Nakedgirl 01: The Story of Dareen

"Bet you didn't know how strong Dareen was," Elly said with a smile.

"Ay! That door must weigh..." he said.

"Sorry about that," Dareen said. "I'll pay for it."

After assuring them that he wouldn't bill them for the broken door, Pedro left, bewildered, wondering what conclusions to draw from seeing Dareen emerge naked from Elly's room, seeing her lift that heavy door, and how to go about fixing the jamb. He was in a daze the rest of the day. It was only that night, while Josefina was riding him in bed, that he concluded that the jamb must have been rotted out anyway, and that the pumping of adrenaline caused by the surprise of being seen by him and having to hide gave Dareen the momentary strength to rip the door out. Of course, that still didn't explain the part about Dareen coming out of Elly's room naked.

Still wrapped in the towel, Dareen sat on the floor next to Elly, sipping the tea Elly had made. Elly guessed correctly that Dareen had been "out flying" last night.

"You can fly only when you're naked? Do you mind?" Elly touched the towel, hoping Dareen would give a demonstration.

Dareen had it figured out by now. "No, I have to be n-naked." She didn't like saying that word, at least as it applied to herself. "For a few hours. Anything I put on me, even a watch, and I can't fly any more. I have to take it off and wait again."

"Wow." Elly wanted to see her fly, but knew that it would be too much to ask for Dareen to not only be naked again, but stay naked for several hours.

Seeing her friend gradually regaining her composure, Elly said, "Is there anything I can do?"

"I'm hungry." Dareen no longer having a door to her room, Elly tactfully retreated to her own as Dareen dressed. Soon they were out getting a sandwich.

It was around 11 p.m. when Elly was awakened by a knock on her door. "Dar?"

The door creaked open and Elly sat up in her bed. "Jesus!" In the darkness she could make out a shadowy brown, Dareen-sized object floating in, level with the top of the door. As the dark form drifted nearer along the white ceiling, Elly could make out the hair hanging down, the two large round forms, the legs sticking out behind.

"I'm your conscience," the form said. "Elly, clean up your room. It's a mess!" Then a low giggle.

"Holy..." Elly said a couple of words in Urdu, the language of her childhood, words that would lose a lot in the translation. Then she said, "Are you O.K.?" As if Dareen's slow flight into her room was caused by illness and it was not Elly herself who was freaked out.

The dark form descended a bit and straightened upright into a big "X". "I'm fine. I had a nice pray. Flying is a gift, not a curse. And it came from Allah."

After a pause, Elly said, quite reasonably, "Where else would it come from?" Then she reached out and turned her nightstand on. In a split second Dareen darted to it and turned it off. Which was comforting to Elly, actually; this was still Dareen, averting exposure.

And now the dark form came down next to Elly, inserted gentle arms under her pajama-clad body, and they both rose together. Elly quickly exhaled through clenched teeth, then grabbed Dareen's hands with a death grip, looking down at the bed. After clutching Dareen with the other arm, crushing her friend's bare breasts against her cheek, Elly started breathing easier, realizing there was no danger.

"El, do you want to go on a little trip?"

Elly's protest of "NO!" died on her lips. All week she had thought about Dareen's nighttime flying and wondered what it would be like. And as for any danger, there was no one she trusted more than the sensible and always sober Dareen.

"Hop on top of me," Dareen said. It felt odd having a naked woman underneath her but Elly positioned her prone body on top of Dareen's, arms under to hook around Dareen's armpits, bent legs clutching the sides of Dareen's hips. Dareen made a motion toward the window and, sensing the need for footwear before going out, Elly reached down next to the bed and slipped her flip-flops on, on one side then the other. She had her long pajamas on; it wasn't as hot tonight as last night. From her perch Elly could sense the slight seismic tremors from the sides of Dareen's breasts as Dareen lifted the window.

Elly's cry of panic was shushed by Dareen as they flew out over Boylston Street, then as Elly clutched ever tighter, they turned and arced over the city, air whooshing through Elly's hair. The astonished girl ventured a look down as the streets passed under them. Her wide-eyed reaction of wonder was expressed in one word, repeated. "Wow, wow, wow."

"Akkk... please," Dareen said.

With the wind whistling by it was hard to hear. "WHAT?"

"YOU'RE CHOKING ME!"

"OH. SORRY." Elly moved her hands to Dareen's shoulders.

