‘Anta nayem, are you sleeping?’

Zafir heard Mum calling out softly. He opened his eyes. It was dark in the room but he could see Mum’s outline in the doorway. He pulled the blankets tighter around himself. He knew why she’d woken him up this early on a Friday. He was glad he didn’t have to get up and go to school. Everything was getting more complicated. Rami was still pretending there was no big secret and Mustafa and Murshid were still picking on him. The whole country was full of dangerous secrets. Back in Dubai, the biggest secrets were about who liked which girl.

‘I was,’ he mumbled as he watched Mum tiptoe into the room. She was rugged up in a long sweater, fleecy trackpants and warm woolly boots.

‘Ya aynee, my honey. Go back to sleep. It’s early. I just want to use the computer for a few minutes.’

Zafir was right. Mum wanted to check her Facebook page. She had her own laptop but it wasn’t connected to the internet through the private network. This was another secret. Zafir rolled over. He shut his eyes and tried not to think.

When Zafir heard Pops open the door a little later, he pretended he was still sleeping. Warmth and the smell of diesel fuel flooded into the room.

‘So this is where you’ve got to. I’ve lit the soba, so we won’t all turn into snowmen, though it was so quiet that I thought you’d both gone out and left me. Is Zafir still sleeping?’

‘Do you know what today is?’ Mum didn’t answer Pops’s question. She didn’t even wait for Pops to answer her question before she burst out, ‘Today is the Friday of Rage.’

‘What are you talking about?’ Pops asked.

Mum read out loud from the computer. ‘Today it is the day for the people of Syria to meet on the streets and show this government we are angry. Angry at all the injustices, the unfair imprisonments, the—’

‘What are you reading?’ Pops asked.

Zafir peered out from under the sheets and saw Pops looking at the computer screen over Mum’s shoulder. Was Mum still on her Facebook page? It didn’t sound like it.

‘What are you doing on this page?’ Pops asked, his voice low and angry. ‘Don’t you realise how dangerous it is to use Facebook when it has been banned by the government?’

‘Plenty of people use it here,’ said Mum. ‘It’s the only way to find out the truth about what’s happening in our own country.’

‘To use Facebook is bad enough but to get on this site, this Syria Revolution 2011 page – what are you thinking? How can you take such a risk?’

‘How can we not risk it?’ Mum asked. ‘Can’t you see, Boulos, if we take a stand, we could gain everything. We could live in our own country without this wall of fear, without all these secrets that are destroying our country.’

‘I agree with Mum.’ Zafir sat up in bed and they both turned towards him. ‘I don’t like secrets. And what’s so wrong about using Facebook to keep in touch with friends?’

Pops sighed and shook his head. ‘The problem is that neither of you really know what it’s like to grow up in Syria.’

‘I was born here,’ said Mum, her eyes glittering as they did when she was angry.

‘Yes,’ said Pops calmly. ‘But your father got the job at Dubai Hospital when you were three years old and the only times you’ve come back here until now were for holidays and a few years at university. You have no idea what might happen if there’s an uprising here.’

‘But in Egypt and Tunisia the people have risen up and rid their countries of bullies,’ Mum said. ‘We can too. Can’t you feel it, Boulos? Spring is in the air. An Arab Spring.’

‘How can you spout this foolishness? Our country is stable because our government is able to keep our many separate communities together. If the government were weak, all would be at each other’s throats seeking power. Or worse.’

‘It doesn’t have to be like that,’ said Mum. ‘Look at us. You’re a Christian and I’m a Muslim. We get along.’

‘Technically I’m a Muslim. Remember? I converted so that we could marry.’

‘Yes, but it was only a formality, and I told you at the time I would have become a Christian but you wouldn’t allow it.’

Pops sighed. ‘It wasn’t because you wanted to be a Christian but because you wanted to do something that had an element of danger to it.’

Mum glared at Pops. ‘That’s exactly my point. In this modern age, all educated people can see there are more similarities than differences between the Muslim and Christian religions and yet we are expected to live by rules that were made for another time. You say that yourself.’

Pops nodded, but Mum wouldn’t let him speak. ‘It’s the same with the government. The time has come to stand up and say it’s wrong to put a seventeen-year-old girl in jail for writing a poem that criticises the regime, for torturing a journalist for telling the truth about the injustices done, for—’

Pops cut her off. ‘Yes, we are educated people and you’re from a family that grew up modern and enlightened, but in this country there are too many people steeped in tradition who live to seek revenge on a neighbour for the slightest insult. You must realise it’s too dangerous for the government to loosen their hold – it could open up old wounds and create further divisions. Now, under a strong government, the people are united.’

‘United in fear,’ said Mum. ‘Oh Boulos, how can our country move forward if even educated people like yourself hold such outdated beliefs? Can’t you see how important this movement is?’ Again, Mum didn’t wait for a reply. ‘I want Zafir to grow up feeling azadi, freedom, in his own country. Don’t you want that for your son?’

Pops was still shaking his head. ‘I want what is best for my son – and that is a stable country.’

Typical. No one asked Zafir what he wanted and what he wanted most of all was for them to stop arguing all the time.

Pops continued. ‘You know I don’t blame you, Nadia. I know who has put these ideas in your head: Ghazi and his university friends. They think a thawra, revolution, is the answer, but they have no idea what might happen if they continue with this business.’

‘At least they’re not too scared to speak up against all that is wrong in our country.’

Pops’s face went red and he did something that Zafir had never seen him do. He raised his fist and for a minute Zafir thought he was going to put it through the computer screen. He saw the muscles in his father’s neck clench and bulge before he turned away and pulled the computer plug out of the wall. The screen fizzed and went blank.

As he strode out of the room, Mum yelled after him, ‘I’m not afraid, Boulos. I am not afraid. The winds of change will come and they will blow away this injustice and shame.’

Zafir sat back on his bed, stunned. Why did his parents get so angry with each other over the way their government ran the country?

The front door closed with a thud. Mum didn’t look up. Zafir knew he should say something, anything, but his throat was tight and there was pressure behind his eyes. He grabbed a towel and went to the bathroom. Maybe if he took long enough in the shower then everything would be okay by the time he came out.

A few hours later, Zafir was in the carpark practising on his skateboard when he saw Pops come home. Zafir followed him inside, and he heard the argument starting again.

‘How could you just go out like that and come back as if everything is normal?’ Mum still sounded angry.

Pops was calm but Zafir could tell he was still angry too. ‘Nadia, please explain how you could use Facebook when you knew I wouldn’t approve?’

Mum didn’t answer for a minute and then she burst out, ‘If you think I’m going to your mother’s house today then you are wrong.’

‘As you wish,’ Pops said in a cold, hard voice. ‘I’ll call Mama and tell her we all have colds. She’ll understand. Abu Moussa will be downstairs already but I’ll tell him we don’t need him today.’

Zafir snuck into his room and shut the door.