by Jasmin Kaur
“What the hell is that?” I murmured.
“Bungee jumping. You climb to the top of the launch pad and then jump off.” My eyes widened in horror and she tried to make it sound more appealing. “You don’t hit the bottom! You’re attached to a cord the whole time!”
“You’ve got to be kidding. Who could possibly enjoy that?”
Something devilish flashed in her smile. “Me.”
We entered the dense lineup, where I stood by her side for moral support that she clearly didn’t need. “Can I ask you something?”
“Shoot.”
“Shoot?”
“As in, go for it,” she patiently explained the foreign term. “Svaal puchla. Ask your question.”
“What do you get from being dropped from the sky? Aren’t you scared?”
“‘Course I am.” She reached for a chunk of my cotton candy and placed it in her mouth. “Tadh hi mein eho jehiaan cheejaan kardiaa. That’s exactly why I do it.”
“I don’t follow . . .”
“I hate being afraid of fear. I’d much rather just face that shitty feeling head-on. I think I’ve always been like this but when Dad’s kidneys went bad, it just made me want to . . . not hide from life. Does that make sense?” She sat down on a metal chain that divided the long waiting line for the ride. Scraped knees peeked out from the tattered holes in her faded jeans. A bald Black man stared up at me from her oversized t-shirt, his middle fingers raised. I think Joti called him Tupac.
“Makes sense.” I nodded. “Can I, um, ask you something else?”
Her square jaw tilted thoughtfully. “Hanji.”
I filled my lungs with air, hoping my question wouldn’t point plainly to the truth lurking beneath my belly. “Have you ever been afraid of . . . people in your life finding out something about you that you want to share . . . but that you know they won’t understand?”
She crossed her arms over her chest, smiling as if she was deeply impressed. “Damn, Kiran Kaur. You’re gay, aren’t you?”
“What?” I exhaled.
“That was a vague-specific question. You’re not the first brown girl to go vague-specific on me.”
“That’s not it.” I shook my head. “It’s something else.”
“Okay.” Joti shrugged. “Well, to answer your question, yes. Hell yes. I still haven’t come out to my mom because of just that.”
“You’re gay?” I asked, surprise renewed in my eyes.
“Uh-huh.” She crossed her arms over her chest, shifting her body away from me, ever so slightly. “Kiran, you look like you’ve just seen a ghost. You okay?”
Heat flooded my ears. “I’m so sorry—I appreciate that you shared with me. I’ve just never met a—a—”
“—queer person before?” she finished my sentence. “I promise you have. Maybe you just didn’t know they were queer.” Her gaze wasn’t unkind, but warmth continued to flood my skin. This was the dad fiasco all over again.
“I’m sorry. I probably sound ignorant—”
“Relax, Kiran.” She softly smiled, arms loosening around her chest. “I get you. It’s fine.”
“Your—your mom doesn’t know?” I asked. “I thought you said she’s understanding . . .”
“She is, but this is gonna be . . . different, y’know? A septum piercing and blue hair aren’t the same as me telling her that she’s never gonna end up with the son-in-law of her dreams.”
I nodded. This, I very personally understood.
“Anyways, whatever it is that you’re keeping in, if it’s a part of who you are, it’s gonna be hard to hide forever. I’m clearly not one to talk ’cause I still haven’t come out to Mom, but I did tell my dad.”
“Really?” I was astonished that she could be so open with a parent. The concept felt intangible, like ether.
“Yeah. Told him I liked girls when he was in the hospital. I explained it to him, like . . . this is just the way that the universe or whatever made me. It’s just a part of who I am.”
“And . . . he took it well?” I asked, trying to remind myself that my parents were not all parents.
“As well as a middle-aged, conservative dad who’s never heard the word lesbian before could take it.” She shrugged. “He was confused but understanding. I guess there’s something about your body breaking down that makes you . . . see past the superficial. Past people’s random definitions of how things are supposed to be. Being sick made him see a lotta shit more clearly. Made all of us see more clearly.”
I nodded quietly.
“When I told him, he was literally like, Joti, I can’t say I get it, but if this makes you happy, then it makes me happy. But your mom . . . puth, she’s not gonna like this.” She imitated her dad’s voice with straight-faced seriousness and then broke into a sad, fragile laugh. She stared at her black Converse until she was ready to look up.
“Was he sick for a while?”
“It was a few years. Kidney failure’s a kuthi, lemme just tell you.” She shook her head. “And he refused—refused—to take a kidney from any of us. Said he wouldn’t be able to live with himself if we ended up going through the same shit and needed both our kidneys. Technically, he said he wouldn’t be able to die with himself. The man had a fucked-up sense of humor.” She smirked for the faintest moment, then her smile faded away.
I had no idea what to say that could make her feel better. “I’m so sorry, Joti.”
“So am I.” She paused for a heartbeat. “Can I give you a word of advice?”
“Please.”
“This thing you wanna share . . . are you worried about what your family’s gonna think?”
“Yeah,” I murmured. “More than anything.” I already knew what Mom thought and, although her reaction hadn’t surprised me in the least, her silence was petrifying. She hadn’t called me since I broke the news two weeks ago, and I couldn’t help but wonder what was going through her mind. The process ahead was even scarier: one by one, everyone in my family would find out that I was pregnant.
