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Tell Me How You Really Feel

Page 26

by Aminah Mae Safi


  Except she’d gotten in.

  It was all there, the Dear Ms. Khan, We are pleased to inform you and everything. Sana clicked out of it and then clicked back in, just to be sure. Just to know it didn’t change after opening it again.

  Nope, there it was. She’d gotten in. She’d gotten in despite—or maybe because of—her interview.

  The only problem now was, Sana had to break the news to Dadu. And Mom.

  April 28

  3 Days Until Deadline

  28

  Whole New World

  Sana

  Sana woke up and took a shower the next morning. She got dressed and slicked back her hair into her usual ponytail. She put on a little highlighter on her cheekbones, along her brow bone. She slid gloss along her lips. She looked like herself, like she always looked. The way she’d taught herself to be presentable, honed through years of experience, and subtle input, and online videos. But it didn’t feel the same. Didn’t carry the weight. It was an aesthetic. The way she liked to look. Maybe one day she’d change it.

  I don’t have to make everything significant all the time. I can just do what needs to be done.

  She could understand that the world was unfair to girls. That her family held her to a higher standard. That people watched her, looking for her to make a mistake that would define her. That was all true. All real.

  But she didn’t have to believe it. Not anymore.

  She headed downstairs. Mom jumped when she saw Sana.

  “You startled me,” said Farrah.

  “Shouldn’t I have startled you two days ago?”

  “No, you scared the living shit out of me the past two days. You looking normal again startled me, that’s all.”

  “I have to tell you something.”

  “I’ll bet you do,” said Mom, taking a sip from her mug of coffee.

  “You should sit down.”

  Mom sat.

  “I applied to a medical fellowship. And I got in.”

  Mom looked startled, her head tilted and her eyes bright. “But that’s wonderful!”

  “It’s in India.”

  “Oh, Sana,” said Mom. “I think you better start at the beginning.”

  And so Sana told her about her doubts about being a doctor and applying for the fellowship. Told Mom that she had been honest in the interview and that she thought they would disqualify her for it. Sana confessed she hadn’t meant to not tell Farrah, but it had become the greatest and worst secret she’d ever kept.

  “But you could do a fellowship here?” Mom stared at Sana.

  Sana knew what her mom meant. Knew it was the kind of thing people said when they meant to help. Why go somewhere else when you could get something similar here? But it wasn’t enough for Sana. Not anymore. “Mom. I want to go.”

  “Oh.” That was all Mom had to say about that. Just oh.

  But Sana wouldn’t be deterred like this. She hadn’t taken the time to get her mom to adjust to the idea. She got why she wasn’t jumping for joy now. “Also, I need to borrow your car.”

  “You’re joking, right?”

  “No,” said Sana. Mom had a rental for now. She still hadn’t found a new, reliable car to purchase. “I need to borrow the car and drive down to Orange County. I need to talk to Dadu. And I can’t do it over the phone.”

  “Does he know you’re coming?”

  “No,” said Sana. “But I’m willing to wait until he can see me.”

  Farrah opened her mouth, then closed it.

  “I’m sorry, Mom.”

  “Sorry for what?” Farrah looked wary. She leaned away and her eyebrows came together, forming a line in between them.

  “For treating you like you were a failure. I’ve never thought you were a failure. I always wanted to be like you. I wanted to be like Dadu, too. You both took the nothing you were given and you made so much of yourselves. You did it despite everyone saying you couldn’t.”

  “Baby, don’t try to be like me. Don’t ever try to be like anyone. Be like yourself. That’s enough, trust me. We did that because we had to. We didn’t have another choice. You do. I swear to you, you do.” Farrah put down her cup of coffee on the counter and she gently grabbed both of Sana’s shoulders. “Do you understand?”

  Sana sniffed. “Yeah.”

  “Good. And here.” Farrah handed Sana a cup of coffee. “Drink this.”

  Sana took the cup of coffee out of her mom’s hands. It was black and warm and bitter and it soothed and jolted its way through Sana’s system.

