I felt queasy as I stared at the article, titled “Will the Hate Ever Stop?” It talked about how many more reported hate crimes there were this year than last year against people of South Asian descent. It talked about a vandalized Jain temple. It talked about a Muslim uncle and auntie who were beaten up in their gas station. It talked about a Sikh uncle who was killed in his own driveway as he watered his flowers.
My hands got sweaty and I quickly got up to drop the paper and Dad’s mail in the hall outside my room and shut my door. But moving the paper and those sickening pictures and facts out of sight didn’t mean all these awful things weren’t happening. This was what Noah was talking about. This was what happened when hate went unchecked. When people heard hate being voiced and didn’t stop it and let it fester and grow until it was used to hurt someone else.
I sank at my desk, thinking about all the people hurting. Thinking about what Aai would feel when she saw that newspaper and her brother’s face. Thinking about all the little pieces of hate I heard every day at school, and the big piece of hate that had been scribbled on my house. Then the old CD got stuck, and I could once again hear Deepika Auntie through the register. She was asking a million questions. “Has this ever happened before? Isn’t America safe? Why did we move here?”
All those questions made me think about the questions I thought I couldn’t answer, the questions I was sick of hearing … the answers I wish I had the courage to give. I grabbed a pencil and started to write in my notebook. Fast. My hand cramped as I tried to keep up with the thoughts that were pouring out of me, unsure that I would still be able to just blend in after everyone at school read what I was writing. But it didn’t matter. I had to do it.
No more changing the subject. It was time to address the subject.
I had to start speaking up.
chapter THIRTY-THREE
The first half of my new schedule was Noah- and Avantika-free. It was also free of any more chances to stand up for myself. Liam and Mikey were not in my history, science, or math classes before lunch, and neither was Aidy. But my earlier relief was now giving way to nervous jitters as I settled into the solo spot I had been sitting at in the cafeteria since the fight. Liam and Mikey were definitely in this lunch period. And at least one of them would be saying something to me. I wasn’t sure I’d be as brave as I was when I wrote my op-ed. But after what I wrote, I would be a hypocrite not to at least try to speak up once in a while.
I had just unzipped my lunch bag when Harper quickly sat next to me. I stared at her. Was this actually happening? Was Harper going to eat lunch with me because I was all alone? I knew I could feel confident with Harper by my side. I’d feel strong. I’d be able to do anything.
“I have to get back to my table, but I just wanted to ask you to please, please, please think about what Aidy said about the razors.”
I pulled my sandwich out. Of course she wasn’t going to sit with me.
“She brings it up all the time. I can’t take it anymore.”
“We lost even though you guys shaved,” I said softly.
“Yeah, but that was with three-fourths of us shaving. Just think about how much better we would do if we all did it. Just think about it before conference finals, please, Lekha?”
I frowned at her question, thinking about what I had written this weekend and how it had made me feel. “My name … my name is actually pronounced ‘LAY-khaa,’ ” I blurted out, taking a long sip of my water bottle to avoid looking at Harper. Despite the cold steel bottle in my hands, I was sweating. I mean, sure, I had changed the subject from razors. But I had also spoken up for myself a little bit about something that had been bugging me for years, hadn’t I?
“Isn’t that what I said?” Harper asked, confusion wrinkled into her scrunched eyebrows.
I shook my head.
“Okay, Lekha,” Harper said correctly, with a smile. “You think about the razors; I’ll work on saying your name right, deal?”
I nodded as Harper got up as quickly as she sat down and headed for her table, just missing a collision with Liam, who decided he also needed to stop by my table. I took a deep breath as he smiled at me.
“Super-important question for you,” he began.
I exhaled, feeling my wimpy breath shiver as I braced for whatever it was Liam was going to ask. I had to do this. I had to stop the questions, even if Harper wasn’t by my side.
“Do you and Avantika ever sit next to each other and play connect the dots, Dot?”
