Page 95 - A Woman Is No Man

their cards made as they swiped them through the metal barricades. There
was a glass booth at the back of the platform, with a man slumped behind
the counter. Deya approached him.

“Excuse me, sir.” She pressed the business card against the glass. “Can
you tell me how to get to this address?”
“Broadway?” His eyes shot to the top of his head. “Take the R train.
Manhattan bound.”
She blinked at him.
“Take the R train,” he said again, slower. “Uptown toward Forest Hills–
Seventy-First Avenue. Get off at Fourteenth Street–Union Square Station.”

R train. Uptown. Union Square Station. She memorized the words.
“Thank you,” she said, reaching inside her pocket for a bundle of one-
dollar bills. “And how much is a train ticket?”
“Round trip?”
She sounded out the unfamiliar combination of words. “Round trip?”
“Yes.”

“I’m not sure what that means.”
“Round trip. To get to the city and back.”
“Oh.” She felt her face burn. He must think she was a fool. But it wasn’t
her fault. How was she supposed to understand American lingo? Her
grandparents had only allowed them to watch Arabic channels growing up.
“Yes,” she said. “Round trip, please.”
“Four dollars and fifty cents.”

Almost half her weekly allowance! She slipped the warm bills through
the glass. Luckily, she saved most of her vending-machine money. She only
spent it on books, which she bought from yard sales, school catalogs, even
off her classmates, who’d become accustomed to selling her their used
novels over the years. She knew they felt sorry for her because she didn’t
have a normal family.

There was a loud rumble in the distance. Startled, she grabbed the
mustard-yellow subway card and hurried toward the metal poles. Another
rumble, more aggressive this time. From the sudden movement around her,
Deya realized the sounds were coming from the trains, and that people were
rushing to catch them. She hurried along with them, mimicking their ease,
swiping her card through the metal groove in one smooth motion. When the
card didn’t register, she swiped it again, more carefully this time. Beep. It

worked! She pushed through the turnstile.