Bisma Jay

Mint Green Walls

I honestly wonder what it’s like to know that once you come out to your family that everything will be okay. That you will all still be safe and happy and love one another. I know that’s what family is like, unconditional love at its best, that is how it’s supposed to be. However, what if it’s not always like that? What if you get the rug pulled from underneath you and all of that safety and comfort that once was is no longer there holding you up. What if the rug was pulled by those unconditional loving parents you hoped for? You dreamed for? What would happen then? I can tell you what would happen.

You end up packing up your room when no one is looking. Carefully folding the maroon dress pants your mother bought you, the mustard yellow blouse you wore to the family picnic, and the black sweater you stole from your brother’s closet. You then walk over to the very bottom drawer on the left side of your dresser and take out the mesh bodysuit your father would have a heart attack over, the shorts you were forbidden to ever wear, and all of the crop tops you mercilessly cut up for sneaky school dances. I took what was left of my double life as a queer Muslim teen living with their overbearing parents and I packed them up one by one in big black garbage bags ready for transport.

After a sleepless night riddled with anxiety, I waited until both my parents had gone to work, hearing their heavy footsteps walking towards the door and the keys turn in the lock, while my brother slept soundly next door to me. I took my giant garbage bags, carrying them upstairs, one by one, to the back door, waiting for a taxi to pull up and take me away. Before I left, I took one last walk around my family home. I touch the mint green walls of my bedroom, walls that have housed my pain for too long. I stand in the kitchen, imagining my mother cooking dinner,chicken biryani to be exact, that was always my favorite. I go to my dad’s study and flip through his notebook, carefully hand written notes decorate the pages. I leave my goodbye letter on his desk, balancing it along his monitor.

I slip out through the back door and my yellow taxi pulls up, I pack my belongings in the trunk. It’s not much, just my acoustic guitar and 2 bags of clothes, I didn’t need anything else. Well, maybe I did need more, at least I hope for more, but more wasn’t coming with me. The hope for more was left in those mint green walls, along with any trace of the person my family once knew.

- Bisma Jay