“Why do you always drag me along to your dumb rallies and demonstrations? Mum, dad, I do not wish to go!”

The Khentavra household was in the throes of yet another tiff over parental activism and a child reluctant to be involved, a seemingly continual debate and source of familial friction, with no end in sight. The scene of the latest encounter was Jahrae’s upstairs bedroom, as her parents tried to coax her into coming with them.

“Jahrae, you are too young to stay home alone, and besides, it is healthy for you to be exposed to and develop social awareness of the issues you might face as an adult,” her dad, Djellrin, calmly explained.

“You don’t have to face friends at school who make fun of you and tease you for having to go with parents to public rallies against the government, and in support of radical ideas! The boys especially call me names, call me a bitch, call me uppity whore, a know it all, and claim I hate boys! I do not hate boys!” Thirteen-year-old Jahrae was sick of the constant teasing and humiliation, and increasingly resisted her parent’s efforts, desperately trying to salvage her declining social life.

“You must be strong, Jahrae. Of course, boys will say this to you; they hear their parents talk; many of their dads are government workers and likely support of the nonsensical view that men are superior to women. Do you believe men are superior to women?” this was her mum, Hrilleae, once again attempting to approach the matter from a deeper layer, rather than a superficial one, or from the direct confrontational style of Djellrin.

“I don’t know! Why do we have to change things? It has been like this forever, yet I have the great luck to have parents who cannot just go about living life, they have to go out and stir up trouble.”

Jahrae thought back across twenty-three years to that heated exchange, the strongest to that point in direct defiance of her parents. She ended up attending the rally with them, and the following day found a ‘bitch’ sign stuck to her back, hand-muffled whispers of ‘ball-buster’ from guys passing her in the hall, and a piece of pie placed on her seat in the cafeteria, just as she began to sit down.

What ensued on her return home after school was not pretty; the outburst directed at her mum and dad earned her a weeks’ grounding. The next four years were difficult ones for the Khentavra family.

Frequently at odds over involvement, they at least stopped making her attend rallies with them a year later, but her parent’s high visibility locally nonetheless still placed Jahrae squarely in the high school social pariah category. In an environment where appearance counted, even Jahrae’s natural beauty failed to override the negatives others associated with her and her family.

Other young women shunned her, all but S’salihn and M’korae, who stood by Jahrae through it all, sometimes defending her to the point they earned detention from unsympathetic school authorities for their steadfast and in-the-face-of-the-mocking-students defence.

After high school graduation, the three drifted apart, and Jahrae wondered about them now, about their lives and their interests, she had not seen them since graduation eighteen years before. She made a mental note to contact her old friends.

S’salihn in particular would privately counsel Jahrae not to butt heads with her parents, that they were working for good cause, for a better future for all women, including Jahrae, even if a bit heavy handed in not recognising the tangential effects it left their daughter to face alone at school.

Jahrae’s thoughts flashed back to another high school incident, where a male classmate stood up and called out that her mum was a loudmouthed whore as Jahrae entered a study hall, prompting Jahrae to tackle the student, earning her the only suspension of her school days. When her parents told Jahrae they would go to the school and discuss the matter with the principal, she objected, not wishing to face further consequences.

They went anyway, and yet another row ensued upon their return home. Jahrae claimed they were ruining her life, and that no one would talk to her. A far-fetched, not thought out solution she blurted out in that moment of anger proved one her parents actually agreed to consider. Jahrae proposed living with her grandparents for a while.

After a phone call, Grandmother Khera and Grandfather J’edehl, who lived a few kilometres away, unhesitatingly agreed to take their granddaughter into their home, and Jahrae ultimately lived with them for a year, until she graduated from high school.

That year was the most uneventful of her adolescent life, ushering in serenity and diminishing issues at school. Her grandparents understood the issues she faced, and while they supported their daughter and son in law in their activism, recognised they should be a bit more understanding of the issues Jahrae faced.

Jahrae enrolled at Arrhazon College, and moved back with her parents, who lived closer to the mass transit system that reached to the outlying northwestern section of Arrhazon City.

“Whatcha thinking on, J’har?” llhaesa softly asked, entering the great room and sitting down on the sofa next to Jahrae, carrying with her a plate laden with celery sticks stuffed with cream cheese. She held the plate out in offering to Jahrae, who graciously accepted and removed one piece of celery. Llhaesa then set the plate on the coffee table in front of the sofa, grabbed a celery stick and took a bite, happily munching away.

“I was thinking back to my high school days, and the issues between me and my parents.”

“That bothers you so, I know, but Jahrae, your reaction was typical of what most would do in that situation.”

“Would you?”

“I know not. My parents supported equal rights, but they were not activists, routinely engaged in picketing, demonstrations, and the like.”

“I know you, ‘essa. You would have joined your parents.”

