The Green Bicycle (12 page)

W
as there a class in the history of school that made it easy to stay awake?

Wadjda leaned her sweaty cheek into her even sweatier palm. Her body felt like it was swaying slowly, back and forth. The AC hissed above her. The fan turned, lifting hot air so heavy it felt like a physical weight. All Wadjda wanted was to tip over onto her desk, close her eyes, and sleep for a thousand years.

At the front of the room, the teacher cleared the blackboard, wiping away the equations and figures from their math lesson. As the complex problems disappeared, so, Wadjda thought, did all sense of logic. In the absence of math, nothing in school made sense to her. It was a lot of words, blowing around the room like sand.

Today, their teacher was collecting ideas for the Religious Club's bulletin board. Though she was the club's newest and supposedly most enthusiastic member, Wadjda's eyelids kept slipping shut. With each comforting flash of darkness, sleep seemed more tempting. At this point, Wadjda's arm was barely able to hold the weight of her head.

Stay awake, stay awake, stay awake.
Wadjda recited the words like a mantra. Dragging herself upright, she started pinching the palm of her right hand with her fingernails. Determined, she stared at the blackboard—and even gave a small smile to the teacher, who didn't seem to notice Wadjda's new keenness.

“Let's compile all the stories we know about torment in the grave and make a pamphlet for the whole school. Any ideas about what we should include?”

Noura raised her hand eagerly. The teacher nodded, giving her the floor.

“I want to tell the story of the giant snake from hell,” Noura blurted. “There's a girl who didn't pray on time. After she died, the giant snake was sent to torment her!”

“Good, Noura. Thank you.” The teacher wrote “giant snake from hell” on the top line of her chart.

Were they really going to do this for a whole hour? Wadjda gazed idly out into the corridor. Was that? . . . She frowned. Yes, definitely the faint tapping of high heels, in the distance but coming closer. The hair on the back of Wadjda's neck stood up.

“What other ideas do we have?” the teacher was asking.

Sitting up in her seat, Wadjda tried to concentrate. She had to think of a good story. Torment in the grave . . . If the Prophet Mohammad put a fresh twig on a grave, it was
said to ease the dead person's suffering, right? Wadjda furrowed her brow, trying to decide if that would be a good addition to the pamphlet.

In the hallway, the sound of clicking heels grew closer. And then Wadjda's worst nightmare was there, coming true right in front of her. Her mother, walking with Ms. Hussa toward her office.

Wadjda's whole body went rigid as she watched them disappear down the hall. Her mother was nervously fixing her hair and adjusting her blouse, holding her black
abayah
at her side as she walked behind the principal.

Forget the torment of the grave
, Wadjda thought, slumping back in her seat. She was about to experience torment right here on earth.

C
rash!

A plate smashed to the ground and broke with a resounding clatter. Smaller crashes followed as the pieces ricocheted off the kitchen cupboards and table legs.

In her bedroom, Wadjda sat up like a shot. She could hear her mother cursing her as she cleaned—or broke—the pile of dinner dishes from the previous night.

“Always trying to get money. Sneaking, lying, breaking the rules—and for what?” Mother's voice, usually low and beautiful, was a screechy scream. Each word trembled with rage. “To buy a bicycle? I swear, Wadjda, you'll never have that thing, not as long as I'm alive! Do you think I'll just wait around until you get expelled?”

Wadjda snuck to the door and oh-so-carefully peeked around the corner. When she made out her mother's figure, she sank back against the wall and buried her head in her hands. Mother was still in her work clothes. That meant things were
bad
. She never cleaned the house wearing her good blouses and skirts. They were far too valuable. Each month, she saved just enough money to buy one
or two things at Zara. Each night, she took great care washing and ironing them so that they'd last longer. Looking good at work was one of her mother's top priorities, and with the mess she was making in the kitchen, her favorite red silk shirt was going to get ruined.

Smash!
Wadjda heard another plate shatter. She covered her ears, desperate to block out the sound. When that didn't work, she flung herself across the room and slapped at the dial on her radio, hoping music would cover the sound of her own sobs. The song that came on was a new R & B hit by Beyoncé, the notes low and pulsing.

