for?”
Marisa had some renewed energy and hope after Peejay’s pep talk, though another dose of morphine or whatever it was Nurse Hae had gotten her hands on would do her good. She was glad to see her teacher, if only for the distraction from her pain, from her helplessness.
“What do you want me to do?” Ms. Duli asked.
At first, Marisa thought it was a rhetorical question, and she waited for her to go on. When she didn’t, Marisa said, “What?”
“To help. For your demands. Your cause. I’m no longer mediating here, no longer taking your requests to the board. I’m on your side now.” She took a symbolic step toward Marisa and put her back against the wall, facing the same direction as her student, one hand on the chains, as if that meant she were now just as locked up.
Marisa scoffed. “What, did they send you down as a mole or something? I’m not telling you what’s gonna happen at 2:30, or how I sent the message.” Only after she said it did Marisa realize Ms. Duli would have no way of knowing about Amira’s post on her behalf.
But Ms. Duli didn’t question the suspicion, simply rolled her eyes at it. She stopped herself short of a full roll, though. If she were still seventeen, if her soul was as impassioned as Marisa’s, she wouldn’t take well to an eye roll. “That’s a fair question,” she said instead. “But I know you’re not planning anything. You’re going to open the doors.”
Marisa tried to open her mouth, but found her anger tensing her jaw shut.
“I told you,” Ms. Duli continued, “I want to help. I want to see you succeed.” A megaphone shriek made them both cringe. The wind howled as if in response. People on the field unconsciously huddled closer together, trying to shield themselves from the weather.
“Why now?”
“I feel time ticking away in which I can be helpful. I thought I could help from the middle, but I no longer believe that guiding the board to act is the right move. It’s about time I chained myself to something, too.”
* * *
Amira couldn’t stop moving. At the coffee shop, she’d pushed the doors open and come to a halt, shocked at the other customers’ lack of a response. She’d opened and closed the doors! As if unable to decide if she wanted to stay or go! As if it were a choice!
Now that she had run again, she wondered how she’d ever stopped, how a girl chained to a door had supplanted all her previous drive to run, to jump, to do things others didn’t believe her capable of. The more she thought about it, though (as she logged on to Marisa’s social media accounts on her phone), the more it felt fitting. Marisa, after all, wanted to push the world to better itself in ways no one believed could be done.
No sooner had Amira posted the message than she felt the need to run again, but also to run to Marisa. To run home and tell her mother: This is who I am. That might have to wait, though.
She managed to sneak into school by crouching behind a car as it entered the parking garage. Then she snaked her way into the crowd, constantly moving because her body demanded it, because she could still control this part of herself, even if her tingles and cravings were dictated by Marisa. But also because she didn’t want to be recognized. Luckily, plenty of people were wearing hijabs and most everyone was wearing head cover for the rain, anyway, their peripheral vision lessened by their raincoat hoods and umbrellas.
Now, as the wind howled and the temperature dropped, Amira’s legs grew tired. It was amazing how quickly her body had fallen out of its old habits. An hour of running would have barely been a warmup a week ago. She stopped to stretch, by happenstance managing to choose a spot on the soccer field only a few feet away from her mom. Neither noticed the other.
Mrs. Wahid was tutting beneath her umbrella, muttering about this or that. Amira heard but didn’t recognize the voice over the sound of the rain, and instead fixed her attention on the roof garden.
It was hard to tell exactly what was going on, but after a minute or so of squinting, she felt like she could make out a figure standing at the edge of the roof, right by the glass.
* * *
Jordi Marcos hadn’t said