Krista Bremer

Become A Friend Of The Sun

Become A Friend Of The Sun

Friend Of The Sun

Blues For Allah

I was wrong. Ismail did, in fact, have powerful connections to the band, connections called “Africa” and “exile.” He under­stood what I’d failed to grasp: that when he led Aliya up the narrow stairs of the tour bus, he was leading her back to the deserts of North Africa, where those who have been driven from their homes recognize the longing in one another’s eyes, where unexpected guests are treated like nobility and children like family.

Friend Of The Sun

Friend Of The Sun

Friend Of The Sun

You Are Not Pretty

On the drive back to the dorm I think more about her comment. Pretty. Even the word sounds delicate, the tongue fluttering against the roof of the mouth like a trapped butterfly when it’s spoken. Alone in my room I take a look at myself in the mirror. I could almost be pretty — I am tall and long limbed, with blond hair and blue eyes — but I’m not.

The Thin Pink Line

In 1994 I was twenty-two years old and had just graduated with a literature degree from the University of California at San Diego. Though I had no idea what I wanted to do for a career, I’d recently stood up on a surfboard for the first time and thought I might just have discovered my purpose in life.

The First Cut

I was raised in a family of four girls. When my sisters and I are together, we speak a private language composed largely of different pitches of laughter that causes our exasperated father to demand to know what’s so funny. I am most at home when I am sharing clothes, secrets, and a bathroom with other women.

My Accidental Jihad

For the next month, nothing will touch my husband’s mouth between sunup and sundown: Not food. Not water. Not my lips. A chart posted on our refrigerator tells him the precise minute when his fast must begin and end each day. I will find him in front of this chart again this evening, staring at his watch, waiting for it to tell him he may eat.

Abuelita

She nodded a greeting to my husband and me, and then her gaze landed on the baby in my lap. Her hands came together in a loud clap that silenced our polite chatter, and she began to chant to my son in rhyming Spanish. He froze, his eyes widening to the size of quarters as she swept him from my arms.