazim hadn’t been around as much as he used to be. He said he preferred to study at school, where it was quiet, as if the three of us were loud, rambunctious five-year -olds. “Not the only thing,” I said defensively.
He scoffed, wiping his fingers on a paper towel and leaving greasy smudges behind. “Your days of playing basketball are numbered, little sister.”
“No!”
“You’ll have to stop being a tomboy and become a dutiful Muslim woman, right?” He was teasing — we both knew our parents were fine with me playing sports. I kicked his shin under the table and he winced.
“Stop it, you two,” Dad said, raising an eyebrow and throwing Aazim and me a warning look that we knew better than to test. Dad’s skin was darker than mine or Mom’s, and when he did yardwork in the summer, it tanned a deep brown. His thick, curly black hair was unruly and always looked like it needed a cut.
“The email from Mr. Letner said you are supposed to take photos of things that matter to you. There’s more than just basketball. You should show your classmates what your life is like. It might be interesting for them.” I knew what Mom meant by life. She meant being Muslim. From the kitchen, I could see the small prayer mat in front of the window in the dining room. Mom used it five times a day for her prayers. Now that I was older, I’d started using it for my prayers, too. The mat had come with us from Syria and was soft from use. Dad had one in the bedroom, where he preferred to pray. He had one at his office, too.
Sadia Page 2
