by Landis Lain
“You can’t be too careful with strange men,” said Mama. “You just never know.”
“I’m not thirsty, Mama,” said Sasha, her voice diamond hard. “I learned my lesson. I’m always careful.”
STRENGTHENED
January 24,
Fighting is hard. I don’t like to do it. Suleiman says that everybody has fighter’s instinct but mine is repressed because I’ve been abused so I shy away from conflict. I was mad at him for two whole days because of that abused crack, like I was some chick on a battered wife poster. But in the end, while I pouted in my apartment, I realized that I was hiding and decided he was right. I’m going to learn to fight even if it kills me, and it just might. I’m learning that I must fight inside my head before my body will respond. That sucks. I want to be like a superhero and go all ninja without thinking about it. Suleiman says that takes years of training. But I need it now.
“If a man grabs you like this, what would you do?” asked Suleiman. From behind, he grabbed her around the waist and swung her off her feet. She flailed her arms and tried to grab his ears or poke his eyes with her fingers but failed.
They were in the empty recreation room in Spartan Village, practicing self-defense moves at Suleiman’s insistence. For the past two weeks he’d been teaching her fighting techniques and flinging her left and right.
“You are not even trying!” Suleiman set her back on her feet gently and she whirled around to face him.
“I think men should be taught how to treat women,”
snarled Sasha. “Then I wouldn’t have to take this stupid self-defense class. When I get to Heaven, I’m gonna ask God why the heck he didn’t give men some manners when he handed out the muscles.”
“Sounds like a plan,” said Suleiman. “But you gotta live this life first, so let’s hit it.”
“Whatever.”
Sasha was sweaty and aggravated after an hour of punching and kicking at all of Suleiman’s vulnerable man parts, as he called them.
“One thing you gotta learn Sash, power is never given, only taken,” said Suleiman. “There is always going to be somebody bigger, stronger, faster. You gotta be ready to use what you got to defend yourself.”
“Says the dude who is 6’2” and weighs 200 pounds,” said Sasha. She crossed her arms in front of her. Suleiman rolled his eyes.
“I’m not talking about your body, Grasshopper,” he said. “I’m talking about your mind.”
“What do you mean?”
“Be aware of your surroundings, you know basic safety stuff,” he said.
“Oh, like don’t be the dumb blond in the horror movie who goes into the dark room?” asked Sasha. “DUH!”
“Your mind is your first line of defense. And it is powerful. Think through your options. First, if you can do it safely, remove yourself from the situation. If you can’t, you use the weapons you have. Your hands, feet, head, teeth. Pick up a rock, whatever,” said Suleiman. “Be in shape so you can defend yourself.”
Sasha rolled her eyes.
“Again,” said Suleiman, holding up his hands. He beckoned her forward.
“I’m tired,” said Sasha, as she wiped sweat from her forehead with her hand. “And all this has taught me is that if some man wants to hurt me, I’m hurt.”
“You need an attitude adjustment, babe,” said Suleiman, sternly. “When I was in the Marines some of the women were bad a- um, could kick butt with the best of them.”
“Whatever,” said Sasha, wildly. “You are such a dude! You just don’t understand.”
“Maybe you could tell me, then,” said Suleiman, hands fisted at his waist. “Stop dancing around this big secret. What don’t I understand?”
“I never feel safe anywhere,” said Sasha. “Safety is an illusion.”
“I know that.” He pointed to himself. “Uh, black man in America!”
“Some brother gets shot,” said Sasha, caustically. “It’s all over the news and people protest.”
“Yeah,” said Suleiman. “They should.”
“But,” said Sasha, voice breaking. “I’m a girl! Bad stuff happens to girls! All the time. And then it’s the girl’s fault because she couldn’t defend herself. Nobody protests. Nobody cares.” She slumped to the floor in exhaustion.
After a long silent moment, Suleiman hunkered down in front of her and tipped her chin up with his hand.