“If they love you, eventually, they’ll see past their own judgment. I know my mom isn’t gonna stop loving me or something when I come out to her. She’s just gonna be, like, on edge for a while. But once we get past that, we’ll be cool.” Joti spoke as if she was reassuring herself more than me.
“Next,” drawled a bored-looking blonde girl in a red Funland polo. The sorrow tinging Joti’s features slowly melted away, as if she was returning to wakefulness from a hazy dream. The ride attendant placed a helmet over Joti’s head while rattling off a list of safety rules, then strapped her into a black harness that wrapped around her body like a vest. After tugging on the harness twice to ensure that it was secure, she sent her up a ladder that led to the top of the diving board.
Higher and higher she rose, waving and grinning at me without a tinge of detectable nervousness. I knew that my parents were nothing like hers, that no amount of love would allow them to see past their reputations. For a moment, however, I wondered about Chachi. About her relaxed aura. How she wasn’t remotely stressed about me living with her, so different than the way Mom would grow irritable at the thought of anyone disrupting the carefully curated sanctuary of her home. Of her life.
Joti’s world isn’t yours, I reminded myself, envy bubbling in my stomach.
A ride attendant at the top of the metal diving board guided Joti all the way to the edge, turning her around so that she was facing away from the direction where she would jump. Then, with a joyful shriek, she plummeted toward the earth, staring fear right in the eyes, sending it a middle finger with her infectious, soul-stirring laughter.
hey, kiran?
she said, before i closed the truck door
and went back inside the house
you have a beautiful heart.
you’ll find the right words for this situation
whatever this situation is
and it’ll be okay.
and if it isn’t
you know where to find me.
us freshies need to stick together, right?
a lovely family dinner
The last bit of cotton candy met my tongue, bliss from the warm summer day still embedded in my smile. Every time I hung out with Joti, things felt a little lighter, easier. I had never met someone whose joy seemed so perfectly weightless. It lifted her from sorrow just as easily as a rose petal caught in wind. If I could learn from her—if I could find a piece of her within me—perhaps things would be okay.
I reached deep into my purse, searching for the house key that Chachi had given me. After fumbling between receipts and transit maps and the random assortment of junk I carried in my bag, I gave up and rang the bell.
When the door swung inward, my grin still hung on my face like a snapshot, but my stomach fell so fast I thought I’d be sick. Air vacuumed itself from my body. I could hardly breathe as I took in the sight of her large, unforgiving eyes, her meticulously arched brows, her pulled-back bun, her pinned-in-place smile.
“Mom?” The word left my mouth an octave higher than normal. “What are you—why are you here?”
“Surpriiiiise!” came Chachi’s singsong voice from just behind her. She smiled over my mother’s shoulder without a clue that anything was wrong. Hardeep Kaur, the overbearing manager of my existence, stared at me, mouth upturned in a grin, eyes completely ablaze. My skin was scorching hot.
“Hi, Kiran.” Wearing the white kurti that she’d bought from New Delhi and a mouthful of maroon lipstick, Mom took a single step toward me. She reached for an awkward embrace and my arms hung lifeless at my sides until I realized that I should hug her back: Chachi and Chacha were watching.
“Where—how did you get here?”
“Did you actually think I’d miss your birthday, puth?” Artificial sugar dripped from her words the way it did when she had so much more to say. Hai rabba, my head was spinning. Was it just me or was the doorway literally in motion? I managed a faint smile but couldn’t come up with words.
Chachi’s grin was still plastered to her face as she looked back and forth between us and said, “Well, dinner’s ready. Shall we go eat?”
Needless to say, dinner was awkward. The sounds of forks and spoons clinking against ceramic dishware filled all the spaces between small talk. With my little cousin Joban off at a sleepover and his sister, Harpreet, far more interested in her picture book than anyone at the dinner table, Chacha and Chachi did their best to make conversation. Mom tried to play along; appearance was everything.
“Hardeep, Kiran’s classes start soon. I think she has all her books, yes?” Chacha turned toward me, wiping a piece of spinach from his bristly mustache.
I raised my eyes from the lasagna that I’d been moving back and forth around the plate. “Yeah! Got everything I need!” I replied, way too excitedly. A bead of sweat trickled down from my armpit.
“Good,” Mom said. “I hope you’re cracking those books open already, Kiran. Trust me, you should get a head start on your readings. After the first week, it’s going to be assignment after assignment.”
Chacha raised a thick black eyebrow and laughed about how it was still summer. He insisted that I enjoy the last remnants of fun before school would begin. Mom placed a bite of cottage cheese and tomato in her mouth and politely smiled, not arguing with Chacha’s point. Instead, she glanced at me in that subtle way of hers, speaking with her eyes. Her split-second glare said something like, You heard what I said. Start studying and cut all this pregnancy bullshit. I glued my eyes to the lasagna like I’d never seen anything more interesting.
