“The Nassers are from Syria,” Mrs. Marino said. A brief, knowing glance passed between her and Mrs. Mooney. I caught the look of pity on their faces, but wasn’t sure if the Nassers saw it, too.
Mom and Dad hadn’t shielded me from the news. I knew what was happening in Syria. I’d seen the footage of buildings being blown up and refugees walking across Europe, hoping to find a safe place for their family. There was a war in my home country. Mom and Dad had been glued to the internet since the first reports started to surface a few years ago. They muttered and shook their heads as places they knew, places we’d visited, were reduced to rubble. And then the reports started showing refugees leaving. Desperate to escape the country, they’d cross the Mediterranean Sea in rowboats or inflatable dinghies.
The footage on the screen wasn’t the Syria I remembered. It looked like another planet. The eyes of the children were haunted, their clothes and bodies dirty and unwashed because there was no water. Some towns were cut off from food supplies, and the children were starving. Then, one day, I’d turned away from the news, not wanting to have my happy memories of Syria replaced with these ugly ones. I’d grabbed my jacket to go outside and play basketball, comforted by the rhythmic bounce of the ball on concrete. But Mom had forced me to sit it out. “Watch,” she’d said, “and be thankful. That could be you.”
Before we left Damascus, I’d seen people beaten on the street, twice. The first time, I was in our house and heard an uproar outside. I went to the balcony overlooking the street and saw our neighbour, Mr. Habib, being yelled at by two officers with machine guns slung over their shoulders. He held up his hands, shrinking away from them, but they pulled out batons and began hitting him. Even when he was on the ground, they kept kicking him, and then they dragged him into a van. Mom pulled me away from our balcony, scolding me for risking my safety. “Don’t draw attention to yourself!” she’d hissed at me. All my life, she’d told me to stick up for myself, not to let anyone put me down, and now she was saying I should hide? I stared at her in confusion.
The second time, I was returning from a shopping trip with Teta, my grandmother. A ruckus broke out on the street. I moved through the crowd to see what was happening. A group of men were shouting at a man and his teenage son, accusing them of being traitors. The onlookers jeered, tossing rocks at them. One hit the boy and made him bleed. He clung to his father, crying with fear. Sitta dragged me away, shouting at me the whole way home that I had to be more careful. When we got home and Sitta told my parents what had happened, Dad said he’d had it. I didn’t know what he meant, but he stayed up late for weeks, talking on the phone and making arrangements. His friends thought he was crazy for leaving; he had arguments with them and sometimes they’d storm out of our house, furious. But Mom and Dad thought it was going to get worse before it got better. Luckily for us, we already had family in the U.K., so it made leaving easier. I wondered sometimes about the people who thought Dad was crazy. Were they still there? Had they left, too? Or were some of them the haunted faces we saw on the news?
Amira’s parents pushed her toward me, smiling encouragement. “Hi,” I said in English.
She stared at me.
“Marhaba,” I tried again in Arabic. She nodded, her hands fidgeting at her sides. She’d brought no backpack or binders.
“Can you show Amira around, Sadia? She’ll have the same timetable as you, except she’s taking art instead of band. Mr. Letner will be her homeroom teacher as well,” Mrs. Marino said. It was horrible but my first thought was no. I didn’t want this sad, haunted girl with me. She’d follow me around like a lost puppy. I hated myself for thinking that way and pushed those thoughts away.
“Sure,” I answered. Mrs. Marino held out her hand to shake Amira’s parents’ hands. I opened my mouth to warn her, but what could I say? Only Mrs. Nasser took her outstretched hand. Mr. Nasser smiled and bowed his head, avoiding Mrs. Marino’s eyes. Mrs. Marino realized, too late, her error and let her hand fall to her side; it wasn’t proper for a Muslim man to shake hands with a woman.
“Amira will be here for half a day, just to get acquainted with the school. Will you bring her back to the office at lunchtime? Her parents will come to pick her up.” I nodded, relieved I wouldn’t have to miss basketball tryouts to play tour guide. I waved goodbye to the Nassers as Amira and I walked into the hallway.
The halls were quiet, and so was Amira. I led her toward the gym, the first place I’d wanted to see when I arrived in Canada. In Syria, we’d had gym classes outside on the cracked pavement of the school courtyard. I hadn’t understood why gym class was held indoors until my first winter. Then it all made sense! “Where are you from?” I asked in Arabic. She looked at me like I’d asked a trick question. “I grew up in Damascus,” I told her, “in Mezzah.” It was a neighbourhood with cafés and stores and an outdoor shopping centre. Lots of doctors and lawyers lived in our building.
“We are from Homs.” Her voice was quiet, a little raspy.
I knew of Homs. I’d seen it on the news. There was almost nothing left of it. My insides churned for her. I wanted to ask how long she’d been away from Syria. Her journey to Canada wouldn’t have been like mine. Staying with family in Yorkshire had been like a reunion while we waited for our immigration papers to Canada. We’d arrived in Toronto and come straight to Winnipeg so Dad could start his job. The university found us temporary housing while we looked for a house to buy; containers with our things waited in storage for us. We’d left before the refugee crisis, not like Amira, who had been forced to flee. There had been no choice for her family. If we’d stayed longer, we might have been like them.
“This is the gym,” I said, pausing at the door. Kids ran past, doing laps for warm-up. Amira hung back, reluctant to get closer. She took in the size of the gym, with its shiny wooden floors and huge Thunder logo painted on the cinder-block walls. I got an anxious twinge thinking about what tomorrow would be like for her: showing up for a full day of school with no idea what awaited. She’d need to stick close to me or she wouldn’t find her way around. For the next few weeks, Amira was going to be attached to me. I hoped it was just first-day jitters that kept her so quiet, otherwise it was going to be a long term.
“Come on, I’ll show you the cafeteria.” We went downstairs to the row of picnic-style tables. I walked through the space quickly, trying to get the tour over with so we could get to class. “This is where you’ll eat lunch, when you stay for lunch. Microwaves are over there.” I pointed to the far wall. “And the canteen. They sell fries, burgers, hot dogs, Pizza Pops, stuff like that.”
“Pizza Pops?”
“Like a pizza sandwich,” I explained.
She furrowed her brow. Without any students, the cafeteria felt cavernous. Our voices echoed.
“Do you pray?” she asked. In Syria, prayers were a normal part of the day; classes were scheduled around prayer times. In Canada, fitting in midday prayers at school was a little trickier.
“There’s a room we use. I can show it to you now, if you want.”
Amira nodded, so we went back upstairs. “It’s here,” I said, pointing to a room with desks and a few computers in it. There was construction paper over the small window on the door to give us privacy and a movable screen to separate the male and female sides of the room.
The truth was, Mariam and I had barely used the room set aside for our prayers this year. Now that I was in high school, I was self-conscious about disappearing at lunchtime. And since