I fiddled with my lunch bag strap as I ran comebacks through my head: “That’s not my name.” “Don’t call me that.” “My name’s Lekha.” “I prefer color by number.” I settled on one and looked up, ready to let the new Lekha’s voice be heard: “That …” I trailed off before I could even finish the first word. Liam was long gone.
My heart began to beat normally again as I told myself I was okay. It was okay. Sometimes big changes took little baby steps. I had told Harper the right way to say my name. It was a good-enough first attempt at standing up for myself.
I started to take a bite of my PBJ when I noticed a slight shadow over me. For someone who sat by herself, I sure was getting a lot of visitors today. I turned, expecting to see Liam again, or worse, Noah and Avantika. But it was Emma.
“Hey,” she said. “Can I sit here?”
I scooted my meal over. I did not want to sit with Emma. No one sat with Emma.
She plopped down, scattering a bunch of pens and her notebook as she clumsily put her lunch bag down. “Look, I just want to say what they did to your garage is a load of crap. And trust me, I know crap,” she added, showing me her latest drawing of pigeon poop.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “How’d you know it was my garage?” I asked, hoping Noah could somehow hear her answer across the cafeteria to know his close-up picture wasn’t as unrecognizable as he thought.
Emma shrugged, her forehead getting a little shiny as she looked around the cafeteria with an awkward, open mouth, as if she was too uncomfortable to tell me almost everyone in our school was white. “I just … I know Noah lives next door to you, and you guys stopped sitting with each other after it was in the paper.”
I nodded.
“People aren’t nice. So, I just ignore them. Sometimes it’s easy, and sometimes … well, sometimes it stinks. But you just have to keep reminding yourself that what they say isn’t true and it isn’t right.”
I smiled at Emma. “Thanks,” I said softly, wondering if I was as awful to Emma as other people were to me.
I quickly glanced over at Noah and Avantika, who were laughing. I watched them squeeze grapes out of their skins like we used to do, and felt a little seed of sadness get planted in my belly. I changed the subject, fast. “You know, in India, I’ve seen cow-dung cakes drying on a wall.”
“What? People eat them?” Emma looked more fascinated than repulsed.
I shook my head. “No. Not that kind of cake. Some people who don’t live in apartments or bungalows use flattened cow dung to burn as fuel for the fire once it’s dry.” I watched Emma’s eyes light up. It was the first time I could remember offering information about India to someone who wasn’t asking me about it in a way that made me feel bad about myself. Or to someone who wasn’t Noah. It felt nice. “I even have a pad of paper made out of elephant poop.”
“You’re lying.”
“I swear. I don’t know exactly how they do it. It’s some old folk craft. They boil the poop for hours to disinfect it, and make it into paper somehow. My cousin bought it for me. A charity was selling it to raise money to help elephants in India.”
“It sounds so cool there. I wish I could go to India,” said Emma.
I smiled at her. We spent the rest of lunch showing each other our drawings and chattering away. As I got to know Emma, I scanned the cafeteria, watching my former friends, my teammates, and Liam. I turned back to Emma, cleared my throat, and started telling her all about the different birds in India. I sipped my water every
now and then, but despite all the talking we were doing, my throat didn’t hurt at all. It almost felt like my voice was growing stronger.
chapter THIRTY-FOUR
After lunch Emma and I walked to Mr. Crowe’s together for English. Avantika and Noah were sitting at the front, where we normally sat, but there wasn’t an open seat near them. I wouldn’t sit there even if there was, I reminded myself, heading past Harper to the middle of the room with Emma, to the two empty seats left.
Mr. Crowe began passing out copies of the book we had to read that month to learn about writing in verse. He stopped at my desk.
“I checked the portal last night. That is a very strong op-ed, Ms. Divekar.”
“Thanks,” I said, trying to force myself to make eye contact with Liam and the other kids who were staring at me, but I didn’t really succeed. I did see Noah try to subtly eavesdrop by turning his head ever so slightly in my direction, though.