Dareen didn't know how she did it, but she intended to go to the same pond as last night, out past Thomasville, and suddenly there it was below them. She gently uprighted herself as she soft-landed at the water's edge. Elly tried to stand on weakened knees, straightening out her pajamas.

"Watch this. Don't be afraid, I'll be fine." Dareen flew up and dove into the center of the pond. Minutes passed by and she didn't come up, though Elly was not afraid for her, Dareen being perfectly O.K. as could be seen from rocks shooting up like rockets from the surface every few seconds. Soon the dripping naked girl was up over the water and hovering over Elly, getting her wet. "Sorry!" Dareen landed next to her, water still coursing over the tops of her breasts, little waterspouts sloping off each huge nipple. "And now for my next trick..." Dareen walked over to a large boulder on the side of the pond, as big as half a couch, and with encircling arms uprooted it, dirt falling from the bottom. Shifting it back onto her left arm, she wound up and flung it across the pond and then some. There were a few seconds of silence as the dull dark object completed its trajectory. Then it landed with a loud dull thump on the other side.

"I'm jealous," Elly said with a smile. "But maybe not. Not if I have to be naked."

Dareen had almost forgotten about her nudity, but after hearing this remark, she crossed her arms over her breasts and crotch. "Sorry," Elly said.

The view of the flight back was even more amazing, with Dareen circling over the warm, gasoline-scented city. "Wow, wow, wow," And now Elly became nervous once more as Dareen descended on Boylston Street with the asphalt below seeming very dangerous from five floors up. Landing with strong bare feet on the fire escape, Dareen skillfully pulled Elly into her room.

Now she floated, with Elly on top of her, about three feet above Elly's bed. "Give me one of your flip-flops." Dareen then slowly slipped it onto one of her feet.

"Aiee!" Elly squealed as they both bounced down onto the bed. Dareen got up. "Now watch. It's gone now." She jumped up and down, hitting the floor like a regular mortal. This made her conscious of her bouncing breasts, and she brought her hands up. On Elly each hand would enclose an entire breast; on Dareen each hand could cover only the nipple and areola. "Got to get dressed." As Elly's eyes adjusted to the darkness she saw her friend walk out, lithe bare back and tight butt cheeks, and with such a strong easy gait that for a second it almost seemed that she was proud of her nudity.

They began to chat but then got the urge for pizza. Fortunately Reilly's, the place on the corner, was open until 3 a.m. They sat in a booth near the window. There were maybe six other people there, white folks at the other end listening to the TV on the wall, tuned to the Cobb News Network. At the moment there was a film of the President of France, walking to the accompaniment of chicken clucking sounds.

The TV acted to mask their conversation. "So now what?"

"What about what?" Dareen said, chewing on her slice.

"Are you going to be a super hero?"

Dareen smiled. That amusing thought had occurred to her before, the first time she flew after that storm. "A super hero needs a costume."

"You can't be Wonder Woman. That's already taken. How about Naked Girl?"

"Um, no."

"Mighty Tits?"

"El!!" Dareen smiled and gave her a mock punch on the shoulder then got back to her pizza slice. Chew, chew, swallow. "Being serious though, if this is a gift from Allah, I wonder what he wants me to use it for."

"I don't think Allah exactly approves of naked women," Elly said.

"But like you said, where else can this gift come from? And what do I do with it? Just fly around for kicks?"

"Maybe fight crime! Like Spider Man!" Elly preferred to joke around rather than deal with Dareen's question.

Dareen's voice went low. "Maybe fight crimes against Muslims. Like those idiots who keep defacing the mosque."

On the TV, the host of the show was saying, "Third world nations. We should call them 'TURD world' nations. Ever sit next to a Pakistani on the train? Try not asphyxiating!" Dareen had a stone face but Elly just rolled her eyes. "Don't let it bug you, Dar. No one takes that stuff seriously."

Dareen mused, "Maybe I'll be an evil superhero."

Elly said, in a mock-newscaster voice, "Naked Girl... if only she had used her tits for good, instead of evil."

"El!" They broke up giggling. One of the guys watching the TV looked over, and smiled as he noticed that the girl with the long hair and the bulky sweatshirt seemed quite well endowed.

When Dareen awakened, late Sunday morning, she had a funny feeling in her nipples. It felt like bugs were crawling all over them. A feeling she had before, recently.