“Jahrae, I have always believed in myself, probably because of music, I knew inside that when I played, what resulted was highly accomplished. A certain level of pride and ego comes with knowing this, and so I looked at the world differently from most adolescents. In that way, I stood by my beliefs, but then only a relative few others ever caused an issue for me or for others, and when they did, I stood my ground, while other students and friends stood with me, not at all happy at what the others tossed my way. In turn, I stood with them when they faced issues.

I grew up in a liberal part of the city; your parents live in what was when I left still a rather conservative neighbourhood. No wonder the school was so problematic for you.

Please share with me the specifics of what memories you revisit.”

Jahrae smiled at llhaesa; she was such a source of strength when unpleasant memories came calling her backward in time. “I was just thinking about when I returned home, after living with my grandparents for a year.

While we no longer actively engaged in loud disputes, the issue of my parent’s activism remained a sensitive one. I was insecure and uncertain of my future, and thinking back now, felt that at that point in my life, acceptance by my peers was important – and horrid when rejected, but this attitude slowly changed through my first year of college.

By the start of my second year at Arrhazon College, I found a modicum of confidence, and was less concerned with the thoughts of others. Although when my parents asked if I would attend a rally in Old City with them, I rather gruffly passed on going, much to their dismay. They had hoped I had outgrown my insecurity.

A month before I first looked up information on you, my parents were listening to an illegal broadcast, and the hosts of the various programmes were proclaiming your talent, the brilliance they saw in your play and in your songs. For your collective efforts, for you and activism intertwine, the hosts called you ‘a brilliant artist, socially conscious – a great advocate of equality.’

I was in another room, and I heard my dad say to mum, ‘I so wish Jahrae felt as strongly as this artist about the inequality of our world.’

When I heard that comment, inside I felt as if I regressed three years, but I said nothing, and perhaps that was burgeoning maturity at work. Not long after came another overheard conversation about the possibility of you playing a concert for EREGS, and that sent me to the internet.”

“Please tell me how you feel about all of this now.”

Jahrae pulled llhaesa closer and reached out to hold her hand. “Now, I understand my insecurity issues of that time, I understand the importance in believing in me and standing for what I believe, and if I could go back in time, would tell that younger me to stand strong.”

“What prompted this flashback, J’har?”

“My dad sent an email – I will share it with you after – expressing regret for how he and mum handled things then. He regrets pressuring me, regrets doing things so overtly that it had adverse consequences upon my early life.

He also claims that from those difficult years I emerged a talented and confident woman who has but one peer in the world and in world leadership: you.”

Llhaesa groaned, albeit softly as if a whisper. Jahrae heard, and called llhaesa on it. “That issue is your insecurity, ‘essa, just as parental activism was for me.”

“I have no issues with leadership. You will make a fine Chief of Government, your dad is correct.”

“Well, that is a start; you have no issue with being married to the head of government. Maybe one day, you will actually see the practical wisdom of you being head of government.”

Llhaesa groaned again, louder, prodding Jahrae to laughter. “You are such a goof, you and your well-known antipathy for a personal role in governance!

Would you storm out of the legislative chamber in a huff, claiming no wish to lead?”

“No. I would carry out one official act: placement of a piano in the chamber, and then I would play. That would be my way of filibustering.”

“Well, I suppose you could sing legislative proposals. Seriously, ‘essa, you groan every time I mention this, but you have not been on Arrhazon in fifteen years now. If you ran for office, your selection might well be unanimous.”

This statement prompted another groan from llhaesa.

“My reluctant leader, you love acclaim for music, you even love that people admire your activism. Yet when they ask you to actually do, not talk, you groan.”

“I do do!

“’You do do!’ Baby talk already, llhaesa, and yet Ahrella is not yet amongst us.”

“Very funny, and concede my maligning of the language in my haste to respond. My point is, I do much, but in other ways than through elective office. Is elective office the only way by which one can serve the interests of the people?”

“Of course not, but it is a way people wish you to undertake and serve, based on the great regard in which you are held by them; rightfully so, you earned such respect. What are you so afraid of, ‘essa?

Actually, you have never clearly explained this for me. To fear holding power – you must feel – actually, I suspect you fear something within you, my love, and I wish to explore this with you.”

Llhaesa swiped at her brow with the back of her hand; the conversation was making her sweat. An exchange on this topic was not a conversation she wished to have, now or ever, but Jahrae was her wife, she was astute and perceptive and intuitive; someone, the only one, she trusted completely with her most secret thoughts and feelings.

Inside, llhaesa knew it was unfair, as well as potentially damaging to their marriage to refuse to discuss the matter. Llhaesa reached for another celery stick before responding, and waved the celery as she began to speak; it was as if llhaesa was conducting her personal demons and coaxing them to share their secrets.

“Oh, damn. Yes, I am reluctant to speak of this, and there is but one person on either world actually able to get me to discuss this topic.”

