17. NAJA’S WATCHING • A Reflection
“So which one do you love more, Akemi or Chiasa?” Naja asked me. We were standing outside our new home in Queens at her bus stop, waiting for the green minibus that picks her up and takes her to Khadija’s Islamic School for Girls, where she just completed third grade and was now beginning her summer session.
“It’s not a competition,” I said calmly, looking down the block for her bus.
“I didn’t say it was,” she replied playfully. “But, everyone has favorites, even Umma,” she said, catching my full attention.
“Did Umma say that she likes one of my wives more than the other?” I asked.
“Nope, she didn’t. But you are Umma’s favorite. She loves you more than she loves me,” she answered with a seriousness, searching me for a real reaction.
“Sounds untrue. Don’t feel like that.” I hugged her with one arm around her shoulder. “I’m older. Umma has known me for more years. I’m a son, so I am responsible for a lot more,” I reasoned with her. She stood staring up and into my eyes, her little bronze face framed by her pale pink hijab. “You know Umma loves you. If she heard what you were saying right now, she would feel disappointed,” I cautioned her without a scolding tone.
“I know she loves me,” Naja said confidently, pulling back her little shoulders in a proud little-girl stance. “Just like I know she loves you more.” She laughed, feeling like she had won. “You even said it yourself. You said Umma knows you more, and that you are responsible for more. You used the word more two times! So you agree with me.”
“Your bus is coming.” I pointed.
“So which one is it? I know you love both of your wives, but which one do you love more?” She was determined.
“Assalaam Alaikum,” I greeted the woman who gets off from their bus, guides the children in, and walks back up the few steps right behind them.
“Wa-Alaikum Salaam brother,” she responded pleasantly to me.
* * *
“Are you ever going to tell me the answer?” Naja asked me. “Or are you going to try and make me forget the way that adults do when they don’t want little kids to know anything?” She and I and Akemi were all three walking in lower Manhattan, through the cobblestone back streets where the top vintage shops were tucked away. I was scouting out and purchasing the most fashionable items of clothes for resale in Asia. My first wife is a charm for my business. Her eyes know what suits Asian tastes and she could break it down country by country. She would hold something up and say, “Korea hai! Japan no!” She let me know that this would sell nicely in Korea, but not in Japan. Japan was all about designer kicks, and they would pay three to five more times the retail amount than we had already paid in America. Japan was all about the newest and latest trend. They had vintage shops, but the majority of Japanese wanted strictly new styles. Their tastes would switch rapidly, and they had the cash flow to keep up. At the time, Korea was behind fashion-forward Japan. But among the young Koreans, because of the products promoted by the music, television, and film media, there was a growing interest and market for anything that Koreans believed Americans thought was fashionable wear. However, they were not up on the shoe and sneaker game yet, and Black Sea and I were pushing to create that market among the teen and college student crowd. We were especially pumping it through the Korean entertainment circles, and break-dancing crews on their side. The vintage shops had the inventory that would sell in Korea at prices that they could afford and wear proudly. Even if an item was off-season or throwback, as long as it had the right brand name and Americans loved it, many Koreans would buy it, use it, keep it.
“Akemi won’t know what we’re talking about anyway.” Naja was in sneaky mode. “So you can tell me which one you love more. Whisper if you have to!”
“Naja, Akemi does not speak English but she is not unaware of anything. I wouldn’t speak about her the way that you are. You should stop,” I said. She looked like her little feelings were hurt. That didn’t matter. She needed to understand. “If you love Akemi like you say you do, you should help her to understand English instead of tricking her because she doesn’t understand English.”
“Sorry,” she said softly. “Next time, I’ll ask you when you and I are alone. And . . . I do love Akemi more than Chiasa. I knew Akemi first, same as Umma knew you first. And Akemi takes better care of me than ‘the other one.’ And, I do teach Akemi some English words sometimes. Like when you aren’t home yet, but I’m still awake. Or like when you are on the first floor, when Umma and Akemi and I all live on the second.” I just looked at her.