Swiping at her nose with the back of her hand, Wadjda cranked the volume all the way up, desperate to tune out her mother's vicious scolding.

“Turn off that damn radio! Recording those evil songs?” Now her mother sounded even angrier. “You're no better than Abeer! And what happened to her? I'll tell you: She's staying at home until her parents marry her off. That's what I'm going to do with you, too! No school for you tomorrow! You're not leaving this house.”

Wadjda turned off the radio and fell back onto her bed. The tears were rolling down faster now, but she swallowed every sob that rose in her throat. Scrubbing at her cheeks, she fought to gather her courage. Then she crept
to the door again, wondering why the kitchen had gone strangely silent.

The moonlight beamed in through the dirty window. It silhouetted her mother, who stood very still, surveying the broken glass scattered across the floor. As Wadjda watched, her mother pulled her disheveled hair away from her face, gathering it back strand by strand. For a long time, she stood there, one hand holding her hair, one palm pressing against her forehead. Water roared out of the tap in the sink beside her. Several minutes passed before Mother turned it off. All the rage had left her body. Now she just seemed terribly tired.

As Wadjda watched, her mother searched slowly through the cabinet under the sink for a hand broom and dustpan. Dropping to her knees, she swept up the mess, dumping the pan full of broken glass into the bin. The shards made a loud clatter against the sides of the plastic container.

Padding silently on the balls of her feet, Wadjda crept out farther into the hall. Her mother was in the living room now, pacing back and forth. Wadjda could hear her nervous footsteps, a fast patter that muffled suddenly when she stepped onto the rug. Once, twice, she reached for the phone, only to pull away. Then, abruptly, she snatched up the handle, punched in a number, and waited.

The ringing sound on the other end of the line was very loud in the quiet house. All at once, it stopped. But before her mother could say anything more than “Hello,” Wadjda heard a muffled, squawky sound. The voice on the other end hadn't wasted any time in speaking!

Mother's breath grew faster as the squawking continued. Here and there, Wadjda could make out a word, a sentence. She'd know that broken Arabic anywhere.
Iqbal.

Her mother tightened her grip on the receiver. In her mind's eye, Wadjda imagined it shattering into a thousand pieces, broken by the force of her mother's anger.

“I know, Iqbal, I know. You waited a long time, yes. But my daughter had a problem at school.” Wadjda could tell her mother was working hard to keep her voice calm. “I didn't have time to tell you I was leaving early.”

Clearly Iqbal wasn't buying it. Her mother paced the floor in tight circles. Then she pulled the phone from her ear—“selfish, stupid,” Wadjda heard Iqbal saying—and held it out to the side, giving herself a small break from his rant.

“Well, you're paid for the trip whether I'm there or not!” she broke in, her fury growing. “Fine. Don't come tomorrow, if that's how you feel.”

Iqbal's voice rose on the other end of the line. He was shouting so loudly that Wadjda could make out every word. Her jaw dropped. He was calling her mother such
awful things! She wanted to dive into his stupid van and give him a good strong kick.

“How dare you speak to me that way?” Her mother's face was red with rage. “Do you think you're the only driver in town? Just watch! I'll find someone else!”

Slamming down the phone, she fell back onto the couch. Wadjda watched her mother's chest rise and fall, heard her breath stutter as she tried not to cry. In silence, she crept back to her room, perched on the edge of her bed, and drew her knee up to her chin. With a black marker, she began to color in the white toe and sole of her shoe. Her pen marks were thick and careful. Once the whole thing was black, she went over it again and again, making the color as dark as possible.

Still no sound from the living room. Wadjda put the marker aside. One by one, she tugged the faded purple laces through the eyelets and set them down on her desk. In their place, she strung the black twine that she'd used for her bracelets.

There was a gentle thump from the hall—the sound of the front door opening. Father must be home. Wadjda froze and tried to listen. Would her name come up right away? She rushed to finish lacing the twine and darted back to her position by the door.