“Whatever happened to you,” he said, gently. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. You didn’t do anything,” said Sasha, taking her chin out of his hand. Suleiman took her hands and helped her stand up. He let her go and stepped back.
“It was my fault,” said Sasha.
“How?”
“Put myself in a bad position.”
“You keep telling me that,” said Suleiman. “How?”
“Trusted the wrong folks.”
Suleiman was silent while he digested that fact. He waited for Sasha to continue but she didn’t. She wiped the sweat from her cheeks with the back of her hand.
“I do care,” he said. “When you get ready to tell me the whole story, I will listen, okay?”
“Okay,” she said, putting up her hands. She scowled. “I’m ready to try again.”
“Let me tell you something that my granddad told me when I was at the VA,” said Suleiman, putting up his hands. He slapped out at her. She ducked and threw a punch at his throat. He blocked it. “I’m pretty big. But, I didn’t feel safe anymore, anyplace, you know? I couldn’t keep from getting shot, no matter how strong and tough and trained I was. Some guys I knew got killed. I kept seeing people shooting at me and trying to hurt me or kill me.” He feinted to the left. She staggered. He righted her and beckoned her forward.
“And they weren’t always enemy soldiers, either. It wasn’t paranoia all the time. My name is Suleiman. It is Arabic. In the Marines, I was possibly the black Moozlum, you know, even though my family has been Baptist for about five generations,” Suleiman scowled and continued. “Like it should matter what religion I was when I’m getting shot at and serving my country. I was always suspect. Evil doesn’t stop at the American border, you know?”
“Okay.” Sasha was abruptly exhausted. He didn’t understand what she couldn’t articulate. She dropped her hands to her side. He did the same. “What did your granddad say?”
“Grandad said, ‘There is no safe place, just where you are,’” Sulieman said. “Repeat after me.”
She complied.
“Bad people happen to good people. Defend yourself from evil to the best of your ability. If your best is not enough, forgive yourself, God will bring you through all adversity. Because God is always where you are.
“He had me repeat that until I memorized it.”
“Where did he get that from?” asked Sasha.
“I don’t know,” said Suleiman, smiling. “Knowing Granddad, he made it up on the spot, but it helped.”
“Can you write it down for me?”
“Sure.”
“Suleiman?”
“What?”
“Why’d you call me Grasshopper?”
Suleiman laughed and then explained.
ISOLATED
January 28,
Sometimes, I get lonely and I pick up the phone to call Gabby. Then, I don’t, because nothing has changed. At least I have Ricky. And maybe, Suleiman.
“I like this one of Ricky and me at Chuckie Cheese’s,” Suleiman said, as he scrolled though the pictures in Sasha’s telephone. “It’s the only one that he’s not screaming in. I’m going to forward it to my phone. I should make a hard copy, because this one is awesome.”
Sasha looked up from her chemistry book and nodded.
“It is nice.”
They were sitting next to one another at her kitchen table studying for upcoming exams. At least Sasha was studying. Suleiman was procrastinating. Ricky was toddling around on the floor, throwing things into his playpen. When he threw enough toys into the playpen he climbed in and
threw them back out.
“Okay,” said Sasha. She eyed the science book in front of her with revulsion and tossed her pencil on the table. “I don’t want to be a doctor anymore. Chemistry is too hard. I hate trying to memorize this periodic table. They keep coming up with new elements.”
Suleiman rolled his eyes.
“You want to quit?” he asked. “Please. You are brilliant. What would you do if you weren’t in school?”
“My math skills are good. Fast food comes to mind,” Sasha said, frustrated. “I can run a cash register.”
Suleiman snorted. “You got a kid to support. You’re going to need to yank down the change and for that type of job you need a couple of degrees.”
“True.”
“Who is this?” he asked, holding up her phone to show her another photo.
“That’s Gabby, my best friend.”
He studied the picture. “She’s almost as pretty as you are.”
Sasha leaned closer. “She’s prettier. She goes to college in Ohio. She got a full ride soccer scholarship. She’s the leading scorer for her school and up for some NCAA award.”
