Brown Nailpolish

by: Deepti Paul   

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Ugh. she had to get it off her mind. She glanced at her nails, and decided that the pale lavender color had to go. It was last week's fling. Today she found her new love: jungle green. She looked over at her collection of colors in the basket next to her. The bottles almost reached the hundred count. She wondered what the green and a couple of her old colors would look together, and she reached over to grab a few choice colors. As she opened up a couple of bottles, she imagined a nailpolish formula in her mind. She frowned, as she thought of her mother's exasperated voice over her color combinations,

"Why can't you get more decent colors... like brown? it's more adult like.."

Jungle green was Aisha's way of proving she was still a child.

She opened up the nail polish remover cap and let the fumes penetrate the air. She immersed her fingers, one by one, as Janet changed her tone to a mellow ballad. Her mother didn't even understand her this obsession of hers. How could she, when she didn't comprehend that she wasn't ready for the next step in her life? Her mother was empty slate when in came to Aisha's feelings. There was nothing there. Aisha had come to accept it, as if being Indian in an American society was a penalty she had to suffer. She accepted her mother's hypocritical views on most anything.

Individualism is not a value. Live and breathe your ancestors." Why do you listen to this stupid pots and pan music, when you have this beautiful cutlture behind your own music?" She could almost hear her mother.

Your Parents know your destiny because they pay for tuition. "Why don't you study something that will make you some money, instead of wasting my money on stupid sculptures?" The high pitched voice burned her ears.

A person cannot be given any breathing space between being someone's child and someone's spouse. "Now, that your in college, we must go to India and find an appropriate match.."

On this rule, Aishe tried and tried her best to explain her situation to her mother. But the conceot seemed futile, as the next day, her mother came up with a new plan to snatch up a well-to-do guy. Recently the plan had been to submerge the house in wedding pictures of Aisha's school mates. So what if everyone and their mother was getting married? she thought, She didn't need wedlock to make her a woman.

She reached over and analyzed the photo once again, being extra careful not to spill the carefully arrayed but open bottles of nailpolish. The ugly moustached guy looked happy enough. But was it her or friend looked as if she was ready to commit suicide? Her face was expressionless, but her creased forehead, pale complexion, and pressed lips of a forced smile, told her everything.

Questions invaded Aisha'a brain. Was this wedding to her approval? Aisha searched her memory for any hint of her friend's disapproval of the marriage. Nothing at all. But yet, she was forced. She knew it. Tears started to well up in her eyes as she recalled her childhood. Were all these years of study and tradition for this ? For this unhappy picture? Are we all porcelin dolls for another man? she thought as she glared at the ugly man's moustache. Aisha threw herself down, sobbing for her childhood friend. She didn't notice the knocked over bottles of nailpolish. Her friend chose to be accepted by the soceity that raised her, rather than be condemned. Was there a way out for her? Maybe if she explained again to her mother, showed her the state of her friend in the picture....

Aisha looked up from her sobbing state at the oozing colors from the bottles. The lovely bright colors had sprawled out and intertwined to create the color of all her nightmares - Brown.