glance at the other pictures from this summer. The Eid brunch, a selfie with Boomer from last week. I look like I’m having the best summer ever. Insta-Maya and real Maya don’t even live on the same planet.
I click over to Sara’s feed. I’d thought she’d have texted me after the post went viral. But she’s not following the election stuff, so it probably didn’t even fly by her radar. It’s strange how something can be someone’s entire universe, but not even register as a blip for someone else.
Her most recent photos make me smile. You’d honestly think she works for the University of Georgia’s marketing team. There are filtered photos of the campus, a selfie with a Georgia bulldog in full red-and-white gear. I pause at one from four days ago. She’s posing with my favorite author on the planet—Angie Freaking Thomas. They’re both smiling and Sara’s holding up her latest book. I look down at the caption: Standing room only for the one and only Angie Freaking Thomas.
I laugh a little at that. Even in our estrangement, we manage to think the same thoughts. I hesitate before texting her.
Hope college is great. I hate how things ended with us. I miss you.
There are no three ellipses bubbling back to me. And that’s okay. I love Sara, and even if I don’t get back what I had, it was a beautiful friendship while it was mine. I don’t regret telling her how I feel.
I feel a little silly about it now, but I’d built up election day so big in my mind, I almost expected bells to toll and confetti to spray on my head when I stepped into the polling precinct. But the Briarwood recreational gymnasium is definitely anticlimactic this late afternoon. For one thing, it’s completely silent. Electronic voting booths line one end of the wall, and folding tables are set up on the other side of the room, with registration volunteers drumming their fingers. Some are reclined so far back in their seats, I swear they might be asleep. A police officer sits by the front door. Hannah is also here. She hands me my poll observer vest, and I sign in on the log. One woman in a business suit is punching in her vote, but otherwise, no one else is here.
My phone buzzes. I pull it out as a news alert flashes on-screen. H.B. 28 passed in the Georgia State House. I click open the article. I’m not supposed to be on my phone, but this has to be a mistake. They weren’t voting on this until after the election.
But it’s no mistake.
H.B. 28 passed. Evidently, the GOP is so confident Newton will win, they’ve begun the first step in making my mother’s existence a crime.
The front door chimes. An elderly woman is struggling to get through the door with her walker.
Get with the program, Maya. I shove my phone into my pocket. I’m here to help the elections run smoothly. This is what I signed up for. I hurry over and open the door for her.
“Thank you, sweetheart,” the woman tells me. “You are absolutely wonderful.”
While the woman fills out her information, Hannah walks over to me.
“It was sweet of you to open the door,” she says, “but as poll observers we can’t interact directly with voters, even if it’s to be helpful.”
“Oh,” I say. “Sorry. Got it.”
The woman finishes voting and heads to the exit.
“Thank you, again, dear,” she says.
“Of course,” I tell her. “Have a nice day.”
“You know, you have the prettiest smile.” She pauses by the door and turns to look at me. “It’s the kind that makes you know the world is a beautiful place.”
“Um, thanks.”
“Hope you have a blessed day.”
I watch her amble toward her car. It didn’t escape my notice that she was wearing a Newton button. Neither did I miss the red hat she had on. I think of Kristin from Dickers’s office. She was just like this lady, full of sugar and sunshine, saying the nicest things. And yet this woman. Kristin. They can look at someone like me—grin at Hannah—and still vote for Newton.
The lines pick up as the afternoon progresses. Some people coming through are walking advertisements of which way they’re leaning, but I can’t read most of the voters. I watch now as a couple in line whisper intensely to each other. The guy keeps raising his hands high up in the air every so often.