Rowan blew out a breath. She prepared herself for what she was going to say next, the real reason she’d left, and the events that led up to it.
“Why do we cut our hair? What are we taught about that?” She asked Juniper.
“We cut our hair when we’re in mourning.”
Juniper’s eyes flickered up to her hair and back down to her eyes. She was smart. She was probably figuring this all out before Rowan could even express it. But Rowan was committed to getting it all out into the open, like Juniper had. It was the only way they could move forward. And she hoped more than anything, they’d be able to move forward from this moment.
“Why though?” Rowan found the courage to ask.
“We’re taught we cut it because we carry all of our memories in our hair. We cut it to move on and let go.”
Rowan looked down and studied the splintered board beneath her feet. She saw her tears wet the board before she felt them fall. Then she felt Juniper’s fingers swipe tenderly across her cheeks as she directed her face toward hers.
“Hey, look at me. What did you grieve?”
“Me.”
She could tell through Juniper’s intense gaze she was ruminating on what she’d been told, what to say next. She was still holding Rowan’s face in her hands. Now it felt more out of comfort, the need to touch and be touched in moments of vulnerability.
“I never told you about when I cut all my hair off.”
Rowan remembered that day like it was yesterday. The edges of that memory still imprinted so firmly on her mind, even though she wished she could crumple it up like a piece of scrap paper and throw it away.
She remembered her dad driving her to the powwow, their Tribe’s powwow that happened at the end of every summer, which also happened to be the day after she had admitted she loved Juniper. That night she knew she’d fucked it all up withJuniper. Even though she was scared that she was leaving for school, in a different state hundreds of miles away, she knew she couldn’t stay either.
As soon as Victor parked, Rowan’s eyes found her. She was with a group of girls their age, including Wren. They were singing along to some song by The Pussycat Dolls, playing with each other’s hair and putting on makeup. Rows of brightly colored jingle dresses hung on hangers in the back of the open van. She looked in the backseat of her dad’s truck to her dress. The last thing she wanted to put on the body she didn’t yet understand was a dress. Anxiety bubbled up inside Rowan so ferociously she felt like throwing up.
She flipped the visor down and looked at herself. It was the final culminating moment where she felt completely physically unrecognizable to who she was inside. She looked down to watch her hands fidget in her lap, picking at the snags in her basketball shorts, and her long hair cascaded over her shoulders. It almost felt like it was mocking her. Either that or enshrouding her in shame.
She barely mustered enough strength to give voice to her plea. “Dad, can you take me home?”
Her eyes darted over to her dad, who looked back in concern.
“Uh, sure” he stammered, “baby what’s wrong?”
Her eyes darted back straight ahead. She wouldn’t allow herself to look at Juniper again. Not ever if she could help it. Rowan thought she was a fuck up, a coward, and Juniper deserved so much better than that.
“It’s nothing. I just don’t want to be here anymore.”
She didn’t want to be there in many ways. She didn’t want to be around the weight of a culture she felt expected things from her she couldn’t give. A home that she was taught she was from, made from, in the ways Indigenous people feel connection to place, to land. It didn’t feel like a home at all. Instead it felt like a cage from which she was supposed to perform. She didn’t want to be around anyone. She didn’t want to even be in her own body.
Later that evening, Victor found her sitting on the bathroom floor crying. The scissors she used to cut all of her hair off were in her lap. All of her hair was in the trash can.
He sat down on the floor with her and pulled her head against his chest. He rocked her back and forth as she sobbed against his heart.
Juniper looked like she was in a state of shock at Rowan’s retelling of the memory. “You never told me any of that. I could have helped you. I would have loved you through that.”
“It’s easy to see that now. It was impossible to know that then. You know, I was always in such awe of you. I watched you walk around the world with such confidence that no one would expect someone who went through what you did to have. You always made me feel so brave, like I could accomplish anything.”
“Then why didn’t you think I could help you feel that way through this too?”
“Honestly, I felt like if I couldn’t be as brave as you, I was weak. I didn’t deserve a happy life, or you.”
“Oh, Rowan, I feel like my heart is breaking all over that you suffered that way in solitude.”
“I don’t want you to feel any more upset about that period of our lives than you already have. I was young… and scared. Finding myself wasn’t something you could give me, or that I could get here. I regret how I left and that it made you feel the way you did. But I don’t regret giving myself the space and opportunity to find myself. I wouldn’t be me if I hadn’t done that. So that’s why I left. When I applied for that job weeks ago, it was out of desperation to not come back and fuck your life up more.”
Rowan quickly wiped a tear descending Juniper’s cheek.