“There’s a town hall in March that Senator Winters is speaking at. The same month your op-ed is going to run. Perhaps you should think about reading it there.”
“I don’t really want to say it out loud,” I said, my throat suddenly feeling tight. Maybe I wasn’t as strong as I thought I was at lunch. Maybe writing my thoughts down for everyone in school to see was a big-enough step for me. “Plus … my mom … I don’t think she’d be able to handle that.”
Noah quickly turned away from me. He was probably thinking about how he put the picture of our garage in the paper when Aai didn’t want it public. I missed him, but I also hoped he felt bad about what he had done.
Mr. Crowe nodded. “Your call. I respect that. But if you change your mind …”
I nodded, cracking open the book and pretending like I was really into it so the conversation would stop.
I kept sneaking looks at Avantika and Noah, and every now and then caught them looking at me, too. I wasn’t sure how long we were going to be fighting, but I sort of wished we were friends again. They had been having snowball fights ever since it finally started snowing again and I missed them. I thought they would enjoy Emma’s company at lunch too.
When the bell rang, I said bye to Emma, who was going to PE, and headed for the door. Avantika was walking out at the same time, and we had an awkward moment when we both tried to exit at the same time and collided our backpacks.
“Sorry,” I said, but Avantika was already through the door frame and turning the corner.
I took the turn myself, since it was the only way to get to my family and consumer sciences class. I was dreading this class. I didn’t want to have to tell the teacher why I couldn’t cook almost every dish we were supposed to make because I was vegetarian. Not to mention I did not have my parents’ culinary skills. I burned my oatmeal at least once a week when it was my turn to make it.
I saw Avantika looking at me out of the corner of her eye as she left the carpeted halls of the English department and turned down the linoleum hall to FACS. It was also the way to the eighth-grade classes, I reminded myself, wondering if Avantika was off to one of her advanced classes.
But she turned right and entered the FACS room, and I had no choice but to follow her in.
Ms. Ross, the teacher, was standing at the front of the room in a bright-green apron that said HEAD CHEF. The room was divided into little kitchens, with two sets of tables in each kitchen for four kids to sit at. I headed to an empty table, but Ms. Ross called for me.
“Over here, Miss …”
“Lekha,” I said.
“Leh-kaa,” said Ms. Ross, butchering my name. Before I could even start to correct him, he pointed toward me, continuing. “You and your friend …”
“Avantika,” I replied, since Avantika was purposely looking off into space as if she had no idea he was talking to her.
“Yes,” said Ms. Ross, not even attempting to pronounce her name. “You two sit over here.” She patted the table Aidy and Mikey were at.
“Great,” muttered Avantika, and I frowned.
As the rest of the class trickled in and Ms. Ross assigned them their spots, she began going through the class syllabus before us.
“I’m going to introduce you to a new world cuisine or style of cooking each day, so that by March, you’ll be ready for your midterm. It counts for fifty percent of your grade.”
I turned the page to the midterm description. It said we had to make a dish that expressed us and write why on an index card, and it was due the same week as conference finals.
“Now, for today, we’re going to learn how to bake a cake. Follow the instructions on the page before you. All four of you in your station will be making the cake together, so a team leader is going to have to assign the recipe tasks. So, get cooking!”
Aidy nodded, like she just assumed she was going to be in charge. Who was I kidding? With her personality, she always was. No one had the guts to challenge that.
“Okay, Lekha and Avantika, you guys can make the fondant so we can frost the cake tomorrow. Mikey and I will work on measuring the cake parts.”
“Good idea,” said Ms. Ross, hovering near us before leaving to helicopter-teach the next table.
“But … we can’t eat fondant,” I said hesitantly, hating that it was already starting.
“Why not?” asked Aidy.
“It’s made with gelatin,” I replied, remembering all the birthday parties I used to go to back when kids invited their entire class, where I had to skip the cake or Dad would cut the frosting off it when Aai wasn’t there so that I could eat the part of the cake without gelatin.
“What’s the matter with gelatin?” Aidy snapped.
