You Exist Too Much

by Zaina Arafat

I’d grown used to maneuvering within the lanes of her behaviors, looking to them as guidance, her innate instincts precluding me from finding my own.

Wearing my uncle’s baggy trousers, I enjoyed occupying blurred lines. Ambiguity was an unsettling yet exhilarating space.

“Maybe one day you’ll learn you can’t treat people with such disregard. Even yourself.”

Worse than anger was indifference: her approval was my compass, even when that meant resisting it.

Besides, I didn’t need a partner to feel loved: I was a DJ! I was loved from a distance, the safest way to be loved.

If my mother was Hamas—unpredictable, impulsive, and frustrated at being stifled—my father was Israel. He’d refuse to meet her most basic needs until she exploded. Then he would point at her and cry, “Look at what a monster she is, what a terror!” But never once did he consider why she had resorted to such extreme tactics, or his role in the matter.