Page 93 of Where There's Smoke

Ranya droppedher carry-on bag at her feet and sat in one of the fake leather chairs with a huff.

“Security hassle you again?” I asked.

She nodded, cursing under her breath as she took out her phone. “Motherfuckers. You’d think they’d never seen a brown person in their fucking lives.”

“People are idiots,” I said.

“All of them.” She looked at something on her phone’s screen, then dropped it on top of her bag. “It’s fucking roulette when I fly. Sometimes they just give me the evil eye, and sometimes…” She grumbled something I didn’t understand, possibly in her native tongue, and shook her head before adding, “Glad to know all the trouble I went to for my citizenship was worth it.”

I drummed my fingers on the edge of my notebook. “Our options are a little limited, but maybe we can try scheduling things so we’re doing more driving than flying. You know, a little less going to San Diego one day and the Bay Area the next.”

Ranya waved a hand and shook her head again. “Don’t worry about it. I can deal with it. It’s just, you know, aggravating.”

“I can only imagine.”

She sighed. “What can you do? I have to fly sometimes. Maybe sooner or later these idiots will stop fucking with everyone who had the audacity to be born in certain parts of the world.”

“You have more faith in humanity than I do,” I muttered.

She looked at me. “People can change.”

“They can. My lack of faith stems from how infrequently they do so.”

“Pessimist.”

“I am. Always will be.”

“Why is that?”

“I’ve spent my whole life hiding part of who I am because other people can’t deal with it,” I said. “And dealing with the fallout if they find out. After a while, it’s hard to have much faith in people’s willingness to change, you know?”

“And I’ve spent the last decade or so not beingableto hide who I am.” Her bracelets jingled as she gestured at her face. “Or rather, not being able to hide who people think I am.”

“With all the hassle you put up with, I’m surprised you’re not more jaded or bitter.”

She shrugged. “Maybe I’m just an eternal optimist. I mean, nine times out of ten, when I fly, people give me the hairy eyeball, pick through my luggage,and stop just short of a body cavity search. It’s almost impossible for me to get through airport security without feeling violated on some level.” She took a breath and leaned back against the seat, draping her arm over the back of the next one. “But once in a while, someone scans my ticket, looks at me, goes through all the same motions they do with everyone else, and then they let me go…just like everyone else. It doesn’t seem like much to other people, and it doesn’t happen very often, but it does happen. And I guess it makes me think there’s hope that things will change for the better.” She shook her head and laughed. As she combed a hand through her black hair, she said, “Like I said, I guess I’m just an eternal optimist.”

I rested my ankle on my opposite knee and tapped my fingers on my shoe. “I don’t know. I guess I can understand that. I could probably be accused of being the eternal pessimist, so…”

She laughed softly. “I guess we balance out. A fucked-up yin and yang.”

I chuckled. “That’s one way to look at it.”

Her laugh turned into a mischievous snicker. “We can be like the devil and angel on Jesse’s shoulders.”

“Oh sure. And tell me, who would be the devil and who would be the angel?”

“Something tells me you’d be the devil.”

“Me?” I put a hand to my chest and scoffed. “My dear, you are mistaken. I am a paradigm of innocence and virtue.”

Ranya snorted and burst out laughing. “Right. Like I believethat.”

“What? Why wouldn’t you believe me?”

“Because Jess—” She caught herself and glanced around. Lowering her voice, she said, “Becausesomeonelikes you just a little too much for you to be anything close to innocent or virtuous.”

I laughed. “You know him too well, don’t you?”

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