‘Chloe, could you please close the window? I can still hear them chant. I am scared they are going to lynch me’, says Rachel.

Chloe closes the window and then continues combing Rachel’s hair with a brush. She’s gonna braid it. Just for the heck of it, because they are not planning to go out tonight.

‘Nobody is going to lynch you.’

‘How do you know? You’re not Jewish. You have nothing to be afraid of.’

‘Am from Alabama. People look down on me here as soon as I open my mouth. Am thinking about accent removal classes.’

‘I never hear your accent.’

‘You’ve known me since we were kids. Of course you don’t notice. My brother has a stutter and I never notice it, unless we meet people and I see that they notice, then I also remember he has a stutter.’

‘I’ve never noticed Ben has a stutter and nobody is going to lynch you for having an accent.’

‘No, just make fun of me and not invite me to parties.’

‘I don’t think you’ve ever been excluded from a party because of your southern drawl. It’s even fading now that you spend so much time up north. Besides, Reese Witherspoone and Julia Roberts have a southern drawl and they’re rich and famous. You could make it a part of your your brand. We’ve had 13 presidents born in southern states. I think you’re imagining it.’

‘And I think you are imagining that people want to lynch you. It’s just fashionable right now to protest for peace. We’re college kids. That’s what college kids do.’

‘But they’re not protesting for peace. They are calling for a free Palestine from the river to the sea. Ergo: they want to kill all the Jews.’

‘Honestly, Rachel, that’s not what it means. Nobody on campus is out to kill you or any other Jews. Nobody even thinks of you as Jewish. It’s not like it’s written on your face.’

‘You do realize my name is Jewish, right? And have you seen my nose? That’s what you’d call a Jewish nose.’

‘I don’t know anyone who thinks of the name Rachel and thinks of Jews. People think of Friends and Ross and Rachel when they hear your name. And you have a beautiful nose. I have never looked at your nose and thought: Oh, she has such a Jewish nose. Until the fall of last year I never even thought of you as Jewish. That was not my association at all.’

‘What did you associate with me?’

‘Oh you know, binge drinking, getting into trouble, skinny dipping, nymphomania, vanity, future bank robbery, a tight derrière to die for. Am only mentioning your positive sides, not your vices.’

‘That’s so generous of you.’

‘Your hair is ready. I’ll get the mirror.’

Rachel looks into the mirror and growls in disgust.

‘Ah, I look awful. My cheeks are so puffy. My forehead looks oily. Everything is awful. And I feel fat. I think I gained weight.’

‘You’re just in a lot of stress. You keep talking yourself into some kind of emergency state. Do you want to play scrabble?’

‘Scrabble is all we did during Covid, so no thanks. Can you also still hear them chant?’

‘Yes, I can, you’re not losing your mind. It’s getting late, they will stop soon. They’re loud, but I think that’s maybe only 20 people. It’s virtue signalling.’

‘I hope so. They’re so stupid. They are supporting terrorism and they think they are fighting for peace.’

‘They’re upset because of all the dead and injured kids they see. It’s brutal stuff. I’ve only seen a couple and I had tears streaming down my face. People don’t know how to react. And all those influencers are enraging everyone with their talk about genocide, taking all that emotion and riling people up for clicks.’

‘If you didn’t know me, would you join them?’

‘Am an introvert. I don’t like crowds.’

‘That’s not an answer.’

‘Rachel, can we change the subject? Nobody is going to lynch you. It’s just the latest cool thing to do. In a month’s time it’s going to be something else again.’

‘It’s been going on for 8 months. Doesn’t look like it will blow over.’

‘Everything blows over. Pantha rei. Everything flows.’

‘Can you imagine walking into a room and everyone sees you as a slave owner and a racist just because you’re from Selma, Alabama? I walk into a room and everyone thinks I want to bomb kids. I just want terrorism to end.’

‘We don’t have slaves in Alabama anymore.’

‘In the prison system you do.’

‘Ok, but, that’s true for many states. And it’s very debatable if employing prisoners at crazy low wages constitutes slavery. Plus, am telling you again, there are very real prejudices towards people from Alabama.’

‘I feel like you are not taking my experience seriously. Am telling you I feel unsafe and all you do is treat me like a whiny kid who’s imagining monsters under her bed.’

‘Sorry, but I feel the same way. You can’t imagine what’s it like when you have to meet your professor and you know he is getting a wry smile on his face because of your accent.’

‘Let go of the accent already. I have never ever heard anyone comment on your accent. Just because you are super self-conscious about it, doesn’t mean people notice. Maybe they are just reacting to your insecure body language.’

