Hijabi Style: The Surprisingly Average Life Of A Teenage Muslim Girl

Woven Lies

It's funny how darkness can be erased with light. How evil can with good. How lies can with truth.

After my seizure on the cafeteria floor last year, I realized that these opposites existed for significant reasons. Still, the hardest to erase were the lies.

My thoughts were interrupted by a deep cough. My retinas burned as I opened my eyes to a room full of light. After wincing and forcing my eyes shut, I opened them up again, slowly, so that they could adjust. The room was completely white, I noticed as I looked around. It wasn't my room. I scanned the room from corner to corner until I saw a flicker of green.

There was a boy that I'd never seen before beside the bed. I forced my eyes shut again and pretended that I was still sleeping. What was I doing with this guy? Was this room his? I'd never seen him, but something about him was oddly familiar- something that I couldn't recognize.

My head was pounding and I felt like my brain was weighing down my skull. I glanced at my hand, only to find an IV needle sticking out of it. My gaze followed the cord to the IV pole beside the bed.

I was in the hospital. This was a hospital. What am I doing in the hospital? Hospital. Hospital. Hospital.

I couldn't get that word out of my mind. Until-

"Yasmeen," a voice uttered.

"Yasmeen," I replied in a hoarse voice. That's me."

And I started to remember. No one had called me by my actual name since what felt like eons ago. I was bitch, slut, and terrorist. Not Yasmeen.

"Yasmeen." I repeated, smiling wistfully.

"You're okay." The boy smiled. He had huge dimples. His eyes were an unusual color, bright green, against his dark brown skin. Oh! His eyes! I knew those eyes!

"Who are you?"

"I'm Kennedy. I called the ambulance for you," he said, sympathetically. "Do you remember?"

"Yes. And you rode over with me. Why?"

"I was really worried. I'd never seen anything like what happened ever before. You were shaking and screaming and I couldn't hold you down and no one came when I called for help, and-"

"Thank you."

He took a sharp breath and nodded.

"No one was there for me. I thought I was going to die," I started, tears welling in my eyes. "You saved me. You did."

He didn't answer. Instead, he looked at me, eyes full of sadness, and patted my head. A few moments passed until he spoke.

"You're beautiful, you know."

"What?" I furrowed my brows in confusion.

"All that stuff that people are saying at school- it's not true. You have nothing to do with all that."

My throat suddenly burned, as I recalled how I tried making them see that exact point. I'd been screaming the whole way through.

"You're a good person."

It took those words from just one person to help me realize he was right. Why did I feel guilty and disgusting about how they felt towards me, when it was all based on lies? I really WAS a good person, and I didn't deserve what happened.

"I'm going to go now." Before I could interrupt him, he continued. "Your parents have been waiting to see you." He squeezed my hand, smiled, and began to walk towards the door.

As he let himself out, a nurse calmly entered to remove the IV while my parents rushed in.

"Habibti, are you alright? Ya Allah, my baby! We are here for you, Yasmeen!" All of the sympathy was a little odd; it was too much sympathy.

After I assured them that I was fine, they demanded to know what happened. Here was where I had run into problems. I couldn't tell them the whole truth because they would remove me from Caldwell, without a doubt. The only other high school in our small town had a tuition cost that was insanely high. So I opted for a white lie, Allah forgive me.

"We found out about the plane crashes today during class. It was really shocking for everyone." Boy, that wasn't the half of it.

I felt terrible for lying, but I really wanted to protect my family from unnecessary issues.

"Oh, habibti," they said, hugging me and patting my back. "We're so glad you are okay."

My parents weren't only being overly sentimental. Something in their voices was off, I noticed. Did they know what actually happened? Or did something even worse happen? Either way, it was clear that they weren't going to discuss it here.

"You can go home with us today." Ummi told me.

"What do you mean, today? How long have I been here?"

"Three days."

"I was asleep for all that time?!"

"Yaz, don't worry. The point is that you are okay." Abba said, while Ummi helped me out of bed.

My muscles felt sore and tense at the same time. As we walked out of the hospital together, I couldn't help but think about the strange way that my parents were behaving. I could handle the pain, and they knew that. So why were they being so emotional?

What weren't they telling me?