Short Story: Hijab
The figures had themselves dressed skimpily
in underwear and bras with no coverings to hide themselves from public view.
The store name was even less subtle with the words ‘Victoria’s Secret’ hanging
proudly above the entrance.
“I’ll be just a minute”
Her voice trailed off as she entered the store
and left him alone outside. He could not be seen entering that store, let alone
entering the store with his mum. James could already hear the chants at school
‘Pervert in room 7’. He couldn’t be labelled in such a way. Instead, James
decided on the best course of action: Take a few steps away from the entrance
and sit down on the public bench, that was luckily, human-being free – he hated
sitting next to strangers.
He pulled out his phone but at 15% battery
and who knows how long his mum was going to continue shopping for, he couldn’t
risk using his phone right now. For the first time in years, James sat down,
slowed down and observed the world that he lived in – especially the
approaching woman, clad in black.
Her black scarf wrapped itself nice and
snug around her head, flowing over the long dark dress that hid almost all
trace of her skin. It draped itself over her extremities and in the midst of
the busy holiday shopping she stood out; a black silhouette against white. She
both mesmerised and annoyed James’ for he looked at her with glaring eyes,
almost as if he was a baby exposed to the strange world around him.
The way she composed herself irked him. She
shrugged her shoulders forth but she was not of old age and she always avoided
making eye contact with anybody, her head down as she waded through the
oncoming wave. James continued monitoring her as she tensed herself anytime
someone would walk past her, the handbag slowly moving closer and closer to her
body. She was nervous, he could tell. It appeared as a suspicious sort of
nervous; James knew she had something to hide. He knew he couldn’t trust any of
these jihadist extremists; they had no love for Australia, nor did they try to
integrate with society, keeping to their sharia law and their sexist ways – he
strongly believed that women should not wear the degrading and sexist hijab. The
news had made it clear and simple to him from the start, those Muslims could
not be trusted.
A balding man had followed her this entire
time but it was only now that James’ had seen him. His face was red with anger
and the words that billowed out even created fear in James’ mind. “Go back to
where you came from, you immigrant! No one wants you here and no one wants you
to force your laws and ways of life on us! Be a part of Team Australia, or get
out of our country, do not bring your problems here, you terrorist!”
He continued berating her, the crowd
dispersing around her like a ripple through water. James’ felt uncomfortable.
He wasn’t sure whether it was the hard wooden bench, or the mixed feelings that
he experienced. He agreed with everything the man said but he wasn’t sure that
she deserved this much punishment. This man was a rabid animal on the loose and
there was no plugging the sinkhole of foul language. Was this what people were
really like?
She tried to move away from the bewildered
man, speeding up her pace, her glance still on the ground. This just seemed to
anger him even more. “OI! LISTEN TO ME YOU BI-“
His sentence was stopped short as the
ear-splitting sound of her dress sliced straight through the growing tension,
smothering all sounds in the distance. It was silent. It was unnerving.
Everyone was frozen. Nobody was moving. James could only hear his heartbeat,
now pumping adrenaline through his body. He was frozen too, though, his hands
clasping to the edge of his seat. He wasn’t sure whether to run to her and
defend this defenceless woman or to sit back and let it play out, for this was
not his business – none of the adults had intervened, so why should he? He was
frozen by choice.
As people began moving again, brushing off
what they had just seen, the man whose head had shone with range disappeared
quietly into the background. She was relieved but she was lost for words.
James’ watched as her hands she uncontrollably as they reached out, grabbing
for the torn bag that had been pulled off with part of the dress. She looked
shattered, vulnerable and disappointed. James’ knew he would be too in her position,
in fact in his own position, he hated himself. He could not get up, he could
not speak, all he could to be think but thinking did nothing in this situation.
His nails had dug deep into the wooden panels of the bench, permanent marks
forming through the fibres. His own beliefs were cracked ‘could they really be
that bad?’
A boy appeared in his line of view; he
could be no more than 10. He walked right up to this woman, now collecting what
had fallen out her handbag, tears drying on her face and he dropped what had
rolled to his feet – It was just in time too, as the adults ignored her silent
pleas for help and feigned ignorance in search of bliss, almost trampling over
all that was lost. He dared to hug her, he dared to speak to her, and he dared
to intervene. James’ face was as red as the man’s but it wasn’t with anger, it
was with shame. He feared peer judgement, he feared associating with the enemy
but he didn’t realise his biggest judge was himself. He had to look away. He
couldn’t believe his lack of courage, his fear of judgement and his intolerance
to pleas of aid. This young child was more of a man than he was.
“So where to next”
His mum’s voice broke his concentration. He
looked back at the store and saw her squatting down, picking up the receipt she
just dropped. He stood up quickly and ran to help her pick it up.
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