“It’s not vegetarian,” Avantika and I replied at the same time. I looked at Avantika with a smile. “Good one, Anju.”
But she didn’t reply. I didn’t even get a chance to see if she was going to, because Mikey started cracking up. “Wedgie-tarian?” he asked, mocking Avantika.
Avantika headed for the little kitchen, ignoring him.
“Why don’t you try being nice for once?” I paused, stunned I had said something back so easily, without thinking about a million comebacks first. I guess my op-ed had changed me a little, even if I hadn’t corrected the way Ms. Ross or the rest of the school said my name.
Aidy raised an eyebrow at me. “Okay, guys. Relax. How about Lekha and Avantika work on the cake, and Mikey and I make the fondant?”
I nodded, handing Avantika the bag of flour as she reached for a measuring cup, thinking she would be shocked I said anything to Mikey, wishing she would tell me that it was so cool to see me being as brave as her, hoping she would have been happy I finally stood up for her after the way I had acted during our fight. But Avantika ignored me, grabbed the sugar, and began measuring that instead.
I put the bag down on the table with a powdery plop. Maybe this friendship really had reached its expiration date.
chapter THIRTY-FIVE
I chewed on the sweet gulachi poli Deepika Auntie had brought us from India and tried not to think about Avantika as Dad worked on dictations in the Jungle and Aai got dressed all in black. It wasn’t for a funeral. We wore white to funerals. It was for Sankrant, the midwinter festival celebrating the sun moving north, and the only festival based on the solar calendar instead of the lunar one, so it was always on the same date. Women wore black because it absorbed the sun’s heat, went to haldi kunku parties, and got gifts from whoever was hosting.
When I was younger, we used to go to Tanvi’s for Sankrant, and they used to give gifts to girls, too. Maya’s brother and all the boys used to get mad about how sexist it was that we got gifts and they didn’t. I wouldn’t have to hear any complaints today, though, because the haldi kunku party was at Avantika’s, and I wasn’t going.
Aai called from upstairs. “Lekha, would you please find that shawl Auntie gave me? It will go perfectly with this.”
Deciding to top off my sugar high with a grand finale, I snuck a bite of tilgul vadi, the rectangular-shaped jaggery an
d sesame seed sweets Aai had made for the party, got up, washed my hands, and headed to the bottom of the stairs. “Where is it?” I called back to her.
“There’s a bag from India here,” said Dad from the Jungle next door.
I entered the den as quietly as I could while Dad recorded his dictations into a headset. At the top of a growing pile of mail on a table was the bag from Deepika Auntie. I opened it and grabbed the black shawl. Under it was the orange plastic bag Auntie had said was for me. I had completely forgotten about it.
I slipped out of the room and crouched on the bottom of the stairs, opening my present. It was a sparkling magenta Anarkali with lime-green and orange chudidar leggings and an orange odhani. It was the most beautiful, fashionable outfit I had ever seen, and it was mine. There was a little card at the bottom of the bag. I opened it and read Avantika’s flowing cursive.
“Knock-knock. Who’s there? Aamti. Aamti who? Knock-knock. Who’s there? Aamti. Aamti who? Knock-knock. Who’s there? Varan. Varan who? Varan’t you glad I didn’t say aamti?” I smiled, continuing to read the note. “See? Marathi can be funny too. I thought of it on the plane.”
I hugged my new outfit and ran up the stairs to give Aai the shawl, feeling like the worst friend in the world.
I heard some muffled shrieking out my window as I passed my room. I didn’t have to look out the window to know Avantika and Noah were having another snowball fight. I turned and entered my parents’ room.
The old wooden armoire was open, showing off dozens of brightly colored saris that Aai had folded inside. She was standing in front of the closet’s full-length mirror slipping on a set of gold bangles, her black and gold mangalsutra, the sign of a married woman, sparkling on her neck. She bent down to fix the pleats of her black lace sari and pin them into place below her waist. Aai stuck a black bindi on and took the shawl from me.
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