Life Within A Dormant Bough
"Hemma, can you take another beautiful family picture like the one we have where you were thinner?" my mother, Amma, asks me in her usual way. A rose handed with a thorn in place. An offer that would return me to my childhood home. My chest tightens with a wave of anxiety that comes from silently harboring age-old resentments. I acquiesce because it will be Baba's 80th, and I still am our family's historian.
***
My nieces and nephews crowd around me, clinging to my jacket, forcing me towards the living room. A cold and uninviting place where sharp-edged modern esthetics hold no space for my abundant curves. I glance briefly at my tall, hulking frame surrounded by my petite sisters and wiry parents in the portrait that dominates the room. The middle finger of my family's fist. I cannot help but notice who's missing; my hand reflectively touches the photo in my pocket.
Small limbs slip and slide on the leather sofa to make room for me, quieting my unease as they climb into my lap. They shove photo albums at me to regale them with stories of their moms at their age before adulting stole their sense of fun. I examine each image as if the memories of these past forty years were simply a commission. A photographer's portfolio, filled with someone else's family, not mine.
"Where are you, Hemma Masi?" came their inevitable cries.
"Here," I say, pointing to the picture of myself at eleven. A faint mustache hovers over lips pursed to hide an overbite caused by thumb sucking. My school photos morph with each page turn, transforming into the woman I would become. In my senior year photo, a self-conscious image reveals a grimace, an unkempt ponytail, and bloodshot eyes. The camera reflected my misery that day. Wishing it were an x-ray showing what lay within: the strength of the bones and the weight of their burden.
I see my sisters, aunties, and cousins bustling around Amma and Baba, preparing for tonight's festivities. Through my lens, they're one mighty maple with branches swaying. The green shoots reaching skyward are their children. My branch is merely a dead stump. Echos of their laughter swirl within my brain amongst thoughts of what could have been, and I struggle to breathe. Grabbing my camera, I run outside. My dented ten-speeder sits in the shed, waiting to flee as we once did.
***
I enter the forest, dropping my bike at the base of a large oak. The thrum of suburban traffic dissolves into calls of foraging birds. The midday light dappled by the canopy of foliage shimmers the way dreams do. I step back in time, but each image captured in the viewfinder has been altered, unlike my memory. The paths are overgrown, long abandoned. Everything appears small, the river simply a babbling brook.
I recall coming home in torn jeans and muddy sneakers to harsh maternal rebukes. After such adventures, Amma oiled my hair, humming softly, her hands deftly weaving my stubborn locks into plaits. One strand was always elusive, defying even the sleek oiling. The "Hemma" of proper Indian coifs and one she threatened to cut off "one of these days." My sisters' dutiful heads shook, giggling and the hair on my scalp ached with more than just the strong pull of my mother's comb against their equally strong roots.
I'm pulled out of my reverie by initials carved on the side of a tree. B+H. Something so permanent from a union so fleeting.
Insecurity led me to Ben. He carried all the confidence I failed to shoulder. It was intoxicating. Our relationship blossomed on these ruddy paths. Our oasis, a neglected woodland nestled between burgeoning neighborhoods of an expanding suburb, the same could be said for my nascent womanhood. I accepted what he offered because it felt like belonging when nothing fit. But he did. Once an adored object of my camera's sole focus, his image has faded over time. The afterimage remains. No, not remains, haunts.
Steadying myself on the trunk, I remember the day my aunties discussed my fate over masala chai. My scandal, the latest spice to be savored. The pregnancy was mine to nurture, not some errant branch to be pruned. Yet the execution was flawless, and my family's worries ceased with my menstrual flow. The only remains delivered to me that day were shame and self-imposed isolation. They placed the event into the annals of our collective history, like a postcard from our cousin in Kenya.
“It's for the best,” they'd say. I'd agree while carrying my stillborn hatred rotting within. I place a hand on my belly, the baby weight I wear without any baby to show. I let go of the breath I'd been holding for decades and inhale the damp, earthy woods. Anger, a chasm that had separated me from everyone, rages within like a storm shaking the treetops, and I scream for all that was and could never hope to be. A family photograph I never developed yet still held its negative.
At the forest's heart lies a magnolia tree. Its glorious flowering is hidden to those who never seek her out. I dig, revealing a tangle of roots below. I take out the laminated sonogram from my pocket, my little lima bean, and bury it deep within that protective nest. Watering it with my tears. I step back from my impromptu grave-site, wipe the dirt on my jeans, and ready my camera. One tiny family photo before I prepare for the larger portrait this evening.
***
My eyes adjust outside the woods as if stepping out of a darkroom. I breathe, alive with new growth and renewed purpose. As I ride back to my role as Masi, the camera pounds my back propelling me forward. My open jacket slaps my forearms as the wind my speed generates plays across my smiling face, caresses my cheeks, and tousles my unruly hair. For a moment, I'm free.
Originally published in 2022 TL;DR Press Mosaics Anthology
Comments
Post a Comment