“Do you ever talk to Gabby?”
They looked at the picture of Gabby and Sasha hamming it up for the camera. They were dressed in soccer uniforms and looked carefree and young. Suleiman scrolled through and found other pictures, always of the two of them, arms slung around each other, eyes shining for the camera. There was a graduation picture of them, both in red cap and gown. Gabby was smiling, but Sasha’s smile was just lips turned up at the corners. Her eyes had changed, too. They were guarded and somber. Sasha looked away.
“No. I don’t.”
“Then how do you know how she is doing?”
“I look her up on the Internet. Sometimes her school posts the games on live stream, so I watch them.”
“Why not?”
“Why not, what?”
“Why don’t you talk to her?”
“We fell out,” said Sasha, glancing at her Chemistry text. “It was my fault.”
“Why don’t you call her and apologize?”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I can’t say.”
Suleiman sighed. “My best friend, his name was Isaac Temple. We went to school together. We left Detroit and joined the Marines together. I used to call him IT because of his initials and because he was a computer wizard. He called me the Wise guy, you know like Solomon in the Bible?”
“Yeah, I called you that, one time,” said Sasha, smiling. “That’s cool. I’ve never heard you talk about him before.”
Suleiman met her eyes. “He’s dead.”
Sasha gasped. “I’m so sorry.”
“Me, too,” said Suleiman. He blinked rapidly and sighed. “He got killed in Afghanistan. I spoke at his funeral. But if he was on this earth and I could talk to him, I’ll be da-doggoned if I’d let anything or anybody keep me from talking to my best friend.”
Sasha was silent.
“Just saying.”
Suleiman reached behind him into the pocket of the jacket that was hanging on the back of his chair and pulled two candy bars. He tossed one across the table to Sasha. She caught it out of the air.
“By the way,” said Suleiman, tearing the wrapper off his and taking a big bite. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”
Sasha laughed as Ricky toddled over and grabbed Suleiman’s pants leg. Suleiman hoisted the baby into his lap and pinched off a small piece of candy. The baby tasted it and then grabbed the rest from Suleiman’s hand.
“You little greedy buster,” he fussed, trying to get the candy back from the baby. Ricky was having none of that. He screamed and squirmed off Suleiman’s lap, clutching the smashed chocolate in his hand. He staggered over to the playpen and boosted himself inside, leaving candy prints on the mesh, where he sat smearing chocolate all over his face and licking his hands.
Suleiman looked at Sasha. “Did you see that? A brother can’t have nothing!” Sasha laughed at the dismay on Suleiman’s face.
Sasha snapped a picture of Ricky with her phone.
“Don’t be mad,” said Sasha, still chuckling. Suleiman glowered at her.
Taking pity, she broke her candy bar in half and gave the piece to Suleiman. He popped the whole thing into his mouth.
“It’s okay. Ricky got you something for Valentine’s Day,” said Sasha, reaching under the table to rifle her book bag. She leaned forward and handed Suleiman a package.
“He did?” asked Suleiman, eyeing the package in surprise. “He go shopping for it by himself?”
“No,” said Sasha, wrinkling her nose. Suleiman took the package out of her hand and turned it over several times.
“I wonder what it is?” he asked, shaking the package.
“Just open it,” said Sasha.
“You didn’t have to get me anything,” said Suleiman.
I know,” said Sasha. “It’s not really a Valentine’s Day gift. It’s more like a thank you gift for being so nice to us.”
“Oh,” said Suleiman. “Thanks.” He tore the paper off the package and looked down at the t-shirt in his hand. It was black with a bright red Superman emblem across the chest.
“I was going to put your name on the back but both your first and last name have too many letters,” groused Sasha. “It was about to get expensive.”
Suleiman laughed. He shook it out and turned the t-shirt around to read the back. “Sensei, huh? You know that means teacher, don’t you, Grasshopper? Now you got me inspired. I’m about to redouble our efforts to make you into a respectable warrior. We gonna go hard!”
