She begins methodically stripping cilantro leaves from their stems. “My Zar should have never let this go on for as long as we did.” She pauses. “I shouldn’t have.”
Leaning against the side of the refrigerator, I think of all the parties I missed. Theirs and mine. I haven’t had a birthday party with my full Zar since the year after Jenny died.
“Then again,” she says, “I haven’t been able to force you to do anything in years.”
As I wiggle my wrist, the bangle bounces against my skin. Except for this.
She gathers the cilantro leaves into a neat pile. “I thought it’d be better if you came around on your own. All of you. But Laila will be sixteen soon, and your Zar will become official. You girls need to cement your bond now. Besides, there’s a lot you can learn from them.”
I turn the oven on from across the room. “I’ve got this.”
“I wasn’t referring to magic,” she says curtly. “But fine, if you’re already an expert on what you can do, what about the things you can’t do? Crystal clear on those, I assume?”
Having grown up in a house where meals cook themselves, high heels pop out of nowhere, and walls swap paint colors in an instant, the list of things we can’t do is short.
“I can’t grant a wish for a human not assigned to me by the Afrit.” I repeat what I learned practically at birth.
From here, I have a perfect view of the Carwyns’ garage out our living room window.
“I can’t heal humans.” A lump finds its way to my throat. “And I can’t bring someone back from the dead.” I repeat what I learned when I was nine.
My mother’s face falls, but I keep going. “We live here. Alone. While—”
In an instant, she’s at my side. The scent of cilantro clinging to her combined with the way she strokes my back causes the lump in my throat to swell. I fight back the water my tear ducts are conjuring without my permission.
“I get it, Azra,” she says gently. “The Afrit’s rules stink. But you can dislike what you have to do without disliking who you are. And who they are. Your sisters. It’s precisely the restrictions the Afrit have placed on us that make your Zar sisters that much more important. They fill the hole.”
My face grows hot, and my teeth clench. The hole? Try holes, plural. Like the hole left when I had to stop befriending humans because my lies about the nine fireplaces and perpetually blooming backyard lilacs were no longer cutting it. Like the hole left by the Jinn father I’ve never met. Like the hole left by Jenny.
My mother’s Zar sisters may be enough for her, but the Jinn girls who will make up my Zar have a heck of a crater to fill.
My mother squeezes my shoulder. “You need them, kiddo. Learning to access your magic is only part of granting wishes. There’s a lot more to becoming Jinn.”
Swallowing the fight rising up in my throat, I force myself to say the one thing I’ve wanted to say since I woke up this morning. “And I … I have to, right?”
Though she manages a weak smile, the creases around my mother’s eyes show her exhaustion. Whether she’s tired or just tired of me is unclear.
“Look, Azra, here’s the thing. This may not be the life you want, but it’s the only one you’ve got. Making the best of it, not the worst, is up to you, but it’s a long road to take all by yourself. Life is compromise, after all.”
Compromise? Really? That’s what becoming Jinn is?
My knuckles turn white as I ball my hands into fists. Without a word, I peel out of the kitchen and march toward the stairs. Until the bangle taps against my leg, I forget I don’t need the stairs anymore.
I app myself to my room, relishing the internal burn as I collapse on top of my white comforter. I flick the bangle with one finger, letting it ride circles around my wrist.
Compromise suggests a concession on each side. But we’re the ones who have to give up everything. We live without the rest of our families, in our little Zar enclaves, churning out the next generation of Jinn. Being able to conjure chocolate truffles doesn’t make up for that.
My mother doesn’t understand. She can’t understand. Yes, the same restrictions apply for her, but that wasn’t always the case. She grew up with her mother and her father. She had male Jinn in her life, even … even my father. It wasn’t until around the time I was born that the Afrit ordered all male Jinn to leave the human world. Even if she only had my father for a short time, it’s more than I’ve had.
I bury my head under my pillow until the smell of browning chicken wafts through my open door. I sit up. My mother’s cooking without magic for me. She’s trying. My birthday present, the purple shirt neatly folded on my dresser, further chastens me. I know she’s trying.
And the truth is, unless we want to bring the wrath of the Afrit down on us, neither one of us has a choice. On this long road, all we really have is each other.
Mr. Gemp materializes out of thin air on my nightstand.
I swear, sometimes it’s as if my mother can read my mind. Because we don’t just have each other. We also have our Zar sisters. At least we’re supposed to.
Open. Close. Open. Close.
I toggle the lid, but nothing escapes in a cloud of blue smoke. I pick up the lamp to move it to my bookshelf and notice the top isn’t fully closed. Something’s caught in the hinge. Not a magical genie—at least not yet.
Rolled up inside the lantern is a photograph of six tween Jinn. Along with our shiny hair and penchant for sugar, we inherited our closest Zar relationships from our mothers: me and Laila; Mina and Farrah; Hana and Yasmin. I always thought Hana got the raw end of that deal. Which everyone else must think of Laila.