The Vow

It’s the perfect reasonableness of his voice that kills. My whole life, I’ve only wanted to make him happy, but now I just want to slam my fist into his face. It’s scary and thrilling, like getting fouled and having all that adrenaline screaming at you to throw a punch. I’m mostly sure I’m not going to.

When did I become so unimportant to him? Why push me so hard, for so many years, to yank it all away?

There’s quiet from above; then his voice starts up again, still controlled, always controlled. But why is he wasting words on Mom? He should be down here. I want him at the foot of my bed, explaining what I did to let him down, because at some point he stopped believing my future was worth anything. He didn’t even try.

There’s a knock on my door.

“Can I come in?” Sarina calls.

“Yeah.”

The door swings open, then closed behind her. She’s wearing my basketball camp T-shirt from two summers ago, sweatpants, and glasses.

“Nice look, four eyes,” I mutter. She got contacts for her fifteenth birthday, so I don’t get to make fun of the glasses nearly as much as I used to.

She ignores me and settles into the chair at my desk. It swivels, and she’s immediately turning herself with one toe, the other leg tucked beneath her. She doesn’t speak, so I let her just spin.

“Do you want something?” I say finally.

“No. Do you want me to leave?”

“No. Just don’t make yourself puke on that thing.”

She spins for another minute or so, and I wonder if she really is going to make herself throw up. “It’s louder in here,” she says.

“What, Mom?”

“Yeah.”

She’s back to whimpering now, possibly running out of steam.

“She must’ve really hated it there,” Sarina says softly.

I try to remember what Mom was like when I was little, when we were still in Jordan, but I can’t. She’s just there, in all my memories, but not smiling or crying or anything really. “I think she’s just being Mom.”

“Maybe.”

In the dark I can see the outline of Sarina’s head, profile and ponytail, turning and turning, an asymmetrical lump of clay on a pottery wheel. “She’ll be better tomorrow,” I say, knowing she won’t.

“What if she’s losing it because life sucked there?”

“It didn’t suck. I remember it, and it didn’t suck. Not that I want to go back, but it didn’t suck.” Maybe I didn’t need to say it three times.

“I remember things too,” she says, “but eight isn’t old enough to know if a place sucks. I just remember the us. Not so much the there. The cousins, Teta, food smells, that big black dog from next door, the uncles yelling at us for knocking over the TV stand. That’s not real life; that’s a family reunion. That’s summer vacation. Why did we stop visiting, anyway?”

“Don’t know.”

I should be relieved. She’s worried, and that means she’s not a complete idiot. But I’m not. I feel like I’m on the Qwik Drop at Kentucky Kingdom right before they slide the floor out from under you, when you know it’s coming and you can’t avoid it or speed things up or know the exact moment you’ll be falling.

“Everything will be different now,” she says.

I have nothing to reassure her. She’s right. It’s silent for a moment; then a fresh whimper from above leaks down and over us both.

“Do you think she’s crying because it sucks to be a woman in Jordan?”

“Of course not.” My answer is quick and firm. Then I start to feel sick because I have no idea, haven’t even thought about it, but now I have to keep pretending. “It’s not Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan or anything. Women work and vote and do whatever, just like men. You know all that.”

“I don’t know anything,” she says.

“Of course it’ll be different,” I hear myself saying, “but Mom went to university there.”

“Yeah.” Her voice is thin with doubt. She stops spinning, and I can see the whites of her eyes glowing at me. “But how different? I don’t remember enough, and besides, a lot could’ve changed. I don’t even know—can I go out by myself whenever I want in Jordan? And do I have to be totally covered? Plus, my Arabic isn’t as good as yours. And with my hair being light, people are going to think I am American, and I’ve heard American women get treated really badly—”

“Stop it!” I say, sitting up quickly. “You’re freaking yourself out for no reason.” I take a deep breath, listen to my heartbeat thunder in my ears. “Dad wouldn’t take us back there if it was unsafe, or if life was going to miserable for you.”

She’s silent. I’m pretty sure neither of us believes me.

“I think I’ll have to wear a hijab,” she says. “Right?”

“It’s not like it’s the law,” I say, knowing that’s not what she’s asking. Sarina understands the differences between laws and customs. Mom used to wear one before we moved, but only out in public.

“It’s okay,” she says with a convincing resolve. “I can do it. I probably should’ve been doing it here anyway.”

Usually her religious resolve pisses me off, but tonight it just depresses me.

“Maybe Mom will be happier there,” she says softly. “Do you remember if she was happy before?”

I shake my head. How is a ten-year-old boy supposed to know if his mom is happy?

“Maybe becoming more devout will make her—”

“I don’t think Mom’s problems have anything to do with Islam,” I interrupt. “And I don’t think they can be fixed by it either.”

We sit in silence and wonder the unthinkable. Is it Dad? Is it us?

“I want something different,” Sarina says finally. “I don’t want to be . . .”

“You’re not like her,” I mumble. It’s the truth, too. I don’t want to talk about this anymore. Something heavy is pressing down on my chest, and above us, Mom is still crying. Their bedroom door slams. Dad’s footsteps travel over our heads and down the stairs.

“I think I’m going to go punch him in the face,” I say.

“Right. It’s not like he has a choice about any of this.” She starts spinning again.

I snort, then roll over onto my side so I can see out the window into the Dubrowskis’ backyard. “Of course he’s got a choice. He’s just not looking for a job in the States.”

“He said there’s nothing here,” she says.

“No, he didn’t.”

“After you left to get Annie, he said he’d been looking for a while. I think all that positivity about the interview in Jordan is just a show. For us, I mean. He must feel like he’s letting us down, but I bet he’d stay if he could.”

Looking for a while. He saw it coming. How long has he been watching me work like a dog for the American dream, knowing full well it isn’t mine to earn? She’s wrong. He isn’t thinking of us at all.

I try to focus on her face, but I can’t catch her features. She’s still spinning. “Seriously,” I say, “don’t make yourself puke.”

“I won’t. I don’t get dizzy.”

“Everybody gets dizzy.”

“Not ballerinas,” she says.

Those words hang between us like smoke.

“Oh,” she says. That’s all, but that puff of air is enough to blow it all away. “There probably aren’t ballet studios and stuff like here. Right?”

“I don’t know,” I say, but I do know.

She doesn’t say a word. She knows too.

“If it makes you feel any better, I’m pretty sure my basketball career is over.”