I could draw out this meal for hours, but eventually, dinner would end. Chachi and Chacha and Harpreet would go to bed and I would be left alone in a room with Mom. A room where she would undoubtedly ask me the question burning holes into her tongue: Why hadn’t I scheduled an abortion yet?
I was simultaneously sweaty, nauseous, dizzy, and close to tears. God, this pregnancy was fun.
Chacha made small talk about the confusing bus connections between Surrey and SFU. Chachi chimed in about the new SkyTrain that was being built as she cut a slice of lasagna for Harpreet. Without glancing up, Harpreet flipped to the next page of The Rainbow Fish.
When conversation lulled, Mom cleared her throat, coughing into her napkin before she said, “Kiran hasn’t been giving you two any trouble, has she?”
“Trouble from Kiran?” Chachi gasped. “She’s an angel! Too polite, if you ask me.”
Chacha shook his head like he’d never heard anything more ridiculous. “Hardeep, we’re so happy to have an older role model like Kiran around for the kids. We’re hoping Joban follows in her footsteps and goes into sciences one day. Harpreet’s already dead set about what she wants to do, aren’t you, puth?” he chuckled. “Tell Thaee Jee what you wanna be when you grow up.”
Harpreet suddenly perked up, wide-eyed with a wonder that could only exist in a kindergarten heart. “I want to be a hole digger!” she proudly declared.
“A hole digger?” Mom’s smile creased her cheeks but didn’t reach her eyes. “What do you mean?”
Harpreet gleefully broke into an explanation of how she’d seen a lady in a hard yellow hat who was digging holes with a giant hole-digging machine. Everyone laughed about how she planned to dig all the way to the Earth’s core and I began to tune out the conversation, grateful to no longer be the center of discussion. Every so often, I would look up to catch Mom’s eyes lingering over me. How did I tell this woman that I was pregnant? What had I been thinking? How could I even be surprised that she’d travel halfway across the world to set me straight?
sometimes i wondered
who mom would’ve been
if it weren’t for the miscarriages
if she had satisfied all their desires
to have a son who’d carry on
the family name
would she have always been
the mother she was
that summer day
so many lifetimes ago
when warm sun caressed our skin
when her husband and her in-laws
were nowhere in sight
when she pulled me onto her chest
and i fell asleep listening
to the sound of her steady heartbeat
the talk
Just as I hid myself beneath the covers of my blanket, the bedroom door creaked open. I lay there silently for a moment, trying to steady my breath before what was to come.
She was quiet at first. I didn’t know what to do so I reluctantly peeked out from the warm safety of the blanket. Everything in my body wished to be buried in the bed’s protective depths, but she wasn’t just going to disappear if I closed my eyes to her. I managed to sit up. She remained standing.
“You think you can just come here and do whatever the hell you want?” Mom’s whisper did all the work of an echoing storm.
“No.” I stared deliberately at the night table to her left to avoid looking at her.
“You think you can embarrass our family like this after all that we’ve done for you? You know . . . I thought that you had some sense. That you’d be wise enough to not do something as shameful as this. But that was my mistake.” She paused. “I haven’t told your father.” Tears stung the corners of my eyes and I blinked them away before she could notice.
Her maroon lips had faded. All the color now existed in her cheeks. “Kiran, just tell me one thing. Why? What’s the real reason for all of this drama?”
“It’s not drama.” I refused to look at her. “Keeping the baby is . . . what I’ve decided to do. It’s not—it’s not to make a scene or something. This isn’t about anyone else.”
“What you’ve decided to do?” she sneered. “Is this a joke? Are you mad because you want attention? Is that it? Are you mad because we told you to go to school before you got married? Hm? Is this your way of speeding up the wedding?”
“I’m not marrying Prabh.”
“WHY?!” Anger had gotten the best of her and it
carried into her loud voice. Silence.
“I was raped.” I don’t know why I said it. Or how I had managed to say it. I just knew that when the word left my mouth, my insides seared. Screamed. It tasted like kerosene and burned all the way out. The tears began to fall in earnest now.
Mom swallowed, but her expression remained unchanged, unsoftened. “By who?”
“His brother. Prabh’s brother.” I held my breath, hoping that I had been wrong. Hoping that she would believe me.
“How could that be? They’re good men. They’re from a good family.”
The tears came to a halt. My skin was ice. Just like the day I told Prabh. I shouldn’t have been surprised. I shouldn’t have let my guard down.
“You can’t seriously tell me that you had no part to play in this, Kiran. Unless . . . there’s more to this that you’re not telling me. Unless there’s someone else.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Who really got you pregnant? Did you meet some other boy? Was it—”
“There’s no boy! There’s no one! I HAVE NO ONE!” My whisper cracked.
“Keep your voice down! You have no one, hm? Then who the hell kept a roof over your head for the past eighteen years? Who fed you? Who sent you to school? How did you ever become so bloody ungrateful to do this to us?!”
“I’m not trying to do anything to you. Or hurt you. Did you not hear what I just said?”
“Yes, I can hear you,” she hissed. “But I haven’t forgotten what happened when you were sixteen, Kiran. Spending time with that boy without telling any of us.”
The bruise of her words made me wince. How did me dating a boy in high school justify her not believing me? How did that have anything to do with this?!