Naja’s young, but she is not dumb. She’s curious and watching everything that goes on in our home. I feel good that we are not showing her anything wrong or shameful. During this summer school session, she only has two courses: Classical Arabic and Islamic Studies. I knew that from her learning the Quran, she would begin to think and feel even more deeply than before, and also would be questioning and comparing everything she saw in her home, in school, and in the families of her and our friends.
Akemi turned in to a vintage boutique displaying last season’s Laura Ashley summer collection. Naja and I walked in behind her. She eased by everything displayed up front, moving towards the back. Out ran a short, slim man dressed in lemon-colored everything, even suspenders.
“You’re just gorgeous!” he said, placing the palms of his hands over his face, smudging the cosmetics that I just noticed that he was wearing. “And look at those baby-doll feet of yours! And those five-alarm fire-red Gucci sandals put Imelda Marcos to shame!” he said to Akemi. “While you’re at it, name me the salon that painted those Picassos on your toenails? And why cover up that beautiful hair? Oh I know! Because beautiful hair on top of everything else you’ve got going on would be a crime!” He laughed joyously. Akemi stepped right beyond him.
“She does not speak English,” I explained.
“Rude is the same in every language,” he quipped. “And by the way, you are quite gorgeous too! Stop the bus! You’re prettier than her!” he said, laughing. I thought he had a mental illness. But in business I’ve learned to interact with all types of characters until whatever deal I’m seeking is complete. He wasn’t hurting nothing.
Akemi weaved in and out of the tables where wooden boxes were piled high with choices. She arrived at a back rack. Then I saw what she saw. High-fashion leather coats for the autumn season. She was thinking ahead. I liked that. She slipped one on to show me, and sat the black leather motorcycle hat over the Hermès scarf she wore to conceal her hair. “Hai!” I said to her, letting her know to pull it and anything else she found like that back there. I went to the wooden boxes. I started pulling T-shirts with brand names and bold English lettering. When I was in Japan, I was surprised to see how many teens were wearing T-shirts with English lettering on them. The illest thing though, was that they would be bootleg, with letters that didn’t spell a word, or had a sentence that didn’t make sense. The fashion for them was only the English lettering, I found out. So the English-lettered T-shirts that had the Coca-Cola brand stamped on them or Nike or Reebok or even Nintendo, I pulled all of them. I thought it was crazy. They manufacture all that over there, but would pay top dollar to buy it back in the form of fashion.
“Akemi is super pretty,” Naja said. Now we were in a nearby ice-cream parlor that both Akemi and Naja could not resist. While I was weighed down with bags, Akemi pointed to the toppings she wanted on her sundae.
“Yes, she is,” I agreed.
“She has nice eyes and her hair is long and perfect. Remember when she cut it? And now look it grew back even longer. I want my hair to be styled the same as hers,” Naja said softly, like she was making a wish. “But Umma said no. Umma says I am too young to go to the beauty parlor.”
“Whatever Umma says is what you should do, always,” I assured my little sister.
“Akemi does not treat me like a baby,” she boasted. “And she shares.”
“S
hares what?” I asked.
“Well, she shares you first of all. And . . .” she continued, “she shares her lotions and creams with me. And she painted my face once. That was the best! And when I took a pair of her pretty heels out of her closet and put them on, I fell. Akemi picked me up. Then she showed me how to walk in heels until I got it right. And she even put a book on my head. I had to learn to walk in the heels without the book falling off. That was fun,” she said excitedly.
“Akemi’s bedroom is the only place where you can walk in heels, with a book on your head or not,” I said solemnly.
“I know,” she said, shrugging her little shoulders.
* * *
Our workshop is in the basement of our Queens home. Initially I thought it would be my space. In the interest of our varied family businesses, I opted to make it a place where each of us could organize whatever we were working on. I used a small corner table to take inventory of the items I had purchased and would be sending overseas. On the large table where Umma had her Umma Designs sewing machine and supplies, as well as a clean and smooth surface for measuring and cutting fabrics, she and Chiasa and Akemi sat. Naja considered herself a helper. She shuttled back and forth on any given night, choosing who she was going to work with on a whim.
