Greg Hrbek - Not on Fire, but Burning

“Dorian.”

“Maybe get the booger off your nose.”

As soon as I reached up, he pushed the shutter button — and there wasn’t any booger there in the first place. He took another with a shit-eating grin on his face, then handed Khaleela the phone. I watched her delete the first picture; and while she was posting the second one, Omar said to me:

“I know you from somewhere. You go to Sacred Heart?”

“No.”

“You all go to Crescent?” Plaxico asked.

Omar nodded. Khaleela said no, she went to Dorothy Nolan. Plaxico told them where we went.

“You just look familiar,” Omar said. “Do I?”

“Not really.”

“I know. You were in The Wizard of Oz .”

“Huh?”

“The play. In the park last year. You were the mayor. Of the Munchkins.”

“No,” I said.

Then he called out to one of the other kids and went off in Arabic. The other one looked at me like I was suddenly in focus and nodded, and Omar took a step closer to me and said: “You do soccer last summer at East Side Rec?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s it. I knew I knew you from somewhere. Soccer. You were always doing those slide tackles—”

“Karim,” Khaleela said. “Your phone.”

He picked it up and squinted at the screen. The ringtone was set to OLD TELEPHONE, so it was going off in his hands like an alarm clock from the Great Depression, and Omar was saying, “The green, dude, touch the green ”—but I think the kid knew what to do, even if he had never gotten a call before. The way he was holding the phone and staring, he didn’t look confused. He looked scared.

Back at the internment camp, just for fun, Karim and Hazem and Yassim would sometimes communicate on the two-way radios even if they were all in the same room or walking beside each other on the street. So when a phone started ringing under the dome and the girl, who was holding her own phone, said, “Karim, your phone” (and Karim realized that his phone, left on a towel colored like an American flag, was the one ringing), he thought for a moment that it must be her calling him. Then he picked up the device and saw the screen. And everything around him — the pool and its pristine water; the face on the inflatable raft smiling idiotically at heaven; the suburban children in their swim-clothes — all these things seemed to disappear, as if they’d only been aspects of a mirage; while the face on the screen, with its thorny beard and eyes glowing red from camera-flash, was the one and only thing that was undeniably real. The name above the photo, the name was wrong, not the one they called him by in Dakota. But the photo. No doubt about it: It was him.

“Touch the green , dude.”

Karim moves away from the invited guests. Toward the steps that lead to the ground. The ringing. Like a command shouted again and again. Answer me, answer me. It is impossible to disobey.

Touch the green .

Whereupon the picture on the screen will change to a different picture of the same person, this one moving and speaking:

“Abdelkarim Hassad. May peace be upon you.”

“Sheikh, I—”

“Karim, greet me properly.”

“Na’am. Aasif. And peace upon you, as well as God’s mercy and blessings.”

“Now, then. Tell me. Are you enjoying the party.”

“The what?”

“Those are your new friends I hear in the background? You’re very gregarious, Karim. Also disloyal.”

“Sheikh, I didn’t—”

“Scarcely a week and you’ve already forgotten us.”

“I haven’t.”

“Forgotten your true friendships, the family they murdered, your people, and even God Himself. Or did you simply forget the ten numbers I made quite sure you memorized before leaving?”

“No,” he answers. “I didn’t forget anything.”

“No?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Then you have purposely ignored my instructions. Instead of being a warrior for God, you want to make friends on the Internet. You would rather fraternize with infidels in a swimming pool.”

“Sheikh, only two are infidels.”

“Oh, is that all?”

“Yes, but—”

“Why didn’t you say so? Only two. Only one-third of the total number. Why not make it an even half?”

“I will call today.”

“It’s too late for that, Karim.”

The boy has walked a good ten meters away from the pool — into the shade of a hundred-year tree where the insects cry and wail like people mourning the wrongful deaths of loved ones. The boy says: “What do you mean, too late?”

“I mean that your commitment is uncertain and there can be no uncertainty.”

“I’m — I’m not uncertain.”

“Listen to yourself, Karim. It’s a shame. Your parents and your sister, they have been counting on you for the justice no one else can do. I’m sure your mother is greatly pained. That you would rather stay with worthless strangers than be with her and earn her the greatest rewards of Paradise.”

“I want to.”

“It’s not a matter of what you want. It’s not your choice — or mine. It’s God’s choice. God chooses his martyrs. Only God can bestow the honor of martyrdom. He alone bestows the honor or takes it away.”

“Sheikh—”

“I’m sorry, Karim. Enjoy your party. I’m sure the water in the pool is refreshing.”

“Sheikh, wait.”

“And one other thing. About your Lifebook account. I recommend a privacy setting. It won’t keep Satan away. But the Internet is full of lesser devils. Beware of them, Karim. Masalama. And good luck.”

Back at the pool, in his absence, they are talking while Dorian and Plaxico listen silently on the periphery.

“What a fuckin freak.”

“Don’t say that,” Khaleela says.

“Well, he is , isn’t he?”

“And what do you think you’d be like?”

“Yeah, that place,” Tarriq says.

Omar says: “What about it?”

“No phones allowed and it’s totally dark — I mean, what if you were never online.”

“I’d be a fuckin freak.”

“He’s trying to get used to things,” Khaleela says.

“What’s the score?”

Joey (looking at his phone): “Still one — zero.”

“I can’t believe we’re missing this match.”

“What match,” Plaxico asks.

“Baghdad United, who else. You like Islamic League?”

“Not really.”

“Figures. But your friend likes to slide tackle.”

“That wasn’t me,” Dorian says.

“Who do you think he’s talking to anyway?”

“Yeah, who would call him?”

“Not his mom,” Tarriq says.

“ What ?” Khaleela says.

“What …”

“Is that, like, supposed to be funny?”

“No, I’m just saying.”

“You three are assholes.”

“Me?” Joey says.

“All of you.”

“I didn’t say any thing.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Well—” (pointing to Dorian and Plaxico) “—what about them ?”

“What about them,” Khaleela says.

“They’re not saying anything either.”

“Yeah,” Omar agrees. “Say something.”

“We hardly know him,” Plaxico says.

“You two are real tolerant.”

“I guess.”

“I doubt it. But what you wouldn’t get anyway is that people like him are bad for us.”

“I thought you were all Muslim,” Dorian says.

“Yeah,” says Khaleela.

“You mean, like, Sunni and Shia,” Plaxico says.

“No, I don’t mean Sunni and Shia.”

“Then what.”

“Look, dude, they never should of let them out — it’ll just make it harder for the rest of us.”

“Shut up,” Khaleela says. “He’s coming back.”

“You shut up.”