I held out my hands, miming writing, my head cocked at a forty-five-degree angle. The older sister nodded, Yes, you write it down. The younger sister stared at her lap, stonily. I moved over one seat.
The forms were written in Arabic, then French, then English. It took fifteen minutes of stilted translation and signage just to get to the part that asked the reason for the visit that day.
“My daughter,” the older sister said, and it took me a second to realize they were not, in fact, sisters. “She has go to the well. Three men have hurt her. We have seen doctor so she has not pregnant.”
My father mumbled, three seats away, “Dear God.”
I glanced at the daughter, who was still staring at her lap, her jaw clenched furiously.
“Rape?” I asked in a whisper. “Do you mean she was raped?”
“We have seen the doctor.”
“I’m sorry. You have already seen the doctor?”
The woman nodded, both frantic and frustrated, misunderstanding me the way I misunderstood her. Later, I would learn that the English use of the present perfect tense is confusing for Arabic speakers. Many rely on the present perfect to describe things that have either already happened or have not yet happened. In this case, the girl had already walked to the well for water, had already been raped by three men. Seeing the doctor, preventing pregnancy, that was what needed to happen next.
Kelly didn’t have to wait to be seen by the doctor, and all that was wrong with her was gross taste in men. I went up with the mother to deliver the forms to the French nurse, explained the situation in English, as though it would be more harrowing in English, more likely to spur urgent action. But the pair was still sitting there when we left an hour later, Kelly with a clean bill of health (it was too early for her pregnancy test to come back positive). I remember thinking in the taxi ride back to the hotel, The world everywhere cares more about girls like Kelly than they do girls like that.
So really, I’m not selfless at all. I’ve dedicated myself to a cause that feels entirely self-serving: helping girls like me who are not like Kelly. It’s time we come first.
Layla makes a U-turn at the wire shelving on the far side of the warehouse. Facing us, she’s all helmet and uneasy smile. She twists the handlebars back, speeding up for less than a few yards before Kelly starts squawking.
Layla parks the bike and climbs off to overblown cheers and applause from the board, like she’s just qualified for the Olympics. She takes a slow bow and immediately turns the color of Jen’s Power juice (beets + carrots + chia) when the applause thickens. “I didn’t even max out, Mom,” she says, unhooking the helmet and pressing it into Kelly’s arms.
Seth shushes us. “Before we get too excited,” he says, “I need to show you something.”
He mounts the bike and releases the kickstand with his heel, sets his hands on the handlebars, and squeezes. The bike lurches forward violently. “Whoa!” Seth cries like a goober, bearing down on the handlebars, which only propels him faster. He comes to a dramatic stop just a few feet shy of a delivery van, looking back at us with gasping breaths.
“Most e-bikes make a rickety sound when they are at speed,” Seth says, making his way back over to us. “But they all have one thing in common. They’re silent when they’re parked, whether they’re on,” Seth flicks the switch, “or off.”
Kelly glances at me. “Is that a problem?”
“Most definitely,” Seth says. “And one that Layla demonstrated perfectly.”
“What did I do?” Layla asks, worriedly, going from feeling good about herself to despondent in a preteen second. She picks at a small pimple on her cheek. On our way out here, I listened to her narrate an Instagram story about the makeup products she used to cover up that very pimple. Instead of posting social media content that makes her peers feel as though their lives don’t measure up, Layla uses her accounts to reassure girls her age that everything they’re going through—the zits, the awkwardness, the malaise—is completely normal. That they are all in this together. She has nearly 30K followers now, and we haven’t even started filming yet.
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Seth assures her. “It’s the design that’s the problem. Since the bike sounds like it’s off when it’s been parked, it’s easy for the rider to forget to power it down. The next person who uses it grabs it, intuitively, by the hand grip.” Seth demonstrates the basic way everyone grabs the bike by its handlebars. “But because of the twist grip design, unknowingly, what the rider is doing is accelerating the bike—which is dangerous not only for the rider but for anyone who happens to be passing in front of the bike. A child, for instance. Then, because the rider is startled and off balance, the natural reaction is to do this,” Seth grips the handlebars tighter, “which only accelerates the speed.” Seth widens his stance and folds his arms across his chest. A good glitch makes Seth feel useful.
“Is there a solution to this?” Kelly asks.
Seth circles his workstation, pushes a few gadgets around, and holds up a small black lever. “Right here. This, ladies and gents,” he swivels at his waist so that everyone has a fair view, “is called a thumb grip. It attaches to the end of the handlebar, which makes it much harder to accidentally activate.”
I say, impatiently, “So attach it.”
Seth levels his chin with Kelly. “I need your sister to loosen the purse strings on the direct materials budget in order to do that.”
I turn to Kelly, my lips parted in outrage. She’s flown six of the eight board members to New York business class, but we don’t have the budget to outfit our bikes safely?
“Did you calculate the ROI with the thumb grips?” Sharon asks me.
The warehouse goes very quiet, as though it is the ninth member of the board, also awaiting my answer. It’s a brutal few moments. I feel like I’m having one of those stress dreams, a nightmare really, where you’re back in school, about to take your midterm final, and you realize with hot-cold-hot nausea you haven’t attended a single class all semester. Because I have no fucking idea what the ROI calculation is with the thumb grips.
“It’s three to one,” Kelly says—bless and fuck her. “That will make costs prohibitive. We’d love to change our promise to riders. But For every seventeenth ride we deliver a bike to an Imazighen family in need doesn’t have the same ring.” Sharon tsks.
“I know,” Kelly sighs.
“Where else can we hike?” Sharon wonders. “You know, the boot camp I attend charges for towels.”
Kelly nods with a vigorous mmm-hmm. “Bike shoes. Water bottles. We can find it somewhere, I’m sure.”
“Please do,” Sharon says. “I wouldn’t feel right letting a child around this thing in its current iteration.” I notice for the first time that Sharon’s neck is a different color than her jaw. It’s very unattractive.
“Whatever it costs,” I say, matching my sister’s firm tone, “we’ll make it right.”
“Well,” Sharon clears her throat, making bemused eye contact with Kelly, “not whatever it costs. That’s the point, right?”