Akemi and Chiasa were flowing in rapid, fluent, soft-spoken Japanese. Chiasa was describing to Akemi exactly how she wanted her clothing customized. Akemi was listening and imagining and sketching all at once the design that Chiasa was requesting. She would pause after a while and show the drawing to Chiasa for her approval or changes. Umma would then create a pattern for the design that Akemi sketched. Chiasa would choose her fabrics and Umma would make the new wardrobe. Once Umma had the pattern mastered, she could make those designs for sale to any customer if she chose to do so.
Naja was looking over the shoulders of my two wives as they worked. “Why do you want so many pockets?” she asked Chiasa.
“Pockets are for holding in place whatever I am carrying.”
“But why are you asking Umma to put your pockets on the inside of the skirt instead of on the outside, like everybody else’s?” Naja asked Chiasa, as she also began leaning on Akemi’s shoulder.
“I like to keep my hands free,” Chiasa said patiently. “And we are women. Sometimes we don’t want everyone to know what we are carrying in our pockets.”
“I have a quarter,” Naja said, pulling it out from her jeans pocket. “No one knew I had it in my pocket.”
“True,” Chiasa said. “But, a quarter is a small coin. A bigger item might make an impression in the pocket. Then, some stranger could tell what it is.”
“Then you should carry a pocketbook like Akemi. Her pocketbooks are beautiful, and she has a different one for every dress or outfit she wears and even matches them with her pretty shoes,” Naja said, with one hand on her hip now.
Chiasa could feel what Naja wanted her to feel, I could tell. Yet, Chiasa was calm and cool and much more clever than my little sister, of course. “Naja, do you know any other little girl who is just like you?” she asked.
“Not exactly,” Naja said.
“Probably not even close, right?”
“Nope,” Naja said proudly.
“Right, because every girl and every woman is unique. There must be some things about you, Naja, that are special. Things that you like, or things that you do a certain way, or things that you say, that are unlike what anyone else likes or does or says? You do these things your way, not because you are a girl, but because you are Naja!” Chiasa said excitedly. Naja was thinking. For once she did not have the swift comeback. Seconds later she came up with something.
“At school, all of us girls dress the same way every day. We all speak in English, while we are each learning to speak Arabic better and better every day. We have the same classes all together. So I don’t know,” Naja admitted.
“Maybe we should find out,” Chiasa said.
“Find out what?”
“Find out exactly what makes Naja special, different and unique, from others.”
“Maybe,” Naja said. She paused, then she blurted out to Chiasa, “But don’t you think that you are a little too special? I mean, you don’t eat lamb. Everybody else does. Even girls in my school who come from other places like Saudi Arabia and Malaysia and Nigeria all eat lamb! You don’t eat beef . . .”
Chiasa interrupted her. “I don’t eat any four-legged animals.” Chiasa condensed it to stop Naja from listing all of the animals in the animal kingdom.
“That’s strange . . . and every other day instead of eating three meals like everybody else, you only drink juices that only you have to make in your loud juicer. And you eat onions the same like they were apples—nobody in the whole world does that. You put coconut oil or olive oil on your skin instead of lotion like all of the ladies do. I saw you soaking your feet in cranberry juice and almost had a heart attack. I thought you were bleeding to death.” Naja inhaled.
“I see you have really been watching me!” Chiasa smiled.
“And you read boring books. You should buy some new ones,” Naja criticized.
“I read the books that I like to read. Books that teach me something that I don’t already know about,” Chiasa said softly. I was surprised she didn’t lose the slightest bit of her cool. She’s very sensitive about her books.
“And humans have two legs. Do you eat humans?” Naja asked sarcastically.
