battles of men and angels

I was twelve. Birthdays were an excuse to get everyone together and play messy mud games of football. Septembers brought the season of testosterone, of Doritos and commercials and not thinking. Overgrown boys painted with dirt and each other’s sweet sweat tumbled into our kitchen. My mom prepared everything in ernest; a tower of pizza boxes and the smell of freshly grilled meat throttled my stomach and launched it into my throat. Hunger was the only thing on my mind. The table was lined with heads of soldiers, of men I knew to be just like me. I was no different. I was the same. The still spilled out of our mouths and our collected silence hovered on the encircled table. It was the calm after the squall of masculine identity.

My mom broke the silence. She turned to me with a smile; “What is your life key verse Abraham?” The only time my mother calls me by my full name is either when I’m in it deep or if she’s talking about something spiritual. This was spiritual but it felt like I was in trouble.

I looked around, they were all waiting. I knew what it was. It was prescribed to me like a stamp on my forward that read Religious Boy, that said Freak Show!, that said Better-than-thou. It was in my name, my Hebrew and Muslim and Christian name, named after a man who looked at stars all day and so couldn’t see in front of him –a blind man who could see. It was a tradition that every birthday I recite my life key verse that my father gave me in front of everyone.

Abraham, but not today! Today I was a man. I proved it on the battlefield, I could tackle and catch and run like the rest. The candles on the cake, twelve warriors lined face to face ready for battle. I was ready for anything, the adrenaline still pumping through my awkwardly overgrown physique, I could face the heavenly hosts. I didn’t want to be Abraham today, today I was no one and everyone. I didn’t want to be a man of vision. I didn’t want to see angels anymore. I could feel everyone looking at the hairs on my neck and my magnifying crooked glasses but I stared at the warriors on the cake.

Not now please. But everyone was waiting. I should just get it over with. I was nothing special then and never wanted to be. I refused but seeing my mom standing straight and her hands folded softly in front of her and her eyes closed shut as if she were about to hear the angelic words of healing—“I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.” There. I said it.