Circle of Jinn (21 page)

Yasmin and I are actually getting along. As I sift through the clothes hanging in my closet, I begin to wonder if my mother cast a spell to bring us together. But it's not my mother. It's the Afrit. I told my mother this would happen. That this is why we stand a chance against them. Because the more they hurt us, the more we want to hurt them.

And we'll go to any lengths to do it. Even becoming
whatever it is I'm becoming
with Yasmin.

My hand lands on what I didn't know I was looking for. The perfect outfit.

Find what Laila loves and give it to her.

The lengths I will go to just got a whole lot longer.

And yet also skimpier.

 

22

Turns out I didn't need the push-up bra. One benefit of this outfit is that the top is bra and shirt all in one. I give a final pull on the knot in my gold halter, but unlike when all my Zar sisters wore a version of this ensemble on my sixteenth birthday, I'm in no danger of spilling out of it.

I fiddle with the sheer scarf draped around my neck as I walk down the stairs. I'm looking straight ahead, unable to bring myself to even peek over the railing and down into the living room for fear I'll lose my nerve.

I hit the bottom stair, pivot, and face … no one. There's no one here. I'm shivering in see-through harem pants, a sequined gold bra top, a tiny monkey-playing-the-cymbals hat with the strap digging into my chin, and there's no one here to see it?

Maybe this is a sign. A sign that this is a ridiculous idea. I'm about to bolt back up the stairs when Hana's voice steals my chance.

“Oh, Azra! It fits perfectly!” Her red hair bounces as she skips over to me. “Everyone has to see.”

“No, Hana, really.” I take in her sophisticated A-line black silk dress. “I was just joking. For Yasmin. I didn't realize you were all here so I should go—”

“Mom, Mina, Yasmin, Laila, everyone, get in here!” She claps her hands. “You have to see Azra!”

Don't you mean “every square inch of Azra”?
I hoist the harem pants up higher and plaster a smile on my face.

She better come. She better laugh.

Laila rounds the corner, and her hand flies to her mouth. My mother, Samara, all of their Zar sisters, and all of mine fill in around me. Laughing, making jokes, playing with my scarf, complimenting Hana, who sewed the outfit by hand, on her skill.

Though Laila remains frozen in the doorway, her eyes dart back and forth, searching mine. I bring my hand to my throat, feeling the rapid beat of my pulse through my skin, and unwind the scarf. As it falls to the floor, I grasp the figure-eight pendant that was hidden underneath. I'm clutching it so hard I could crush it.

She better know this is for her.

With measured steps, she crosses the room. On tiptoes, she unclenches my fingers from around the pendant and holds my hand in hers.

*   *   *

“I was more hurt than mad,” Laila says.

We're alone in the living room. Our mothers shooed everyone to the back deck, handling the protests of it being too dark and too cold by loading their arms up with lanterns, blankets, and our industrial-sized patio heater.

Laila folds her legs underneath her on the couch next to me. “I would have given it to you if you'd asked.”

Though I'm still taller than she is, I'm huddled into an even tighter ball. “I know.”

“Then why didn't you? Ask?”

“I…” My insides are tied up like a sailor's knot. This question, which follows on to why I didn't return her locket, is one I've asked myself a thousand times since she found out I stole it from her. I think I've always known the answer. But I haven't wanted to admit it to myself, let alone to her. “I think I wanted to hurt you.”

My voice trembles, but I don't try to cover. When she found the locket in my nightstand, I had pretended to be strong. I didn't want her to think I was hurting, like I was a victim in all this. But that only made her think I didn't care. That I was callous and insensitive. That I didn't give a damn that I'd ripped her heart out and treated her trust like it was toilet paper.

And now, I admit I wanted to hurt her and this is her response. No tears. No shouts. No protests of why. Laila, my best friend even when I didn't treat her as such, knows me well enough to understand.

She uncurls her legs and slides closer to me. Her gold eyes seem bigger and rounder, but her lashes haven't given up their slight size. She looks even more like a doll that I should be protecting. But she doesn't need my protecting—not anymore. She probably never did, but I was too focused on myself to see her kind nature wasn't at the expense of her strength.