The tense, hissed tones hit her ears like a slap. The fight
was getting louder. Soon, Mother's and Father's voices would carry into the yard. Wadjda hoped none of the neighbors would hear.

“I can't afford a private driver for a week!” her mother was yelling. “Why don't you help me? Why can't you pay for something, for once?”

“How?” her father shouted back. “With what? You want me to steal, is that it?”

“You find money whenever you need a new cell phone, don't you?”

Her throat felt hot and scratchy again, but there'd been too much crying tonight. Pressing her lips tightly together, Wadjda put on her shoes. Though the sneakers hugged her feet just right, like always, they looked wrong. Colored black, they'd be lost in a crowd. They'd make her look like everyone else.

“And what about the dowry money? Surely my handsome groom could spend a little of that wealth!” Her mother's voice dipped meanly on the words
handsome groom
.

“Do you think it's easy for me?” Her father's voice was even louder and angrier than her mother's. “You think I want to support two families? But I don't have a choice! I'm the town joke. And somehow I have to get that son you can't give me!”

Drawers banged open and slammed shut. Wadjda swallowed even harder.

“Forget it! You think I need this nonsense? You think I like your complaining? Don't count on a visit next week! Don't even think about it!”

“I don't care!” Her mother's voice was a burst of raw emotion, like nothing Wadjda had ever heard. “You think I don't know how much time you spend at your mother's? That every night you're discussing potential brides?”

The front door slammed so hard that the pencils on Wadjda's desk rattled. Then there was silence.

Wadjda stayed awake for a long time that night, her stomach filled with a heavy, indigestible sadness. In her mind's eye, all she could see was the chart she'd made to track her savings for the bicycle.

Somehow
, she thought,
I have to fix this.

T
he morning brought sun like a hammer, its hot rays slamming against the cardboard over the window and forcing Wadjda out of bed. She woke knowing she couldn't spend the whole day in her room. Grounded or not, after the chaos of the previous night, she needed to escape.

Delicately, she tiptoed around, neatening the sheets, pulling on jeans and shoes. She was careful not to make any noise that would draw her mother's attention. From grim experience, she knew how these days went. Mother would camp out on the couch all day, watching TV, or she'd lie in bed, staring at the ceiling. Now and then, she'd sneak onto the roof for a cigarette. But then she'd be back, on the couch or in her bed, her dark eyes seeming to follow Wadjda around the apartment.

Wadjda's shoes were laced. She was ready. With the utmost care, she put her hand against the bedroom door, giving it tiny nudges with her finger. Finally, it opened enough for her to look across the hall.

Her mother was in her room, sitting up in bed, hair all over the place, a look of exhaustion on her face. In her left
hand, she held the phone. Her whole body leaned into it, listening nervously. The voice on the other end must have said something bad, because her mother started rubbing her temples with her fingers.

She probably didn't sleep last night
, Wadjda thought. Again, guilt twisted in her stomach.
And it's all my fault.

Her eyes went to her father's side of the bed. The sheets were neat, undisturbed.

“Can you count it as emergency leave?” Mother offered, breaking off whatever was being said on the other end of the line. “I still have some days, I think? You know how hard I've been working, covering for everyone. And I wouldn't have missed today if it weren't for that driver! I'll open up for the entire month if I have to, I promise.”

Her voice trembled as she spoke, and Wadjda saw desperation on her face. Then, suddenly, her whole body seemed to relax. Her eyes closed, and Wadjda saw her lips move, as if in silent thanks.

“Okay,” she said. The relief in her tone was almost painful. “Thank you. Thank you so much. See you tomorrow.”

As she hung up, though, she shook her head. It was a hopeless gesture, and it hit Wadjda right in the heart. Last night's wasn't the first fight she'd overheard between her parents. So she knew what her mother was thinking. While she'd managed to buy herself one more day, she
still had no driver—and no way of getting one. Father was gone. The money was gone. Mother had exhausted all her options. And if she didn't make it into work tomorrow, she'd almost certainly lose her job.

