Nanu’s eyes roam over the page I’m holding out. I can see her eyes moving, taking in all of it. Slowly and steadily.
“It’s beautiful, Jannu.” Her voice is soft. Quiet. Like she can’t quite believe I’m the one to have done this. “It’s your first one? It’s amazing.”
I feel pride swelling up in my chest.
“You really think so?” My voice is barely more than a whisper.
“It’s so much better than any design I did when I was your age.” She laughs. “Maybe next time you’re here I can show you all of my sketches. I have notebooks full of them.” Nanu has been decorating people’s hands with henna since she was my age. She used to put henna on all of her cousins. After she got married, she applied henna on her new nieces and nephews. I can’t even imagine what her sketch books look like. I can’t even imagine how many she must have.
“Yes! Yes! I’d love that!” I say.
“You know, your Ammu used to be quite good at it, too, once upon a time.”
“Really? She never said anything about it.”
Nanu chuckles. “Yes, she wasn’t very patient, Jannu. Not like you. She was great at it, but she couldn’t get all of the precise details right because she would rush. She got bored very easily. After she married your Abbu and moved over there … well, I guess she didn’t really have anyone to practice on for a long time. She lost interest and forgot about it.”
I feel a pang of sadness at that thought. I imagine if Ammu had kept it up; maybe Priti and I would be experts. Maybe it would be a proper family tradition. Maybe we would already have notebooks full of original designs.
I try not to dwell on it too much as I say my goodbyes to Nanu.
9
AT THE LOCKERS THE NEXT MORNING, CHAEWON AND JESS are still discussing their ideas, which makes me all the more nervous about telling them my idea. They’ve already cycled through so much.
“You know, I was thinking …” I start, interrupting their argument about whether or not people will pay good money for Jess to draw chibi art of video game characters (Chaewon says no, but Jess insists yes). “Priti and I were brainstorming, and we came up with the idea of setting up a henna business.”
“A henna business …” Jess repeats, like she’s trying to wrap her head around it.
“You know, like …” I wave my henna-laden hands around in front of their faces.
“You did this?” Chaewon grabs hold of one of my hands and inspects my palm. Her fingers run up and down the deep red vines sprouting leaves and flowers, sending a shiver down my spine.
“Why didn’t you say so?” Jess looks impressed too as she edges closer to Chaewon and peers down at my hands like it’s the first time she’s seen them.
I shrug, pulling my hands away and feeling a blush rise up my cheeks.
“I didn’t know you were such an artist,” Jess says.
“I was just practicing over the summer. You know, for that wedding?”
“People would definitely be into this.” Chaewon begins to nod so fast that she looks a little like a bobblehead. “I mean, people love this stuff and you’re so good.”
“Thanks. Jess?”
Jess gives me a nervous smile that makes my stomach drop.
“Don’t get me wrong, your work is beautiful,” she starts.
“Stunning,” Chaewon adds.
“But … we don’t know how to do henna. What part would we play in this?”
“The business part? Like … pricing, advertisement, all of that good stuff.”
“Wouldn’t that be unfair to you? You have to do all of the hard work?” Chaewon says, but I suspect that’s not what she’s worried about.
“I don’t mind. No matter what we do, we’re all going to have our different roles, right?”
“Right.”
“That’s true.”
Chaewon and Jess exchange a look.
“I think we should do it,” Chaewon says finally with an encouraging smile toward Jess. “It’s unique. We might actually have a good shot of winning.”
I grin at Chaewon like she is my favorite person in the world. Right now, she is.
“Hey,” Flávia greets me with a smile during lunchtime, taking a seat opposite me. Chyna takes the empty seat beside her, looking unhappy about being seen with me. She shoots me a smile that resembles a grimace.
“You know my cousin, Chyna?” Flávia says.
“Hi, Chyna,” I say, like we haven’t been going to school together for the past three years. Like she hasn’t single-handedly spread rumors about half the girls in this school, ruining their lives like that was something to get pleasure from.
“I wanted to show you something.” Flávia extends her hands toward me on the table in front of us. For a moment, I think she’s going to take my hand, until I notice it. The red wrapped around her palms, weaving up and down her skin. “You inspired me at the wedding. Well, everything there did, really. And then Chyna told me about an Asian shop in town where we could probably get a tube of henna.”
Discomfort flutters around in my stomach that I don’t really understand. It’s how I feel when Priti comes into my room in the middle of the night and pushes into my bed and steals almost all of the duvet. Annoyance? But annoyance verging onto anger almost.
“How did you …?” I begin, not sure exactly what question I should be asking.
“I just wanted to try it, you know,” Flávia says, extending her palm out in front of her. She’s looking at her hand and not at me anymore. She isn’t even asking for my opinion, just admiring her own handiwork. “I think I did a pretty good job, what do you think?”
I frown. “I … I guess.”
She looks at me, her smile still in place. But instead of the usual butterflies that smile sends fluttering in my stomach, the gnawing discomfort grows.
“I really thought it would be a lot more difficult than it was,” she says. “But once I had that picture your sister put up on Insta … it was simple, really.”
The gnawing grows from annoyance to all out anger. Flávia can’t just do henna because she saw it at the wedding, and because she saw Priti’s Instagram picture. How can she sit in front of me and act like there aren’t a million things wrong here?
I have to stop myself from saying what I’m really feeling. What I’m really thinking. I don’t even know how to form the words. And I know Chyna won’t take it well.
“Flá is this amazing artist,” Chyna chimes in. “She always has been. I knew she’d be amazing at making henna tattoos. Look.” She inches her arms forward and there it is, inked onto her hands. The same identical design in a garishly red color. It looks odd and out of place on her white skin.
I can’t explain the lump that begins to rise up my throat, or the tears prickling behind my eyes. Before I can even think, I stand. The chair makes a loud scraping noise. Flávia is looking at me with a frown on her lips, maybe looking for some sort of an explanation. But I can barely look at her. I definitely can’t look at Chyna.
“I have to go.” I dash across the room and out the door.