  Farrah went to the counter and grabbed her keys. She put them into Sana’s hand. “You are back to school tomorrow, correct?”

  “Correct,” said Sana. “I’m sorry. I really am. I appreciate this, you know?”

  “Yeah, well, remember everything you said to Baba word-for-word because that is the way you show gratitude in this house.” Farrah sniffed into her cup of coffee.

  Sana leaned over and gave her mom a kiss on the cheek. “Love you.”

  “Love you, too,” said Farrah. “Now go give your Dadu hell for me. It’s the least you can do.”

  Sana laughed, still not quite used to the sensation anymore after a couple days of staring blankly on the couch. She took the keys and she was out the door.

  There wasn’t any traffic at this time of the day, which was a solid relief. It was miles and miles of highway for a little over ninety minutes until Sana got to the exit she needed. It was a soothing, sunny drive. She gave her name at the gate to the guard the way she and her mother always did, and the man waved her through without incident.

  The air was cooler than it had been yesterday, but it wasn’t really cold. As she parked and got out of the car, the wind whipped through her ponytail. It was the Santa Anas again. Probably come to tell her she was wreaking havoc on her own life, the way they had warned her before she’d gone into the editing bay four days ago. But Sana wasn’t going to be warned off by wind. She would do what she meant to do, what she came here to do, and live with the consequences.

  Sana rang the doorbell twice. She was surprised when Mamani opened the door.

  “What is this? Don’t you have school?”

  Sana nodded. “I came to see you.”

  A smile twitched at Mamani’s pursed lips. She didn’t like skipping school. But she loved being thought of. “You’re here now; let’s make you a pot of tea.”

  “I did also come to talk to Dadu.”

  “Ah, there it is. I have all you girls and I am second to all of them.”

  Sana was never sure what to say when Mamani said things like that.

  “He’s out right now, but he’ll be back,” said Mamani. “Tea.”

  “Yes,” said Sana. “Definitely tea. Do you need any help?”

  Mamani made a tsking noise. She bustled around the kitchen, getting the tea, and getting the right container and the right pot and simmering the leaves in a double boiler for long enough and dropping in the cardamom at the right moment. It always looked like an art, from where Sana stood. From another perspective, Mamani was just throwing it all in as she got it out. But to Sana, it was a dance around the kitchen—a hospitality waltz. Eventually the tea was done and the kitchen was—for the briefest of moments—a little warmer and a little more humid than it had been minutes before.

  Mamani carried the tea on a tray into the living room. There was space in the kitchen to drink it but Mamani liked to do things right and proper. She set the tray down on the large coffee table and settled herself into the white couch. She poured the tea out of a glass pot—probably from that fancy French tea store she liked to buy her tea from sometimes—and into the little demitasse cups. Mamani didn’t get out the samovar for just two people.

  “What are you come to talk to Dadu about?” Mamani handed Sana a cup.

  The demitasse rattled against its saucer in Sana’s hand. “School.”

  Mamani reached out to the tray, took the tongs, and dropped two cubes of sugar into her glass she had broken the habit o
f popping the sugar cubes in her mouth to drink long ago. Instead, she stirred her tea properly—wafting the spoon back and forth in the cup without making a sound. “When I married you grandfather, they told me I would pay. They waited, you know. It was insane to them, the choice I made. To marry for love over duty. They meant well. We were all in a new place, with new rules. They wanted something safe, I think. But still, they waited for me to fail, for your grandfather to fail. But he succeeded in ways they could never imagine. Later, they decided your mother was my failing and my punishment. They said it over and over again, trying to make it true. That was what happened when you let women make those kinds of decisions, they said.”

  “It’s not fair.” Sana took a sip of her tea.

