She is a stranger, and she is welcomed home.
Under the story about a girl who had fled the fighting in Libya to go to Europe were countless comments. Some were kind, words of awe and support of the girl’s brave journey, and she wished those were the ones she could remember now. Others ripped like barbed wire. Go home, migrant. We don’t want you here.
THE WATER’S EDGE BY FLAVIA BRUNETTI 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 65
Leore walks down to the water’s edge, thinking hard. Her friend had emailed her—read the comments under the story, he had told her, though now she wishes she hadn’t.
Under the story about a girl who had fled the fighting in Libya to go to Europe were countless comments. Some were kind, words of awe and support of the girl’s brave journey, and she wished those were the ones she could remember now.
Others ripped like barbed wire. Go home, migrant. We don’t want you here. She feels the comments as if they are ripping her own skin, though she is not, nor has she ever been, a migrant.
The ugliest comment is almost hidden amongst several banal comments, a trap, jaws open. You can burn like your country.