One Half from the East by Nadia Hashimi

will not turn white with my classmates staring at my back. I can climb trees and hang upside down, letting the blood rush to my head.
    To my cousins, my neighbors, my aunts and uncles, I am Obayd. I want to be nothing else.
    â€œOf course, Rahim. Why are you even asking? What else is there to be?”
    Rahim doesn’t look at me. He kicks at the ground.
    â€œThere’s nothing else to be. Not for me. I only want to be what I am now.”
    â€œHonestly, Rahim. I can’t picture you as anything else.”
    My comment makes him happy. I wonder if he’s talking about this stuff because of what my mother said—about us being one half from the east and one half from the west. I really didn’t think she meant anything bad by it.
    â€œNeither can I. But I don’t know if everyone would agree with us. Other boys like us have to change. I’ve heard it’s bad.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œThey say we’re not supposed to stay like this forever. They say we’re supposed to be girls again. Before we get too old. I heard my mother talking to my aunt about it.My mother said she’s heard some boys like us don’t know what to do when they’re changed back. They get confused and act really weird. I don’t like the sound of that, so I’ve been thinking about it, and last night I had an idea.”
    â€œI’m not confused, and I don’t think you are either,” I snap at him, ignoring the fact that he had an idea. I wish he hadn’t brought up what might happen when kids like us are changed back.
    But we both turn quiet, wondering if I’m right or if we would even be able to see this in ourselves. I don’t think my head is scrambled. And, although he may be a bit smug at times, I’m pretty sure Rahim’s head is fine too. We’ve spent mornings, afternoons, and evenings together, believing that what we are is the most normal thing there is. We know we’re smarter than the boys and stronger than the girls. It’s not something we say in words. It’s something we say in the way we pat each other on the back or laugh when one of the boys fumbles playing soccer. It’s in the look Rahim shoots me when we run past a group of girls trying to keep the wind from blowing their head scarves away. It’s in the way we take our time going home after school, knowing we don’t have to rush. While boys play in one courtyard and girls play in another, Rahim and I skip along the imaginary high wall that divides them, closer to the sky than anyone else. We are untouchable.
    â€œI don’t feel messed up at all,” Rahim says confidently. “But I can promise you this—if someone tries to tell me I’m a girl, I’ll be so angry that I’ll mess him up in the head.”
    And that’s why I love Rahim.
    â€œI’d like to see that!”
    â€œConsider yourself invited, my friend.”
    I start to wonder how we wound up here, Rahim inviting me to the match between my best friend and the imaginary person who dares to call him a girl (even though he is one). When I remember, I become curious.
    â€œWait, you said you had an idea. What was it?”
    Rahim juts his chin out and beams.
    â€œYou want to know, don’t you?”
    â€œSure, why not?”
    â€œI remember my mother telling us about a legend once—about Rostam’s bow. The legend says that passing under a rainbow changes boys to girls and girls to boys. Even if a pregnant woman walks under the rainbow, the baby in her belly changes.”
    This sounds vaguely familiar. I bet my grandparents told me this story when I was little.
    â€œI think we should do it,” Rahim whispers.
    â€œDo what? Pass under a rainbow?”
    â€œIt’s easier than passing over one.”
    â€œYou’re serious.”
    â€œI am. I want to go under the rainbow and be changedforever. I don’t want this to be temporary. Do