Wadjda remembered the long months of her mother's job hunt well—it had taken forever to find a school that would hire her. “They're overflowing with applications,” Mother had said, slumping over the kitchen table, folding the most recent rejection letter between her fingers. “Most won't even take mine.”

In the end, she'd been hired by her current school, in a remote area very distant from their house. The commute was horrible—an endless drive of almost a hundred miles along a desolate road. Her mother worked at a remote desert village school near the Empty Quarter, the vast sea of shifting sand dunes that surrounded Riyadh. To reach it, she spent two hours each morning stuffed into a minivan with six other teachers. And then another two hours on the way home.

“It's the only option,” she told Wadjda tersely when she accepted the offer. “We need the money.”

Once, Wadjda remembered, Iqbal's battered old car had gotten a flat tire a few miles away from the school. Her mother and the other six teachers had to walk. They'd
made the trip alone, because Iqbal refused to leave his car. Wadjda could picture them, walking along the side of the road, seven indistinguishable figures backlit by the early morning light. Her beautiful mother one more drifting shape in a dark
abayah
.

Her mother had tried to sing, hoping to make the journey less stressful, but it hadn't worked. One of the teachers had gotten angry at her, hissing furiously about how they should recite the Quran silently in their hearts. “That way,” her mother told Wadjda, “God would protect us.” She rolled her eyes, making a joke of it.

But no one walked on the highways surrounding Riyadh—to do so was a death wish. Cars drove on the medians and shoulders, and didn't watch out for people on foot. And even when her mother wasn't walking, her long commute was dangerous. On an almost daily basis, newspapers reported horrifying stories of people killed on that desolate road. Cars were old, with tires that burst or shredded because the drivers went at such colossal speeds. The drivers were bad, poorly trained or self-taught. Some packed extra women into their cars to make more money. The seat belts, like the AC, were almost always broken. With every trip Wadjda's mother took to earn her living, the threat of deadly accidents loomed.

And yet, Wadjda thought, as awful as the trip was, she'd do almost anything to bring that horrible Iqbal back to her mother now.

As she watched, Mother fell back into bed and rolled toward the window. She pulled the sheets over her head, hiding herself from the world. Gingerly, Wadjda tugged her door shut.
Somehow
, she thought,
I'm going to put everything right again
.

She walked to her desk and turned on her radio, spinning the volume dial all the way down. A pleasant low hum murmured out. Next, Wadjda snapped on the light above her desk, which added to the illusion of an occupied room.

Should she stuff pillows under her blanket, in the shape of a body? Wadjda paused at the end of the bed, pursing her lips. She'd seen kids do that in the movies when they were sneaking out, but honestly, it seemed like a waste of time. She knew that her mother wouldn't be checking on her today. When things got this bad, Mother drifted off into her own world. Wadjda couldn't just walk out the front door, but she didn't have to act like a superspy, either. It was a matter of finding the right moment and moving fast.

Music buzzed from the radio. The heat beat against the window. Wadjda watched the dust rise and fall through
the sunbeams as the AC dribbled cool air into her room. Finally, Mother moved from her bed to the living room, where—sure enough—she fell onto the couch and turned on the TV. A Turkish soap opera blared to life, a handsome man and a beautiful woman, arguing. Wadjda didn't know why her mother watched this stuff when she lived it in real life.

Still, with the added noise, Wadjda was able to creak her door open, slide her body out, and let it latch shut again without drawing her mother's attention. The worn soles of her sneakers made her steps virtually soundless as she tiptoed past her mother and slipped into the stairwell that led to the roof. She climbed noiselessly and swiftly, feeling her heart beat faster, like a hummingbird's wings fluttering in her chest.

One last step, and sunlight hit her full in the face. Wadjda closed the stairwell door behind her. Stepping forward, she leaned against the waist-high wall that ran along the flat surface of their roof. From here, she could look out across the entire city. Riyadh spread before her like a painting, penned in at the top by a thick blanket of yellow smog. Blocky old apartment complexes huddled next to sleek new construction. The stadium, which looked like an alien spacecraft, stood out, its reddish color dampened to ochre by the smudgy air. Each street, each roof garden
was a story, a mystery. And it kept going, on and on as far as Wadjda could see. Almost as far as she could dream.