Part 8

She sat up, reaching forward to clutch the tips of her braless breasts as they pressed out against her white flannel pajamas. Something was wrong, or about to be. Though she scowled with concentration, she couldn't sense anything more specific. But the ominous feeling of foreboding was unmistakable. Something bad was about to happen.

She hopped to the kitchen, through the tacked-up blanket that served as her temporary door until Pedro fixed the old one, still holding her breasts. Elly had gone out. Thinking about what to do, it occurred to her that the tingling was exactly the feeling she had all over her body that stormy night just before she was struck by lighting, or by whatever that was. Only now it was just in her nipples, not all over.

She said a short prayer. "Allah, please see fit to make my mind clear. What was wrong exactly?" But nothing came to her. She ran to Elly's room, still holding her bouncing breasts, and looked out the window, the window she had flown through last night. It was a bright, bright day, not a cloud in the sky. People were walking on the street below. But somehow she felt the need to go back to looking at the sky. So blue. So clear. Now the tingling got stronger.

She had to do something. Report it to the police. But what? With mounting anxiety she decided to get dressed and head for the police station. Maybe it would come to her on the way. As she got into her usual sunny-day outfit of bulky T-shirt, unbuttoned sweater and jeans and sneakers, she kept telling herself: no, this is not crazy. 'I'm not sure why I'm going to the police but I'm not a crank. I've been given special powers and right now those powers are telling me something. Of course, if that's how I put it they'll think...'

She brushed these thoughts aside and bounded out onto the sidewalk and walked briskly, ignoring the double-take by the occasional guy at her bouncing frontal assets. The police station was five blocks away and she lumbered on up there, somewhat more slowly during the last block because "it" still hadn't come to her. What should she tell them?

She stood there in front of the station like an idiot, hesitating about going in. A deep breath. The tingling was getting stronger. Wait. She just had to wait. She decided to lean against the low concrete wall, below the surveillance camera, and wait.

An officer walked by. "Can I help you, miss?"

"I'm... I'm waiting for a friend who wants to apply for her ID card," Dareen lied. "Her English isn't too good and she wants my help."

With a little smile the officer said, "I understand," and walked into the station.

A moment later, Dareen saw it -- a little metal-bullet kind of rocket flying high over the city, vaguely familiar, and now she grabbed the bottom of her T-shirt and hesitated before pulling it off, she began trying to step out of her sneakers. And then...

In the middle of the sleepy sunny Sunday afternoon, the blinding flash of light, the intense hissing sound, were things that all Atlantans would remember the rest of their lives. As the flash died the people who were outdoors wanted to panic but found themselves frozen in their steps. 9/11! 9/11! 9/11! The numbers ran through everyone's head, it was the first thing and the second thing and the third thing they thought about. Hearts were in mouths. Eyes closed, people prayed.

When eyes opened there thankfully was no destruction. But there was a quiet and in a moment everyone realized what it was. The lights were out. Air conditioners were silent. Cars were stalled. Inside, computer screens were dark. Cell phones did not work.

And the people of Atlanta slowly began moving again, making their way this Sunday afternoon in a city with no electricity, no radio waves, no frequencies, no lights, nothing except their own muscle power in a city full of the inert carcasses of dead technology.

Dareen bunched up in a ball on her bed, shaking and crying. Oddly in her distress fatigue overcame her and she fell asleep. When she woke up it was early evening and she realized she was hearing the sounds of cars outside. She reached over and turned on the nightstand. The lamp went on. Was that whole thing a dream?

Evidently not. Elly came through the blanket curtain and wordlessly embraced her friend.

"Did that really happen?" Dareen said sleepily.

"Oh Dar, I thought the world was ending, I thought we were 9/11 right here in Atlanta," Elly said. "Shit. I was over at the bodega and I actually got down and prayed. Thank goodness it wasn't a-an exploding bomb. Everything came back after an hour or so. Just some kind of electromagnetic pulse, the radio said. But computers all over are still fucked up and the trains are still out. Dar, I feel like going to mosque."

Dareen stood up and thought. It would be a long walk with no trains, but..." Good idea." She needed something to comfort her now. Some news would comfort her too. "Let's find out more."