* * *
Later that night, after I delivered the clothes I had inventoried and packed tightly in two duffels to go overseas, I went straight up to the second floor to my first wife’s bedroom. Quietly, I pushed her door open and looked inside, only to see Naja lying there on Akemi’s stomach. Akemi’s blouse was open. Naja’s eyes were closed. Akemi placed one finger over her pretty lips as if to say Naja is asleep. I stepped right in and lifted my little sister and carried her to her own bedroom. I knew she was pretending. I could see her little eyeballs moving around beneath her closed eyelids. I laid her on her bed, her face landing softly on her pillow. As I walked out hitting the switch to turn the lights off, Naja began chattering again.
“Wait! I have two great reasons why you should love Akemi more.” She sprung up to the sitting position.
“Good night, Naja,” I said, closing the door.
“Please listen!” she said with enthusiastic desperation. I stood in the almost shut door not because I wanted to hear what she had to say, but because I did not want to hurt her little feelings even though I thought she was heading down a wrong path.
“One, remember when we first came to see this house? Like before you and Umma even bought it?” Naja asked.
“Of course,” I said.
“Then you’ll agree that it was a really stinky, messy place. Akemi changed this whole house and made it the most beautiful home. Not only her bedroom but every room. She even painted the whole Fatiha on our living room wall. How come she could make the Arabic letters look so perfect when she can’t even speak or write in Arabic at all?” Naja asked innocently.
“No one has to convince me about my wife. I chose her. I married her. I love her. Good night, Naja,” I said solemnly.
“And Akemi has three hearts!” Naja whispered loudly and quickly, holding her three fingers in the air and waving them.
“Three hearts?” I repeated.
“Yes, I had my face on her tummy. Her skin is so soft. I heard the babies’ hearts. They’re twins. That’s two. And I heard Akemi’s heart beating also. That’s three.”
I stood in the hallway with her bedroom door now all the way shut. I felt a little tight and a low-grade anger was building up in me. My head had been business all day and all evening, and business was real good. So, I didn’t know why I felt stuck the way I did right then.
I could see the light glowing from beneath Umma’s door. “Umma.” I knocked lightly just in case she had fallen into sleep. When I heard her reply, I pushed her door open halfway. “About Naja,” I said.
>
“I know,” Umma said. “I know my daughter has been stirring up a storm in our home. Step in, I can see you have a question.” Umma smiled and patted her bedspread inviting me to sit. Amazed, I loved the way she could possibly know the details of my thoughts and feelings before I expressed them.
Umma’s bedroom was how I imagined an exclusive spa or club would be, although I had never been to a spa. But people seem to go there to relax, looking for a clean, good-smelling place to unwind and get massaged. Three walls, only one with a window, in Umma’s room were lined with long, sheer, peach-colored curtains, which she kept open or closed based on her feeling. The moon pouring through the peach fabric would cast beams of colored light, creating the illusion of stars indoors. The fourth wall had wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling decorative wooden racks that held twenty test-tube-size designer glass vials in a row, and twenty shelves of rows of elixirs of perfumes, and oils and treatments that we packaged and sold. The natural scents created a scent that was pleasing and clean when you inhaled. She did not have or want a television, opting for a radio, which she had set on her favorite stations. The satin summer quilt that she made, and pillows from an array of fabrics, made her bed seem incredibly comfortable. Rather than get lost in Umma’s atmosphere, her warm smile, or my admiration for her, I opted to sit on her floor and listen carefully to whatever advice she could offer.
“Do you think it matters if a man loves his wives fifty-fifty or not?” I asked her. She paused in thought.
“Fifty-fifty,” she said with a soft confidence, “or any definite percentage would be impossible, I believe. And a fifty-fifty portion of your true love to each of your wives is not required in Islam. It is only required that a man treat them fairly. Because of course, the heart and love itself cannot be controlled or legislated by anyone else. Allah created each of us that way. Even you yourself cannot demand that your own heart obey you. You can want it to. You can ask it to, but in the end, the heart feels as it feels and does as it does,” she said softly, and then smiled like she somehow could see directly into my thoughts, feelings, and concerns.