And We Are Heroes

2.1 ; jamal

"I was told when I get older all my fears would shrink, but now I'm insecure and I care what people think."
chapter ii ; part i

Jamal showed his unsent text to Nayara, bouncing up and down on his toes. "Is this good, do you think?"
Nayara winced. "I mean, I know you're trying to butter up to your parents, but I think this is a bit over the top."
"Okay, I'll change it," he decided, and deleted Dearest Father and Beloved Mother. His fingers hovered over the keypad, twitching, but his mind blanked. "To what?"
"Dearest, Darlingest Momsie and Popsicle," she said. When he automatically began to type that, she shook her head frantically. "No! I was kidding!"
Sheepishly, Jamal deleted what he'd typed.
"How about just skip that part? This is just a text, for God's sake."
"But," he protested, leaning over his desk in consternation, "My parents are, like, really conservative. How else am I going to convince them to let me," his voice dropped, "you know." He glanced around the nearly empty classroom like a hunted mouse.
"Join my cheer team?" Nayara finished. "Honestly, Jamal, if you can't even say it out loud, you're hardly going to be able to convince your parents."
He pouted. "You're not helping," he whined, and was interrupted by the first morning bell. After his disaster two days ago, he'd made sure to get to class as early as possible. And Nayara, who wasn't even in this class, was eager to avoid more of Brady's stupidity, so she let herself be dragged along. In return, Jamal agreed to drive her to school in Brady's place.
"I'll write it for you, 'kay?" Nayara said impatiently. "God, you're so persnickety." She snatched his iPhone from his hands and tapped out a message as students began to trickle into the chilly classroom.
"I found a good scholarship opportunity," Jamal read. "Nearly every male athlete in all-star competitive cheer is selected for sports scholarships."
Nayara pressed send.
"Wait, no!" Jamal exclaimed, shaking his head so that his gelled quiff bounced up and down.
"Too late." She handed back the phone and stood up, swinging her navy JanSport over her shoulder. "Gotta go. I'll see you at lunch."
He gazed forlornly at the texts, half-hoping his parents would lose their phones within the next five minutes. The desk pod filled up, and Mr. McCleod, in his pressed white dress shirt and plaid blazer, started the class as swiftly as usual.
Maria Guzman still wasn't back from her suspension and Jamal had no idea when she would be. Still, that didn't stop Mr. McCleod from tsk-ing and assigning their group the topic with the biggest workload.
Next to Jamal, Brady devoured a bag of cheese puffs like an animal, not even bothering to wipe the sticky dust from his fingers when he reached for the project instructions or rubric. The two girls at the table both had their noses in their phones, completely zoned out. One of them, a shy Indian girl Jamal vaguely remembered was named Arushi, furrowed her eyebrows together as her eyes flicked to and fro across the tiny screen. She twisted a strand of wavy black hair around her index finger, looking worried and agitated. The other girl, Neha Banerjee, giggled to herself as she scrolled. She'd asked Jamal's friend Tejas to Sadie's last year, and he still remembered the rebellious, provocative way she'd ground on the boy when the dance chaperones weren't looking. Briefly, he wondered what her proud, model-minority parents would think if they knew.
Sighing, Jamal took the project guidelines from Maria's empty desk and skimmed through the requirements, careful to avoid touching anywhere Brady's filthy fingers had been. "Who wants to draw five pictures of 'major turning points in the Jeffersonian Republic' for us?" he announced to his three group members. "Arushi?"
Her head jerked up from whatever she was reading. "Huh?"
"Can you draw?"
"Just 'cause I'm quiet doesn't mean I'm good at art," she retorted.
Out of the blue, Neha volunteered. "I can draw."
Jamal was perceptibly surprised, but he nodded. "Okay. Who wants to write a page on the pros and cons of the Articles of Confederation?"
Brady raised his hand, his eyes wide with excitement. His freckled cheeks were rounder than a pufferfish, stuffed with too many Cheetos puffs. Concerned, Jamal nodded. "Oh-kay... Arushi, do you want to create a timeline of events from 1765 to 1777?"
"Can I use Microsoft Word?"
Jamal's phone buzzed and his heart jumped. A text message from his mother said, "Family talk tonight."
"Hey, you okay?" Arushi questioned, tilting her head.
"Yeah," he said, but he could barely get his words out. In fact, he suddenly could barely even breathe. He felt overwhelmed with fear, and he had no idea why, but waves and waves of terror kept seizing his body. His chest hurt and he thought he was having a heart attack.
"Breathe, breathe!" Arushi yelped. "Come on. Open your airways."
He leaned over, squeezing his eyes shut, and shook his head repeatedly. "Can't." He choked, gasping for breath.
"Oh my God," Arushi said, jumping up out of seat. She nodded toward Neha, who stared, frozen, "Hurry and get help!"
Neha stood up and shouted, "Mr. McCleod! Can I go get the nurse?" Jamal wasn't sure what happened next. Everything around him, all the sounds, were just too overwhelming.
Arushi reached out to touch him, but he shook, his body repelling any outside touch.
Someone else knelt beside him, shoving Brady out of the way with a clipped, "Move, Donald." It was Tiffany, probably the sole emo kid in the school, and she took control like she'd done so a million times before. "He's having a panic attack," she announced. "All of you need to back away."
Arushi's hands stopped touching him and immediately he missed her steadiness. But with the clearing of the curious crowd, he realized he could breathe just a little better.
"Jamal," Tiffany soothed, "I need you to stand up, okay? Let's go outside."
He didn't want to stand up. He could barely move. But Tiffany took his arm and pulled, so he obliged, his entire frame trembling. He wheezed with every step he took toward the door. When his leg buckled, Arushi rushed in to support him before he fell. She wrapped his right arm around her shoulder. Among the smells of pink erasers, Axe, and teenage body odor, he smelled her jasmine shampoo. After this was all over, he thought, he would buy seven jasmine-scented candles, one for every room in his house.
Tiffany shoved students out of the way as Mr. McCleod tried to organize his class again. She, Jamal, and Arushi finally escaped to the hallway and Tiffany shut the door behind them. "Lean against the wall," she said. "How many fingers are on your left hand?"
Jamal shook his head, clenching his eyes shut. "What?"
"It's easy," Tiffany said. "How many fingers are on one hand?"
"Five," he whispered. He felt a boa constrictor crushing his ribcage and a slowly growing sense of nausea and faintness.
"What color is my shirt?" Tiffany continued.
He looked up reluctantly. "Black." All she wore was black. He fidgeted. What was up with black? It was the color of death, which only made him wheeze harder. He was panicked enough already.
"Focus on your breathing," Tiffany said.
"I can't breathe."
"Yes, you can. Focus." She nodded, mostly to herself. "Name five types of cats."
"Tigers, lions," he concentrated. "Tabbies, sphinxes, rainbow Poptart cats."
Neha and the school nurse came running down the hallway. The nurse thanked Tiffany, Arushi, and Neha and sent them back to class. She knelt down next to Jamal and he focused on her name tag.
"Honey, I'm going to call your parents. Which number should I try?"
"Not my parents," he pleaded. His leg bounced up and down.
"Honey, you're in no condition to stay at school. You need to go home."
He shook his head emphatically. "Not my parents."
"You're having a panic attack."
He shrunk into himself, the waves of terror growing more debilitating by the moment. Nurse Robinson wanted him to get better, but the mention of family only made his anxiety skyrocket.