Applause. I hear applause. Firuzeh and Liv embrace me. I am crying. Bahadur squats beside my supine body, crying too. Beck is covered in sweat. He tosses the punch mitts and extends a hand to help me up. I stand. I hold Beck and continue bawling, fully trusting. Fully in my body.
Firuzeh looks at me and ceremoniously rolls up the sleeve of her T-shirt. I tearfully do the same. We touch shoulders. Liv, Beck and Bahadur join in, rolling up the sleeves of their shirts and touching deltoids. A circle. Joy.
As the days pass, our drills become more graceful, become muscle memory. Some days Beck holds us each at the waist, guiding us sideways as we shoot three targets using an AR-15. Some days Liv has us practise loading ammunition in the dark. Some days we review the plan of attack. Each day ends with us dirty, covered in dust and watching the waxing of the moon.
While we train, Bahadur and I witness another curriculum that does not include us. Every morning, Liv and Beck make their way to a clearing and practise the embodiment of their resistance, complete with corresponding movements and words said out loud:
When I do not act, I am complicit!
When I know wrong is happening, I act!
When the oppressed tell me I am wrong, I open my heart and change!
When change is led by the oppressed, I move aside and uplift!
And each morning, Bahadur and I have followed them to the clearing, overwhelmed with curiosity. At first, we experienced the same discomfort we would feel when witnessing white folks taking up too much space with their guilty tears or their complete denial. Each morning we waited for the shoe to drop, for their ritual to suddenly become performative. It was obvious to us that it had taken years for them both to arrive at this level of awareness, because their chants were said in a whisper, their movements delivered with authenticity. There was something about their efforts having nothing to do with us, that their unlearning and undoing was not leaning on our labour of explanation nor our praise, that made this a ritual for us too. It forced Bahadur and me into a place of ease, of witnessing, of relaxing while folks processed their allyship. It felt foreign to us to not have to bear this burden. Foreign and delicious. It became our daily morning event, without Liv or Beck even knowing of our presence.
One morning, Bahadur and I watched Hanna make her way to Beck and Liv in the clearing.
“Where are you going?” shouted Peter from inside the house.
Without turning, Hanna shouted back, “Where does it look like I’m going? I’m off to spend some time with our son!”
Once she got to the clearing, she stood with her cane bearing her weight and asked questions.
“So, you do this every day?”
“Yes, Mom.” Beck wiped sweat from his brow.
“But why every day?”
“Because we have to unlearn every day.” Beck went down on his haunches and retied the shoelaces on his combat boots. He looked back at his mother, whose face was twisted in confusion.
Liv chimed in, hoping to clarify things. “Oppressing others is learned from the minute we’re born, Hanna. It’s like trying to sink a beach ball in the water. It pops up every now and then, whether we want it to or not.”
“And when it pops up, we either pretend it’s not there or we ask oppressed people to help us keep it down or we ask them to praise us for sinking it.” Beck tentatively held his mother’s hand. Hanna shuddered at his touch. Her face and neck were red. “For me, the most challenging part is not crying. It’s hard to not feel shame, to not feel guilty for having this much privilege. But shame or guilt doesn’t help anyone.”
The rest of the day unfolded with Hanna unable to look us in the eyes. Over dinner, she quietly crunched away at crackers, her eyes focused on some unknown point on the horizon. When she rose from the table to leave, the crumbs that had gathered at her waist fell to the floor, and she absentmindedly wandered back into her bedroom for the night.
“I’m really sorry you have to watch my mom struggle through all this,” Beck said awkwardly once she was out of earshot.
“No, no. We’re all accustomed to this type of discomfort,” said Firuzeh, smiling eyes meeting mine, then Bahadur’s.
Miraculously, Hanna returned to the clearing the next day. Her eyes were swollen from crying.
“When are you making breakfast, Hanna?” Peter called from the house.
“You’re perfectly capable of opening a can of cocktail wieners,” she answered as she made her way to the clearing.
“Hi, Mom. Are you ready?” Hanna nodded wearily. She proceeded to learn the set of movements and the set of chants and adjusted them to suit her level of mobility.
Some days, she argued with Liv, her left hand flapping in the air as if to dispel any of Liv’s truth into the ether of their collective shame. “I gave them all a place to stay, didn’t I?”
During these times, Liv would hold her palms up as if to calm a wild animal she had cornered with truth. “Yes, you did give them a place to stay. But we need to dig deeper than that. What makes us believe we are better than them, that we are entitled to certain privileges? That’s what has led us here.”
Hanna would storm off, pushing past branches and brush towards the house. On these difficult days, she would intercept me in the hallway of the farmhouse and say, “I’m a good person!” then make her way to her room to cry some more. I would force my arms to my side, willing myself not to assist her in her process. I have done enough of that in my lifetime.
Some days, Hanna would change her tactics. “Why do you and Liv need to lead this fight?! Why can’t we leave this uprising to them?”
“It’s different, Mom.” Beck would hold his mother’s shoulders and stare deep into her eyes. “We’re not leading it. What we’re doing has been planned by activists who have fought their entire lives just to live, to work, to love. Everything, from what we’re saying in our chant to how we’re moving when we say that chant, has been guided by them. They have done that work. And believe me, Mom. They had to do a lot of work on me to get me where I am now. I will continue to do that work, on myself and those around me, for the rest of my life. And you know what? It feels good. It feels good to wake up and stop pretending. It feels good not to be afraid, not to set myself apart, not to defend what wasn’t mine in the first place.”
Hanna looked around helplessly. “But why my son? Why do you have to fight? What if you die? What will happen then?! You might not have a life to live!” She attempted to embrace Beck to soften his approach, but he held firm.
“Mom, I need you to understand that, for me, even having a choice to fight is a gift. People right now are being raped, killed, taken away from their children, being forced into workhouses. I will not let that continue. I choose to fight.”
Hanna shook her head wildly to keep Beck’s words from sticking. “Not my son! I’m not one of those evil Boots! I’m a good person!”
Liv had had enough. She approached Hanna until they were face to face, Liv’s glare demanding connection, willing eye contact.
“Look at me right now, Hanna. I don’t give a shit if you think you’re a good person.” Liv was seething. Bahadur and I looked at each other with mouths agape. I turned back to the trio, wondering if this exchange would transform from peaceful conversation to a rowdy episode of the Ricki Lake Show.