Episode 2: Fundamental Flaws
Relationships carry so much
Nadia looked weary in that blue hospital gown. Her glasses inched down her nose as they often did, but this time she didn’t have the energy to push them back up. She had no health insurance, and I’m not even sure I did then, but she had to get that hole in her cheek stitched up. Otherwise, everything she would drink would dribble out.
Back then, I felt like it was my fault she nursed that ruby-shaped hole.
Nadia and I first met at a friend’s organizing training graduation. I had always seen her around but I was too shy to approach her. But after our mutual friend introduced us, we hit it off and started dating soon after. We eventually moved in together because we fell in love, and because of our joint underemployment. I had told my parents about the move-in and that it was temporary, but they promptly yelled at me and hung up. We both lived off our meager savings, staying in most days to cook and watch movies. That night she ended up in the hospital, we had just come back from a party in San Francisco, having taken BART back to Oakland.
I had moved to the Bay on September 18, 2001, and my political consciousness grew within this charged context. I intentionally identified myself as a queer and trans ally and sought to build bridges with other people of color. I organized and socialized, went to protests and parties. I would go to parties to see friends and make new ones, and to show that coalition-building didn’t have to stop at the office. I dated Nadia because we liked each other, but in some ways that relationship represented an extension of my coalition work.
The party that night was at a labor organizer’s house, a standard bay area bash laden with missed connections and long glances, progressive talk and liberal-bashing. People indulged this vitality with dance and drink, clustering around the ancient kitchen island in the tiny San Francisco 2 story walk-up. I had been living in the bay a few years by then, and grew tired of the activist scene. But probably, my weariness was connected to a depression that I would not recognize or address until years later. So over the course of the night, I grew tired of socializing, seeking solace where I could.
After that party, when coming out of our BART stop at the Fruitvale, we were anxious to get back to the comforts of our tiny apartment. But we heard a woman’s screams coming from outside the station, and as we came down the escalator, Nadia insisted that we check it out, despite my protests. Neither of us could avoid the glaring signs of something horrible happening around the corner.
Once we got off the escalator we jammed our BART cards through the gates, then quickly ran towards the screams. I frantically rolled my friend’s bike alongside, and just outside the station a black teen was repeatedly pushing a black girl up against the wall, and she screamed for help, for witness, for anything. It was late, and the people off of our train rushed by, glancing at the horror but still moving forward. Seeing someone like herself be victimized, Nadia went up to the teen and yelled at him, telling him to get off of her. I tried to throw the bike at him, but missed. After a few seconds, he turned his attention to Nadia and said that she needs to watch out, calling her a bitch. He then back-slapped Nadia, his ruby ring ripping a hole in her cheek. During all of this, I stood there, not saying anything, not responding to anyone. The kid fled on his bike as I froze and didn’t pursue.
I quickly realized that my positioning as a South Asian cis het man standing in the shadow of Fruitvale station, which was not my community and despite my lofty aspirations, I still held stereotypes about who that teen was. About him possibly having a gun or leading me to his crew. Moreover, my concern had quickly shifted to Nadia and her injury.
At the hospital, I watched as the doctor stitched her cheek and couldn’t help but feel that what happened to Nadia was my fault. En route to the hospital in the taxi at 1 a.m., she expressed her anger and disappointment at me more than a few times. Being preoccupied with guilt signaled to me that I too had those same ideas about masculinity drilled into me. About being a protector, about using my body to shield her, avenge her. What it meant for me to “defend” her, and what it meant that I didn’t, consumed me. In light of my political commitments, I thought about where masculinity fit in. Or if it did at all. And if I did take action, what would defense even look like? Nonetheless, my actions that night ultimately led to a serious blow in our relationship.
For Nadia and I, at the time when everything seemed to be going well in our idealized bubble of a world, the BART incident popped it. Because playing out my politics vis-a-vis a relationship was too simple to keep the relationship alive. And because we never queried the roles we played within the relationship and were forced to confront important questions about our roles and expectations that we couldn’t answer. It took an act of violence against my partner and friend to realize that my approach to the relationship had some fundamental flaws.
This piece was originally conceived as part of D’Lo’s “Coming Out Coming Home” workshop that took place in Southern California in 2011. The workshop was sponsored by SATRANG, which supports South Asian LGBT*Q folx.