Because it takes someone with Laila's inner strength to forgive.

“You wanted to hurt me because I had what you wanted,” she says. “Not a picture of a male Jinn, not a picture of a father neither one of us would probably ever meet. I had our Zar and you didn't.”

I nod. “But it was my fault.”

“No,” she says, “well, yes, maybe, but we have been a bit insular. Inside jokes, talking about things you weren't a part of…”

I tap my chest. “My doing.”

“Not entirely. We didn't always ask you to join us.
I
didn't ask. And I used to. Even when I knew you would say no. I just gave up on you for a while there, Azra.”

This is all news to me. It hurts more than I would have expected. Still, I say what's true. “You tried harder than anyone else would have.”

“But I'm not anyone else. I'm your best friend. And best friends don't give up.” She covers the tears I see forming by flicking my tiny hat. “I do believe you are the perfect example of that today.”

I dig into my halter top and pull out the tiny strand of silver tinsel Laila wrapped around my wrist when we were ten. She pretended it was the silver bangle I wouldn't receive for another six years. She wanted me to have fun, to play make-believe and grant her wish. “Extra points for this, right?”

Laila flings her hair in my face as she gets up, but she can't help smiling. “Certainly. Still, I'm not letting you out of wearing that for the rest of the night.”

I groan. “Remind me not to piss you off again.”

She laughs. “Oh, yeah, I'm a real force to be reckoned with.”

Standing up and almost tripping on my stupid sheer scarf, I say, “You think you aren't? Is there anyone else I'd put this on for?”

“Nate!”
Farrah and Mina cry as they barrel into the room.

“Henry,” Laila whispers.

What was that about my best friend knowing me so well? Better than I know myself?

I plant my hands on my hips to steady myself and face Mina and Farrah. “Have you two been eavesdropping the entire time?”

Mina's verbal “no” is at odds with Farrah's effusive nod.

“Come on,” Mina says. “We need more bodies outside.”

“More?” I say. “The deck's going to break if it gets much more weight on it.”

Farrah changes the color of her headband from blue to purple to pink, and I know she's taking me seriously. After I convince her I'm joking, she says, “They're all acting strange. I don't even think they've opened a bottle of wine.”

“Something really is wrong, then,” Laila says, laughing. “Let's go lighten things up.”

I trudge behind, knowing that each step brings me closer to doing the exact opposite. I'm about to burst the Jinn bubble for all my Zar sisters. And I understand, a bit more, why my mother keeps secrets.

*   *   *

“Oh, thank Janna, you're back,” Hana says. “I was just talking about the last wish I had to grant.” Her freckles dance as she wrinkles her nose. “Someone else go. Otherwise it's too … quiet.”

She says “quiet,” but what I think she means is “tense.” All our mothers are like wax replicas of themselves, and Yasmin is eyeing them like she's trying to make them melt. I guess it's not only my mother who she blames for Raina being taken. I didn't realize how much of a pacifier Matin's been for her. The sooner we set the stage and get him and Zak down here, the better.

Hana taps her foot, and suddenly I feel her desperation. Literally feel it.

Whoa.

She practically smashes her high heel through the wood decking, and
her
nerves make
my
palms sweat.

“Right,” I say, nudging Yasmin farther down the bench to make room for me and Laila. “So, Hana, what was your last wish?”

“Oh, nothing too difficult.” Hana aims for the open seat behind her. “What the…?” She hops up, having sat right in Farrah's lap. “Nice apping job, Farrah. Now scooch over.”

Laila asks again, “So … the wish?”

“Yes, the wish.” Hana wedges herself in beside Farrah. “Boobs.”

Yasmin snickers. “Figures. Shallow humans. I mean, is there a Jinn here who
hasn't
gotten boobs?”

Laila and I are the only ones who raise our hands.

“Seriously?” I say.

Farrah raises hers halfway. “Does junk count?”

The deck shakes with the force of our collective laughter, and a small part of me does wonder about its structural integrity.

“What about hardest wish?” Hana widens her eyes at us girls.