“Whatever,” said Sasha, rolling her eyes.
“I got you something, too,” said Suleiman.
“What?” She eyed him warily.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he said. “I just put some music on your I-Pod.”
“Why?”
“Because you always listen to all those sad songs,” said Suleiman. “I put some music on there to make you feel better.”
“Aw, how sweet,” said Sasha, touched. “What songs?”
“One is called ‘Put your war clothes on’; one is ‘Beautiful’. I can’t remember them all,” said Suleiman, looking bashful.
“There are some newer songs and some old songs. I had my mom help with the old stuff. It’s under the ‘BEAUTIFUL’ playlist.”
“You are so corny,” said Sasha.
“I’m corny, huh?” He looked away, embarrassed.
She got up from the chair and rushed around the table to throw her arms around his neck. He hugged her back carefully.
“It just so happens, I like corny. Thank you!” she said and kissed him on the cheek.
“You’re welcome.” He smiled and kept smiling as Sasha pulled away to go the clean the chocolate off her son.
HUNTED
February 26,
One of the best and the worst things about Suleiman is that he is tenacious as a bulldog. He is going to tell me what’s on his mind no matter what. I was mad at Suleiman for about a week because he was being reasonable about calling Gabby. I didn’t want him to hold Gabby up to me. I already know it’s my fault that we don’t talk. I feel guilty enough. I miss her so.
“What do you want to talk about, today?”
“Nothing,” said Sasha. “I got nothing.”
“Why don’t you call Gabby?” asked Dr. Michelle.
“It would conjure up a lot of bad vibes,” said Sasha.
“How are you feeling?”
“Okay,” said Sasha with a shrug. “Sad.”
“Tell me about Gabby since you got nothing else,” said Dr. Michelle. “Don’t waste your mama’s money.”
Sasha smiled sadly. “She’s like the sun, you know? Always shiny and smiling and laughing. No matter what happens, she can find something funny about it. She used to keep me rolling. But she’s fierce, too. Gabby is a crusader for the underdog.”
“Really?”
“Y
ep,” said Sasha. “One time a teacher was treating some Tunisian students poorly, making funky remarks about their hygiene and stuff. Gabby organized a sit-in. She sent out flyers and everything. When we got through, that teacher had to publicly apologize and go to diversity training.”
“She sounds like she is something else,” said Dr. Michelle, smiling.
“She is,” said Sasha.
“What happened that makes it impossible for you to call Gabby?”
“I’m not ready to say.”
“Okay,” said Dr. Michelle. “What do you want to do?”
“Get my head right.”
VIOLATED
March 16 –
It’s my two-year anniversary. I should never have gone to that party – Mama always told me that I should leave any place where I was the only girl. Liquor and a bunch of guys make for foolishness. But I knew I could handle any situation. I didn’t drink or get high. I was a good girl. I was smart. A senior on the way to college. I was safe because Craig was there to protect me. And then he wasn’t…
“You going to wear that outfit?” asked Mama, hands on her hips.
“Yes, I am,” said Sasha. She looked down at her short spandex dress. It fit her slender curves lovingly. “This is the style.”
“I don’t know why the style has you young girls looking like hookers,” said Mama, frowning. “And where did you get that dress anyway? I know I didn’t buy it.”
“Gabby gave it to me,” said Sasha. “She said it didn’t fit her properly, but she had already taken the tags off and couldn’t take it back. I think it is cute.”
“So where are you and Gabby going?” asked her mother.
“Probably just to the movies,” said Sasha. “That new scary movie is out.”
“In that dress?” Her mother’s eyes narrowed. “No boys going?”
“No, not that I know of,” said Sasha. “Craig and I are going out tomorrow night, maybe, but he hasn’t said.”
“You are going no place with that boy while you live at my house,” said her mother. “He’s nothing but trouble. I told you to leave him alone after he got arrested. You are on your way to college. He’s on his way to prison.”