‘I am insecure? Sorry, but am not going to continue this conversation. I think I have been very supportive these past few months. Very, very supportive. I don’t know anything at all about this topic, I don’t think I could find Israel or Palestine on a world map. I have three essays I need to finish. I have exams coming up. My boyfriend gives me the feeling he’s about to break up with me and my parents are getting a divorce. There’s more in the world than some slogan. If it’s been going on for 8 months, then why haven’t you been lynched yet? Cause nobody wants to lynch you!’

‘You won’t find Palestine on any world map, cause it doesn’t exist. It’s not a state.’

‘You know more about that than I do. Am in med school. I don’t need to know about politics to become a gynaecologist.’

‘Yeah, just look away while they lynch your best friend.’

‘Nobody is lynching you!!! And if anyone ever tried I’d be the first to jump to your aid. You know that. Let it go!!’

‘I can’t stay roommates with someone who doesn’t see the danger I’m in.’

‘Jesus H. Christ.’

‘Leave that one out of it, please. I’ve got people telling me online that I crucified him personally.’

‘People? Plural? That was one guy with two followers and no profile picture. Some frustrated incel looking to piss you off.’

‘Sure, keep minimizing all the shit I have to put up with. One day am going to be dead and then you will go: I’ve always known something was going to happen to her, but nobody wanted to listen to my warnings.’

‘Oh dear God, who do you think I am? Some manipulative bitch? Next you’ll claim am only friends with you to use you as my ‘I am not an anti-semite’ patch.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Exactly what?’

‘That’s exactly it. That’s what you do.’

‘Rachel, seriously? For the millionth time, I do not give a rat’s ass about your religious background! You’re a secular Jew. You’re as secular as they come. You eat salami like your life depends on it. You go to the gym every Saturday morning. You’ve never been to Israel. What’s gotten into you?’

‘For someone who cares only about medicine you know a lot about Jewish customs. I think I have woken up to the fact that my best friend doesn’t want to listen to a word am saying.’

‘I don’t know a thing about being Jewish and I doubt you do. And I listen to you all the time. Day after day after day. Instead of studying I listen to you. That’s all I frigging do after class.’

‘Do I force you to listen to me? Please go and study if I bother you so much. Go become a rich gynaecologist, so everyone forgets you’re trailer trash from Alabama.’

‘You’re calling me trailing trash?’

‘No, am not, but that’s how you see yourself. The world reflects back to you what you think about yourself.’

‘Ok, so do you see yourself as someone who wants to bomb kids?’

‘No.’

‘But if everyone reflects back to you how you feel about yourself and you say that people see you as someone who wants to bomb Palestinian kids then it must mean you do want to bomb Palestinian kids, no? You see, I can also come up with psychobabble.’

‘Maybe we need counseling.’

‘What? Like couple’s therapy? We’re not a couple. You’re acting weird.’

‘Not like couple’s therapy. There must be some kind of friendship therapy. Anything exists. Therapists will milk any problem.’

‘Listen to yourself. Now you’re saying therapists milk people for money, but you want to go and see one with me. Rachel, am seriously getting worried. What is going on with you? You can’t let some slogan do this to you. You don’t want to bomb kids so it should affect you as much as someone chanting Rachel weighs 500 pounds. You don’t weigh 500 pounds. So who cares?’

‘Why did you take obesity as an example? I did gain weight, didn’t I?’

‘Aah, am losing my mind here. Stop it. Am going for a walk.’

‘Yeah, you can go for a walk at night, alone, nobody is trying to lynch you.’

‘I will talk to myself in my most affected southern accent, so we will see.’

‘Not funny.’

Rachel and Chloe did find a counselor who does therapy with friends.

The therapist suggested that both of them carry some kind of generational trauma with them. They should both look into their family history and dig up stories that could explain why they both think the world automatically sees them as somehow ‘tainted’. The therapist said: ‘If it’s hysterical, it’s historical.’

They ignored that advice, got into some more fights and now the two are not talking anymore.

Chloe’s moved out.

Chloe thinks Rachel is using the arena of contemporary politics to hide from her own much more personal problems, namely her parents who can’t hide that Rachel’s older sister is their absolute favorite.

Rachel thinks Chloe secretly hates her because people think Rachel is the prettier one of the two.

Chloe has started going to pro-Palestine marches. Yes, she chanted From the river to the sea at some point. Not loudly. She really is an introvert.

She doesn’t want to lynch Rachel. She hopes that one day they will be talking again. She just doesn’t want to see kids with horrific injuries anymore. As a future doctor she has to save lives.

Rachel has confronted her parents about the telling contrast between how they talk about her sister and how they talk about her. At first her parents emphatically denied treating their two daughters unequally in any way whatsoever.

Lately Rachel sees how her mum is trying to spend more time with Rachel.

She has started noticing the chants a little less.

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