  Mamani reached out her hand to touch Sana’s cheek. “No. But your mother was always a joy to me, just as you are to her, to us all. You are not her scandal. She is not my punishment. Only people who want to control you would say such things. Because they are scared. Scared of themselves. Too scared to try for what they want. I do not regret my life. Life comes too fast. It can change in a moment. It rolls and crests like a vast ocean. If you want to live as you wish, you will be a scandal. But you will also be free. If you wish to be free of criticism, the world will place other bonds on you. That is the great trade-off. The great choice. Scandal comes with freedom. Freedom comes with scandal. They go one hand in the other. You never get them alone.”

  “Nobody should have to make that choice, Mamani.”

  Mamani shrugged. It was an old gesture. Handed down through the generations. The shrug of survival. “What should be and what is are two very different things.”

  “Then believe me. I want to bring them a little closer together. Just a little bit.”

  When Mamani smiled, it started on the right side of her mouth and spread across to the left. Almost like she resisted the expression on instinct. “You have me in you, too. Not just Dadu’s eyes. Nobody ever says you have me in you.”

  “I know I do,” said Sana.

  Mamani’s smile held. She set her tea down, stood up. “You want cookies? I’m going to get cookies.”

  Sana got up, embraced Mamani fiercely. Because Mamani only got out cookies on special occasions. Tea was for everyone. Cookies, however, were for brides and new mothers and exceptionally well-behaved children.

  And for Sana, when she decided to give Dadu a piece of her mind.

  * * *

  Dadu walked into the house while Sana and Mamani were still embracing. They both quickly jumped back and wiped their eyes with the backs of their hands.

  “Guess who came to visit,” said Mamani, her voice bright and chipper. She sniffed so lightly Sana barely heard it. “Came to talk to you.”

  Dadu walked into the room. He held his work bag in one hand and his face had a weary, bone-tired expression. He caught sight of Sana. “Poti.”

  “Hello, Dadu,” said Sana.

  Dadu dropped his bag, went around, and clapped a big hand on Sana’s shoulder for a moment, then dropped it. “Come. Into my office.”

  He kept walking, without waiting for another reply. Mamani gave her one of those nods with a little eyebrow motion to hustle Sana out of the room to her grandfather’s study. Sana got up and followed him.

  It was a bright office, which most people didn’t expect. They anticipated heavy wood and dark paneling. Instead the room was open, airy. His chambers at work obviously looked like that, with the dark wood and the leather-bound law volumes. But his office at home had clean, modern lines and elegant furniture. Dadu took a seat behind his desk.

  “Sit,” he said.

  Sana sat. “I’m done, Dadu. I’m done caring about what people think.”

  “We all have to care what people think, poti.”

  “No.” Sana shook her head. “I care what you think. I care what Mamani thinks. I care what Mama thinks. And I really do care about Rachel’s opinion, unfortunately right now.”

  Here Sana paused, and she watched as Dadu’s face formed a grimace that went quickly back to neutral.

  Sana went on. “But I am done caring about people. A generic people that could judge me at any turn, left, right, and center. And I’m done caring unequivocally what you think. I love you. I respect you. But I can’t have you living in my head, judging every decision I make.”

  “I never wanted that for you.”

  “But it’s what happened, Dadu. It’s what happened. I tried so hard to be good. To be a good girl. The daughter you and Mamani did not have. The daughter you wanted. The one who could wipe the slate clean for Mom and make her life easier. The one who grows up and becomes a surgeon and is respectable. The one who is worth the financial investment. But I never made her life easier. And I was never enough, for you or Mamani or for everyone I thought was judging. It was never enough. I was always wondering what people think, wondering what people would say.”

  Dadu put his head in his hands. “What do you want from me, poti? I did as I knew to be right.”

  Sana got up. She reached out and put her hand on his shoulder. “I know. I know you did.”

  When he looked up his eyes were glimmering. Tears. He was holding back tears. “What would you have me do?”

  “Something new,” said Sana simply.

  Dadu took a deep breath. “You have to go to school, poti. You cannot throw your life away. It’s my job to prevent that.”

  She deflated, looked away, toward the door. Maybe coming here had been a mistake. But it was too early to quit. “I’ve got a deal for you, Dadu.”