Things really must have been painful out here.

Lalla Isa notices the new pink color of her daughter's headband, and the one in her own dark brown hair turns pink. She and Farrah used to wear matching ones, but this is the first time I've seen a headband in Lalla Isa's hair in a while. She juts her square chin, more angular than Farrah's, toward Hana's mother. “Why don't you tell them about yours, Nadia? I still think that's one of the hardest any of us has ever gotten.”

Lalla Nadia crosses and recrosses her legs. “I don't think the girls want to hear—”

“We do,” half of us say at the same time. Including me. I think of Matin upstairs, listening.

“Please, Lalla Nadia,” I add.

“Okay, if you're sure,” Nadia says. It may be the light, but her creamy skin looks paler than usual against her auburn hair, a shade deeper than Hana's. “It was years ago, before you were all born. I was given a scientist in Boston.”

“A doctor, wasn't he?” Lalla Isa says.

“Yes, but a researcher. Just as precise as you'd expect. His wish was so strong I barely had to connect with his anima to reach it. He wanted to cure cancer.”

Even Yasmin leans in at this because we all know that's not a wish Jinn can grant.

“You never told me this,” Hana says. “What did you do?”

“Well, clearly I did not grant his wish, otherwise humans would no longer be suffering. From that at least.”

“You went deeper, then?” I ask. “Found his true wish?”

She places her hand on her chest. “I tried. But that was it. It wasn't his wish because he'd lost a family member and what he really needed was solace. It wasn't because he was ultracompetitive and needed to win or even to be revered. It was simply his deepest desire. It's the purest wish I have ever been asked.”

“Wow,” Farrah says, her headband practically glowing. “What did you do?”

“I started by dipping a toe in the science.”

“A toe?” Samara's chest heaves with her booming laugh. “She practically got a PhD herself.”

Lalla Jada adds, “You should have seen your mother, Hana. No Jinn has ever been more dedicated.”

Nadia's face flushes. “I'm sure that's not true, but thank you, Jada.” Nadia looks at Yasmin. “It was your mother who eventually stopped me. She made me realize that interfering with science … with nature in this way is not something we can do. It must happen organically.”

Next to me, Yasmin stiffens. Her eyes dart toward Nadia, but she refuses to hold her gaze. But this is good. Bringing up Raina. A natural lead-in to the conversation we need to start.

After a pause, Nadia continues, “So I let go. I found the most adorable dog named Cancer, of all things, that was suffering from some rare parasite, and through many, many convoluted steps brought doc and dog together and … eventually, there you go. Cured Cancer.”

Laila sucks in her top lip. In a soft voice, she asks, “But isn't that cheating?”

Nadia nods her head. “Absolutely. Sometimes you don't have a choice.”

My mother moves behind Nadia, wrapping her arms around her shoulders. “And sometimes, you don't know the ripple effect your actions might have. Cancer's owner happened to be a scientist in her own right. Together, she and the researcher discovered an important gene, and what else, Nadia?”

She playfully slaps my mother's hand. “Got married. But that wasn't me.”

“Maybe not directly,” my mother says, “but isn't that what makes all this worthwhile? We never know what our helping may lead to.”

Isa chimes in, “Even with boobs. Remember mine? My ‘Miss Double D' became Miss Country or Miss Universe or Miss Planet Earth or some such thing, and now that charity of hers has planted more than a million trees.”

All the heads in the circle bob up and down. Except Yasmin's.

She leaps from the bench and cries, “
Khallas!
”

The recognition on my mother's face contrasts with her Zar sisters' surprise and confusion.

Unaware of what she's said, Yasmin launches into the tirade she's been holding in not just for tonight but for weeks.

“This is absurd!” She throws up her hands. “Dogs, trees, you cannot be serious? It's all a random farce. We do these inane things for humans at every expense to ourselves. Go ahead and attempt to convince yourselves otherwise, but I am not going to remain here, because the bull that's spilling from all of your lips, Lallas, reeks.”

She marches toward the house but stops short and whips back around. “Maybe if one of you put an ounce of the energy you give to humans toward my mother, she'd still be here.”