Interrogation Room 38

Roya Azadi

WHEN I SAW the flight attendants rushing up the aisle, I had a terrible feeling in my throat. I knew that we would not be going home. Afshin had been stopped and interrogated before for much less. His history would not help us. I knew that we would have to explain ourselves in a room like this.

Today

THE ROOM WAS cold and sterile, like a doctor’s office. A Customs and Border Protection officer had escorted us past security, past the long lines and luggage carousels, and told us to sit and wait until our names were called. I was surprised to see so many other people in this waiting area: families, solo travelers, even a little boy who seemed to be by himself. Everyone looked nervous. Some of the families were chatting quietly.

When the officer walked away, Soraya took out her phone and started recording.

“Soraya, put that away,” my mom said, swatting at her hand.

“This is unfair,” Soraya said, yanking the phone away. She was recording a video. “What you see here is a Muslim family, being held against their own will—”

“Soraya!”

“Ma’am, you must turn off your cell phone in this room,” barked a female officer standing against one of the walls.

My mom snatched the phone out of Soraya’s hand and put it in her purse. She let out an exhausted sob.

“This is all my fault,” I whispered. My mouth was dry. “I don’t know what got into me. I just—”

“Amir, not now,” my mom said.

Soraya rolled her eyes. “It’s never a good time, is it?”

“Soraya—”

“Amir shouldn’t have snapped on the airplane,” Soraya said, cutting my mom off. “That was a mistake. But that was his only mistake. The only one.”

Soraya glared at my parents. Then she reached over my mom and held my hand.

We sat there waiting for five, ten, fifteen minutes. My dad and I were sitting on opposite ends, with Soraya and my mom between us.

At the seventeen-minute mark, the officer announced she was leaving the room and that she’d be back momentarily. When she left, I heard my dad say something in a hushed tone. I thought he was talking to Soraya, but then she tapped my arm and he said it again.

“Two times two,” he said.

I couldn’t believe it. Multiplication tables. It’s what we used to do when I was a kid at the doctor’s office.

I shook my head.

“Two times two,” he said again.

“Four.”

“Three times three.”

“Nine.”

But I didn’t want to be that kid anymore. I didn’t want to be my parents’ baby forever, cute and innocent and harmless. I didn’t want to be their toddler, the one who tripped and hiccupped and made everyone laugh.

I’m eighteen years old now. I’m practically an adult. I love my parents; I realize that now more than ever. I will always love them, and I will always be their son. But I have to be my own person, too.