Though her parents' argument still tugged at her mind, Wadjda felt some of the tension in her shoulders ebb away. She hung her hands, shook them out, and rolled her neck from side to side. She loved being up here, above it all, wearing whatever she wanted and feeling the breeze against her face. Below, the burning concrete streets stifled the wind to nothing. Up here, it teased Wadjda, whispered,
I am ready for that race.

The space held many memories, too—most of them very good. On winter nights, her mother used to wash the roof. When it was dry, she'd lay out three mattresses, side by side: Mother, Father, and Wadjda in the middle.

It had been a long time since they'd had one of their sleepovers, Wadjda thought now, watching a car speed by on the street below. A lot of their neighbors still did it, though. Maybe sleeping in the open air gave Saudis a taste of the ancient, nomadic desert life they used to have, before oil and the massive concrete buildings that oil paid for took over their land.

I loved those nights
, Wadjda thought, leaning her face into the wind. When she was very small, her father would hug her and whisper old folk stories in her ear. Since the night breezes could be chilly, her mother boiled hot milk
with ginger and honey to warm them up. They'd snuggle together, all three of them, a small cluster of warmth in the vast desert night. When it was clear, Wadjda and her father would count the stars as they sipped their hot drinks. This, despite her mother's giggling objections. Wadjda could practically see her, her big eyes free from the worry she now wore like a cloak. She'd burrow her head into her husband's side, smiling.

“Shh,” she'd whisper. “You know the old women say counting stars gives you warts!”

Every time her mother said this, her father would double over, laughing. “Silly beliefs,” he'd murmur, pressing his cheek against hers. “How can you possibly believe them?”

Just in case, Wadjda always checked her hands and feet in the morning light. She never found any warts. Since then, she'd been suspicious of all the old wives' tales that guided her mother's thoughts and behavior. Like so much of the adult world, Wadjda thought, the ancient warnings seemed designed to keep her from doing things that were fun and interesting, the things that made her feel most alive.

Since those long-ago winter campouts, the roof had become Wadjda's special place. This was where she went to escape it all. And when she said “escape,” she meant
it literally. Another grin broke out on Wadjda's face. The promise of action cleared away the memories like a broom sweeping out dirt. She tightened her
abayah
around her waist and kicked her leg over the wall. As the muscle memory that comes with much practice kicked in, she lowered herself down the pipe that ran along the front of the house. Though it was only a two-story villa, when Wadjda looked down at the concrete patio below, it seemed a lot higher up.

As she shimmied past the living room window, her foot slipped on a loose piece of concrete. Gasping, Wadjda kicked down, trying to find a stable footing on the house's crumbling side. For a moment, she had her balance, and then the chunk of concrete ripped free of the wall completely. Gasping, her palms slick with sweat, Wadjda pulled herself hard against the pipe, scrabbling her toes back and forth. Her precious black rock fell from her pocket and bounced across the courtyard—a series of loud
snicks
as it clacked against tile.

Breathless, Wadjda darted an eye to the window. To her horror, she saw her mother rushing over, hastily covering herself as she moved from the couch. Wadjda pulled herself tighter against the wall and froze. If she didn't move, if she didn't look, there was the slightest chance she'd go undiscovered.

An agonizing moment of silence passed. Then Wadjda heard the rattle of curtains on the rod. Cautiously, she lifted her head. Her mother had drawn the shades.
Safe
, Wadjda thought. Hopefully her luck would improve from here.

She lowered herself the rest of the way down, scooped up her rock, and moved to the gate. Propping it open with her foot, she popped a piece of gum in her mouth and chewed till it was good and sticky. Then she plastered it carefully to the lock, ensuring that it wouldn't close completely and catch her out.

Donning her
abayah
—the regular one today, thank goodness—and veil, she ran out into the street, moving fast and true like an arrow shot from a bow.