“Hey, Nish—” I barely hear Chaewon’s voice as I walk out of the room as fast as I can, muttering don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry to myself in my head.
“Apujan.” Before I know it, before I realize what exactly is happening, Priti is pulling me into one of the bathrooms. “What’s wrong, Apujan?”
“Nothing.” I’m rubbing at my eyes, barely realizing that I’ve begun to cry for real. And for possibly the most ridiculous reason ever. I never thought that I’d be one of those people who holed up in the school bathroom to bawl their eyes out; most of my crying is reserved for the privacy of my bedroom. And the only person allowed to see me cry is Priti.
“You’re crying!” Priti exclaims. I somehow manage to put my tear-dampened hand onto her mouth to hush her.
“MM-HM-HM-HM-HMHM!” Priti’s voice is muffled against my hand. I’m still crying, but silently. Each sob sends a jolt of pain through me.
Priti hmms something else onto my hand. I can see her glaring at me through my blurry vision. I know what comes next, but I’m too slow; she bites my hand before I can pull it away.
“I’m trying to help you!” she says.
“You’re … being … very … loud,” I say between sobs.
Priti’s still glaring at me, but she leans forward and wraps her arms around me. I bury my head in her school sweater.
“You want to tell me what happened?” she asks.
“I … don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“It doesn’t make much sense.”
“I’m used to that. Tell me, okay?”
“It’s Flávia … and Chyna.” I hiccup.
Priti sighs. I’m half expecting her to burst into her usual, “I told you so,” routine, but she doesn’t.
Instead, she says, “What did Flávia do?”
“It’s not … imp–important.” My voice is both muffled by Priti’s sweater and coming out in a weak stutter. It’s a wonder that Priti can understand me at all.
“Nishat.” Her voice is stern in a way that reminds me of Ammu.
I pull my head away from her shoulder and rub at my puffy, red eyes. Feeling ridiculous and pathetic and horrible all at once.
“Flávia stole the henna design on your hand.” My voice is barely above a whisper. “From your Instagram.”
“That bitch!”
“Priti!”
“Okay, sorry.” She looks sheepish, but only for a moment. “Still though, that was your first original design. I didn’t put it up so she could steal it. Where did she even get henna?”
“She said she got it from some Asian shop, but Priti … Chyna had it too.” That’s what makes it all the worse. Chyna, who spent the past three years of school coming up with the most horrendous, racist rumors about me and my family that she could think of, is now sporting henna on her hands like it’s nothing.
“I did tell you about her …” Priti says, like she’s treading the waters before pulling the haughty “I told you so.”
“I know.” I don’t need her to say “I told you so.” I feel foolish enough as it is. I look at the faded red henna on my hands. Not a single person at school has even noticed that Priti and I are decked with henna. Not a single person has commented on it.
The bell rings and Priti picks up her backpack from where she dropped it on the floor when we came in.
“Are you going to be okay?” There’s concern in her eyes, though I can tell that she wants to be snooty about being right. I appreciate that she can put her pride aside to comfort me.
“Yeah,” I say.
But for the whole day, I can’t get Flávia out of my head—and not in the way she’s been on my mind lately. It’s like somebody flipped a switch and changed everything. Like I can’t see her the same at all anymore. No matter how much I try to stifle my anger, my upset, it keeps bubbling up inside of me. Over and over and over again.
On the way home, Priti soothes me like only a sister and best friend can.
“You’re too good for her anyway,” she says. “She’s like … I don’t know.” She crinkles up her nose, presumably thinking of Flávia. “She seems kind of cold, doesn’t she? And she’s Chyna’s cousin.”
“You’re still going to Chyna’s birthday party,” I point out.
“That’s different. I’m barely even going to see her there. It’s a big party, there’ll be a lot of people.”
“So all of that stuff you said about Chyna extending a hand and you meeting her halfway was bullshit.”
Priti looks at me with narrowed eyes but doesn’t deny what I’ve said. “Maybe it’s not the most accurate portrayal of my feelings … I know what Chyna’s like.”
Everybody in our school knows what Chyna is like. She single-handedly runs the rumor mill. It started with the lies she spread about me, but it grew into something larger than life. Or, at least, larger than all the people in our year.
What I can never understand is why people stand by her despite the rumors she spreads. She’s not exactly a credible journalist; half the things she says are outright lies, but people still accept them like decrees from the Pope himself. To the people at St. Catherine’s Secondary School, Chyna Quinn basically is the Pope, and you don’t go up against her.
At home that evening, I spend hours poring over blank pages, trying to perfect more original henna designs.
“You need to actually practice, you know,” Priti says when she slinks into my room with her math book.
“Are you offering your hand as a canvas?”
She examines her hand with careful eyes, like it’s about to reveal the answer to my question. Like it’s a sentient being instead of part of her body.
“I suppose I must make this sacrifice to aid my sister.” She sticks her hand out in front of her. “I offer up this hand to—”
“Oh, shut up.” I can’t help but smile. If there’s one person who can take my mind off of miserable things, it’s my little sister.
We plop down on the bed together, her with the math book propped up in front of her, and me with a stick of henna in my hand once more. It feels like we’re in the summer days again, when Priti and I did this so often. Lazing about. Spending all of our days together, cooped up in this room with nobody to bother us.
I wish it could last forever.
“Do you think helping you with this competition, a.k.a. sacrificing my hand to this worthy cause, is an excuse to not have my math homework done tomorrow morning?” Priti asks.
“Definitely not.”
She frowns and brings her math book closer, muttering, “I hate math.”
10
AFTER I’VE FINISHED APPLYING HENNA TO PRITI’S HAND, she actually looks more than a little impressed. She doesn’t say anything, but I can tell from the way her eyebrows shoot way up into her hair. She purses her lips because she’s usually not one to give compliments; she prefers backhanded ones, if she absolutely has to. The fact that she can’t come up with anything fills me with warmth inside. I’ve almost forgotten about the incident at school. And Flávia.