  “A deal?”

  “Yes, Dadu. A deal. I go to Princeton next year if you agree to my terms.”

  “This is not how it works, poti.” Dadu’s eyebrows furrowed again. “I can send in the deposit.”

  “You can,” said Sana. “And I can not show up to class.”

  Dadu wiped his hand down his face. “Poti. Please let me put down the deposit.”

  Sana laughed. “Dadu, I like science. I do. But I want to travel, I want to see the world. There is so much out there right now. So much happening. I want to do something. I want to help. I got into a medical fellowship in Kolkata and I want to go before it’s too late and I get on a path and I never get off and then I’m old and suddenly wondering what I did with my life. You chose your path. You chose to make something of yourself in a new and scary place. You say you didn’t have a choice, but you did. We always have a choice. You taught me that. Mom taught me that. I want to be able to do that, too.”

  Dadu shook his head. “I don’t like it.”

  Sana deflated a little. “Then what would you like?”

  “No, don’t look at me like that. I’m not finished. I don’t like it—but I have an idea. You want to take this fellowship? You can. You can work your job in India for the year. Work at that hospital. See if you like it. See if you like the world and see if you like medicine and can treat people who are sick and in need. I can call Nazim Mama and you can stay with them. How would you like that?”

  Sana almost sobbed she was so relieved. That’s all Sana had ever wanted. Space. Space to think. Space to breathe. Space to travel. “I’d love that, Dadu.”

  “You would?”

  “Of course I would.” Sana wrapped her arms around him and gave him the biggest hug she’d ever given anyone. She felt the tears pricking at the backs of her eyes again.

  Dadu nodded. “It is your life. I am proud of you, poti. I am proud of the person you have become. I hope you know that.”

  Sana sniffed. Dadu sniffed. And if either of them cried, well, neither one would have told on the other.

  29

  Saving Latin

  Rachel

  Passover was supposed to be a celebration of freedom. The chosen people released from the bonds of slavery. Spared by God and to be finally let go. Kicked out, more like it, was always how Rachel had seen it. And of course, there was the matzo, which everybody complained about but nobody dared not buy. Celebrate freedom, but please ea
t this bread that tastes like cardboard from one of the special flours, so nobody gets too far above themselves.

  Thank God Jeanie always brought matzo ball soup from Factor’s for her Passover Seder.

  At least, Rachel was thinking that until Jeanie walked up behind her and said, practically shouting into her ear, “Hey, where’s that cute girl who was hanging around the diner?”

  Jeanie meant Sana. There were no two ways about it.

  Rachel grimaced. “How am I supposed to know? She’s not Jewish.”

  “You should have invited her.”

  Rachel grimaced again. “Probably.”

  “Oh no. Spill.” Jeanie put her hand on her hip and everything.

  “I screwed up, Jeanie.”

  Then Rachel told Jeanie about karaoke and the piercing and the thunderstorm, though not with any real details because privacy, please. She told her about the Santa Ana winds and getting into a fight and breaking up before she and Sana had even started anything. She went on and on and Jeanie probably had people to greet and all these duties to perform being the hostess, but Jeanie just stood and listened and nodded and cared and Rachel had never been so relieved in her whole life to tell a whole story from start to finish.

  “I messed it all up. I screwed it up before we even had a chance to begin. Maybe I was afraid to ever begin. And now I’ll never know. Now it’ll be this lingering thing forever.”

  Jeanie laughed. “I’ve always loved your sense of melodrama. But let me give you a piece of advice, from my own life and from watching people come in and out of a diner every day for years. The nice thing about life, and not the movies, is that there’s no curtains, no The End. You can always write your own story. You can always start over and begin again. It doesn’t have to make sense or go in a straight line. It happens. You make it happen. And while you don’t get a do-over, if you’re still alive and stick kickin’, you do still have time ahead of you. You never know how much, of course. But time is still ahead of you, no matter how much more you get.”

 

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