Jahrae smiled, she and llhaesa were on the same page in thinking the other their ‘one person.’ “The time is now, ‘essa. If you do not discuss it now, you never will – and I will be gravely disappointed you could not share this with me.”

Llhaesa could see the humour in this, her partner, the love of her life, had left no wiggle room and had her verbally cornered. She drew a deep breath, looking to find the strength within that she was uncertain existed. “Your current profession is a good one for you, J’har. Goddess of Arrhazon you are relentless in pursuit of what you seek!

I will discuss this with you, but you must promise not to raise the matter again.”

“I will make no such promise, not if I perceive your well-being is adversely affected.”

Llhaesa screamed, not a loud, angry scream, but one born of playful frustration, her hands messing through and fluffing her hair as she verbally vented and mentally processed.

The initial result of the mental processing, especially when Jahrae looked at her with unrelenting anticipating and suggestive eyes, was a slight giggle, because llhaesa so understood the apparent immaturity in her inability to share the words.

Letting out a soft sigh, not in continued frustration but as a lead into her forming and ejecting the words, llhaesa began. “I have this fear within Jahrae, and this fear is worse now than fifteen years ago.

I know that makes no sense, at least yet, so please bear with me.

As an activist and someone who garnered public attention as a musician, I was aware of many of the abuses of power in the Brellian government, and prior to Brellian, in the Zreltian administration, though in the latter case it was actually by Brellian and his like-minded cohorts, and not sanctioned by Zreltian.

When the government banned me from any of its land and facilities fresh out of N’rellia, by that time – all of age twenty-two – I had developed a keen sense and understanding of the abhorrent conduct done in the name of the people, who grant broad powers to their leaders to act on their behalf.

Sometimes the intent is well meaning. Think of our action in Myanmar – M’traliel and I were exceedingly careful, but we were operating close to the line, Jahrae.”

“I do not understand the Myanmar reference. What do you mean by ‘close to the line’?”

“We were melting down tanks and weapons, putting holes in roofs and stopping superstitious men in their tracks by exploiting their superstition. We were on the periphery of playing with lives, and that is as about as far as I wish to go – ever – in such action.”

Jahrae thought on this, let llhaesa’s words digest and marinade. Llhaesa’s outlook was excellent, and one Jahrae needed to be cognizant of as she moved forward with ambassadorial work. “I see, and that makes much sense, ‘essa. You have taught me perspective that I had not considered, and I thank you for that.

I wish to explore what you started to share about your post-college days on Arrhazon, when you first strongly felt resistance to leadership. Please return to intent and well-meaning, but back in time.”

“Most people are of good intent, but in power, sometimes one can lose sight of individual lives, individual experiences, individual concerns. An issue in need of a solution, a solution that works or that does not, the views of the opposition, tragedies, and rewards, all of these things might affect and influence one’s thoughts.

I like checks and balances, Jahrae. I like checks and balances on me. I do not wish to wake up one day and realise it all went wrong. We help each other, we guide each other, always toward good decisions, always away from bad decisions, and that system of checks and balances works even between just you and me. I need this, there is security in this feeling, that you have my back, and I have yours.”

“You fear corruption if you are elected to high office?”

“No, I do not fear corruption; Goddess of Arrhazon we have all we wish for or ever need in life and so much more, on this world, never mind on Arrhazon where the bulk of our assets are located. No one could bribe or seduce us via greed, and so I do not fear this. Besides, both of us are committed to our foundations and assisting others.

My fear is more of…incrementally losing my soul in the pursuit of making any given policy in which I have an emotional investment, work. ‘A bit further, just a bit further, and success is nigh’, that sort of thing.”

“This is quite a revelation by you, my love, and I am proud of you. Do go on.”

“Go on? That is not sufficient?”

“All of it, my dear llhaesa, all of it – spew.”

“Spew! I like that, ‘please spew’! I am a musician Jahrae, first and always. I see music in everything, I see everything in music, sometimes I see, sometimes I sense, through music. I cannot explain this feeling, but suffice it is to say it feeds and powers my soul.

That I have a social awareness and conscience is not unique to me, but music gives my views undo importance, because it places my opinion in front of more people – a world, two worlds now. Many heard my advocacy, saw that it made sense – and again, it was not groundbreaking ideas or views, but it made sense – and no one else was saying it, so they loved my music and loved my advocacy, and yes either my stupidity at saying it all or my courage, you pick.

Leading will never be the primary element of my life, and is that fair to the Arrhazonan people, having a leader who sees, senses, feels, and communicates through music? Who when faced with difficult decisions will set and play piano for eight hours?”

“If people heard your words right now, I suspect they would love you yet more for these dredged out from the depths of your soul views and fears, and would clamour yet louder for you to lead.”

“Why? I just do not get that, Jahrae, why?”