“When was the last time you put oil in your hair?” Ammu asks accusatorily, running her fingers through the strands. “Look, your hair’s gone all dry. Once it all falls out there’s no getting it back, you know.”
“My hair isn’t going to fall out, Ammu.”
“You never know. You have beautiful hair, like I had when I was young. And now, look.” I don’t know what she’s talking about, because Ammu’s hair is still long and thick and black as ink. “Don’t cut off your hair, okay?”
I frown. “Why would I do that?”
“I don’t know. Sometimes girls like you cut their hair short,” she says.
“Girls like … me?”
“You know.”
Lesbians. She’s talking about lesbians. There’s a weird comfort in hearing her—well, not say it exactly, but … recognize it. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Abbu fidgeting in his chair like he’s not really paying attention to his book.
“There are a lot of lesbians with long hair, too,” I say.
“Where? There’s that woman, you know? Helen DayJinnraas. Her hair is so short, she looks like a … a lesbian.” Ammu’s voice dips low when she says the wordlesbian,like it’s not meant to be said aloud.
“Well, sheisone. Her name is Ellen DeGeneres, by the way. And her wife has beautiful, long hair.”
“And her wife is a lesbian, not a bisexual?”
I turn around so fast at that that the hairbrush is left swinging from my hair, pulled out of Ammu’s hand.
“What are you doing?” She tries to get a grip of the brush again.
“Why do you know what a bisexual is?”
“I’ve been reading.”
“About lesbians?”
“And bisexuals. And paansexuals.” She says “pansexual” like they’re people attracted to paan, the food, not people who feel attraction to people of all genders. “And … what is it called? Transgender. Like hijra, right?”
“Pansexual, Ammu,” I mumble under my breath, though I’m impressed she knows even this much.
“Paansexual, that’s what I said.” She finally turns me back around and puts the hairbrush away. For a while, we sit in silence; I’m trying to figure out what I should say next while she begins to part the strands of my hair to rub oil into my scalp.
When she’s finished, she pats me on the head like I’m a pet.
“You know, when I told your Nanu and Nana about me and your Abbu I didn’t understand why they were so angry. He had such great prospects in front of him. So did I. It made no sense. Later, I realized that I was supposed to have lied about it, that that would have made it better. If I had pretended I had never spoken to him before, never known him, that he was a stranger who I liked the look of and nothing more, then nobody would have spoken about us in hushed whispers like we were shameful. Amma and Abba would have been able to hold their heads up high, because I would have made the right choices.”
“You said you regret what happened. You feel ashamed.” That conversation is imprinted onto my mind and I’m not sure if I can ever forget it.
“I did. I do. I …” She trails off. “At the time, I didn’t understand. I thought I was supposed to be honest with my parents. I thought Ihadmade all of the right choices, so why was I being punished for one wrong thing? I was angry, you know. At the wedding, wearing my red saree and mehndi and jewelry, I couldn’t be happy because I kept looking out at the sea of faces and thinking of what they were probably saying about me. I didn’t want you to go through that, Nishat.”
I push back the strands of my hair and blink up at her. I can’t wrap my head around her words.
“But that’s how you’ve been feeling anyway, isn’t it?”
I nod, feeling a lump rising in my throat.
“I was just trying to understand. I don’t … understand it, Nishat. I’ve never met someone like that before.” There’s a slight waver in her voice. “I thought … it was just something that happened here. Not to Bengali girls. Not to my daughter.”
“It’s not something that happens, Ammu.” I rub at the tears running down my cheeks. “It’s something that I am.”
“I know.” She reaches out, wrapping her arms around me. “I know.”
