Strings - Capstone Amal Al Shamsi (1)

Some days later, she came home after school and must have asked her mother to take her
for a haircut. Hamza had returned from a day of sitting still at work. He picked up his daughter’s
scooter from the grass and walked to the front door, calling out to her.
Lamya smiled from the couch before walking over, taking the scooter from him. “Tell her
it looks nice.”
“Huh?”
Hamza walked over to his room where Haya was collecting pens from his desk. Her hair
stopped below her ears, not much longer than his own. He thought she looked nice, although he
couldn’t imagine thinking otherwise.
“Let’s go play?” he asked her.
He let her choose their path, the scooter wheels bumped over the rocks as she skidded
along. Every time they stopped to take a break, he watched her move a hand to the top of her
head. He felt the same way when he shaved his head, those couple of times, trying to get used to
the sliver of weight that wasn’t there anymore.
She had been too tired to ride home, he held the scooter in the crook of his arm, carrying
her on his back, still unbound by age.
“Why did you choose the rocky path?” Hamza asked, chuckling as she shifted her ankles
away from the scooter as it shifted in his grip. “You are always too tired after.”
“I’m not tired,” she said. She thought for a while, or maybe just stayed quiet. “On the
smooth part, I’m always too fast for you. It’s boring to just wait.”
Hamza laughed some more. “I just let you catch your breath, that’s all.”
Haya hung her head to the side, Hamza shifted his weight to keep balanced. “Do you like
my hair?”
“Obviously,” he said.
That night, he heard her crying in bed. She said she hated her hair. Hamza heard her
mother talk softly to her. Lamya came back to their room with a strange expression.
He made an extra effort to kiss Haya’s head each morning. It was a weird gesture, felt in
reverse. He felt she was mad at him ever since, somewhere beneath it all. Her brother shared a
similar look, but it was harder to hide in an embrace.
89