They turned on the TV. The local news reported the general chaos and how the city was getting back under control. The governor had declared a state of emergency, the President was flying in. They were finishing up an interview with the mayor. "This is clearly a terrorist act and thank goodness no one was killed. But this bomb has crippled our city and the technology is clearly a threat to our Western civilization." And now the screen switched to a newscaster who said, "No terrorist group has claimed responsibility for this bombing. As the mayor just said, thankfully no one was killed, at least not directly. Yet there are 17 people in area hospitals who are in critical condition because various life suppport devices were out."

"Oh no!" Dareen said, her heart thumping. She returned Elly's puzzled glance and gulped. "Elly... I saw the rocket. It was a rocket that exploded. I could have... I could have stopped it."

Elly unwittingly glanced down at Dareen's chest. "How? How could you know, so you could strip in time? And even then, what would Naked Girl do about it?"

"I know somehow I could have... maybe grabbed it and threw it far away." Dareen's wet eyes looked at the screen. Then she closed them. "Please Allah, let those people in the hospital live. Don't let them die."

Elly embraced Dareen again and spoke into the back of her friend's neck. "Don't torture yourself. It's not your fault. It's some bad person's. The people who sent that rocket. THEY'RE to blame."

The phone rang and they broke the embrace. It was Dareen's mother, tearful. It took a few minutes for Dareen to calm her down and reassure her that everything was getting back to normal in the city. "I want you to come home right now," she said.

"Mom, it's O.K.," Dareen said.

After a long silence her mother said, "Remember, be careful outside." Dareen didn't have to ask what she meant. After the Oklahoma bombing a few years ago, her brother Kes was chased down the street by some white guys. Fortunately he outran them and got to his car in time. Muslims, and Arabs especially, just had to be careful every time something like this happened.

Dareen said, "I'll be careful. I love you, Mother!" It always made her mother glad to hear that. Dareen was the youngest child and, though it had been two years, her mother hadn't gotten used to the last of her children now living away from home.

After they hung up Elly said, "I think we both could use some prayer right now."

Dareen said, "And people around us. Let's go to mosque like you say. I'm sure the Imam has it open at a time like this."

The went into their rooms and reappeared with their kerchiefs. Elly moved to the TV to turn it off. A minister was being interviewed. In the rolling lilt of a Southern Baptist preacher he said, "That we must pray for the terrorists' souls does not mean that they and their sympathizers must go unpunished."

"Shit, I don't need to hear this!" Elly meant to hit the "off" button on the remote but she hit the "Channel Up" button instead. Now it was the Cobb News Network. A skinny, long-haired blond woman in a very short skirt was thundering, "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders, and convert them all to Christianity!" "Amen to that!" said the adoring news anchor. Elly finally hit the "off" button and the little kitchen was in silence.

Elly and Dareen looked at each other. Two women of Middle Eastern ancestry, going to mosque at a time like this, with the TV encouraging everyone to hate. It was safer for them stay in the apartment, but the force drawing them to the mosque was powerful. It was the kind of moment most of us have at some point in our lives, when we are called upon to be brave and true. The two kerchiefed young women gulped and went out the door together and started the mile-long walk to Al Hijia Mosque.

Part 9

"Allah we pray to you that our fears shall be eased, that we shall not suffer, that the cause of this terrifying bomb shall be discovered and laid to rest." It was the piping, accented voice of Imam Tahir, acting as Khatib for this special service, the sermon after the common prayers. The little mosque was so crowded that there was no separation between men and women and no one could sit except for a few elderly people up front. Dareen and Elly were packed in at the back. They had gotten there just in time. They craned their necks to see the Imam, standing not in his usual spot, but in the middle, next to his wife and seven young children.

"I apologize for not being with you on September 11, 2001. We were in Paris visiting family at the time when the terrible news came over the media. It was afternoon in Paris at the time. The next day was the day of mourning.

"We went to the great square, several millions of us, and at 12:45 p.m. all the churches in Paris rang their bells. Even the great church of Notre Dame, where the bells are rung only on great historical occasions, from there the bells were heard. Now we Muslims have different associations of the sound of church bells, but at the time the resounding sound throughout the city could not fail to grab one's heart. The church bells stopped ringing and the whole of us, the whole of humanity, stood silently. The entire country, the entire world in fact, stood together as if to say: We are all Americans. And then a trumpet was heard, playing 'taps', the tune that is played in the military in honor of the dead. It was too much for me, and for my wife, and we cried. Many others did too.