Purple Eye

What is the most valuable thing you've lost? Something that made you feel abandoned, a void that you think is unfillable.

I often think about things like these, especially when I'm hungry after work. This has been happening a lot lately. The suppressed memories have begun to resurface. Making it hard to focus. My shrink thinks I've been working too hard and that I should take a break. That I had been skipping on my medication. And some hormonal changes are bound to happen especially with these new changes happening to my body. She doesn't know crap, my shrink.

With a dying cigarette between my thin pale fingers, I watch the cold rain fall over this grey city from my cubicle window, wondering where the years went by. I should grab something to eat I think to myself and I switch my system off and head out.

The elevator music brought back the memories of the old rusty radio we had a long time ago. Back when I still had two parents.

I was an unusual boy unaware of this pretence that we call adult life. I didn't act and didn't talk to stay relevant. Back then you would find me walking around with my head bowed down, until one douche decided I was his punching bag for the day.

The memory of that fateful day makes me laugh. Max had been beating me for over a year now. In the hallways, on the school bus, or sometimes even in the class when no one was looking. One thing he didn't expect that day was to get blowback. The purple patch on this left eye was a sticker of humiliation, which told him what happens when you pick on the weak for too long. Max knew he had to wear it for days to come if not weeks. My knuckles still ached in Father Dan's office. Who made us shake hands and leave. 

As we crossed the door and entered the hallway Max whispered in my ear, "I am gonna kill you, little girl."

Now I've been around on this messed-up planet long enough to know good from evil. I have met some messed up people too. Have tasted gunpowder, smelled its sooty aroma, and have seen a bullet come out the barrel through the white smoke and disappear in my chest in slow motion - blasting out tiny fibres of tissues. But between you and me I assure you, that is not how death tastes, smells and looks like.

It tastes like the sour aftertaste of bad lunch, smells like a fruity eraser from pencil tops and scotch tape, and looks like a 12-year-old having his fist ready to strike you again as soon as you exit Father Dan's office. This time to truly kill you.

My whole life flashed before my eyes. The hallway was closing in. Sweat running down my eyebrows and taking off from the bridge of my nose. I wasn't scared of this piece of crap in front of me. If I could bruise his eye, I realized, I could beat him to a pulp if I wished. I just wanted out that day. And Max would be my aid.

Mother knew Father didn't that I was a girl trapped in a man's body.

"Walk like a man you piece of shit!", he'd demand every time I walked past him. Maybe war had made him twisted in place you and I wouldn't dare imagine. But I hated him. I wanted to shout back at him and stuff the tuna sandwich down his throat. But all I did was drop ice in his whiskey. And walk away. Shameful as a man and a woman. Trying to control the natural sway of my hips. 

At 8, tiny golden strands of hair began to pop on my arms and thighs. I remember feeling pukish, overnight my smooth skin had disappeared only to be replaced by these dirty follicles. Without thinking much I grabbed my father's razor and shaved them off in patches. Making my skin ruddy. You can imagine the havoc at my house the next morning, I'm not even gonna describe it.

I was jealous of my mother, who always had the most beautiful smooth skin, glistening with lotion and she always wore beautiful dresses. She was the epitome of grace and beauty. And I would never leave her hand when we went out.

I on the other hand was forced to wear rugged shoes and jeans and polos like my father. Who wanted to make a tough man outta his boy overnight.

Every Sunday I watched mother work in the garden, her skirt whirled like leaves in sunlight, as she watered the plants. And every morning she'd give a peck on my cheek before I boarded my school bus, I would inhale as much aroma as possible of her white Lilly perfume. From the bus window as I waved her bye-bye I saw her sparkly earrings, and I thought if I could listen closely, I could hear them chime.

I wanted that for myself. I did. I wanted that grace. I wasn't good at anything that Father demanded. I sucked at fishing. I couldn't skate on ice, I'd tire away easily while climbing rocks. But I never wore out copying poems, or making ice lollies or planting flowers in our garden.

I wanted to be more like a mother. I was obsessed with her Rimmel make-up box. And one day I mustered up all my courage to ask her, 

"Mother? Can I have that?", I said pointing at the makeup set on her dressing table. 

She was tidying up her hair. The brush leaving the strands of her blonde hair in perfect arrays of a waterfall over her shoulders. Her eyebrows squeezed and lips curved upwards.

"What for silly?", she said looking at my reflection on the side table mirror before her. I sat there swinging my legs, my hair covering the top of my eyebrows, pouting.

With one graceful motion, she picked up her make-up kit, emptied the contents in the drawer, and handed me the empty box. A smile on her face. As if to say,' what's mine is yours sweetheart'. 

I took the box with a pit growing in my stomach. I so wanted her to read my mind then so that she'd know I wanted to be more like her. I couldn't blame her. You see, to her, I was just her peculiar boy, who couldn't make friends like other kids. Right?

At nights I would stuff my head in my pillow. Trying to cover my ears. The sound of my mother crying in the next room made me sink with shame. I wanted to go to their room and say something. But I was scared of loud noises. The Glass smashing, yelling and the sounds of things thrown made me stay awake.

And every morning my parents would pretend that the dance of rage that happened last night, happened in silence. Father would be hidden behind the newspaper and mother would whisper sweet nothings in my ear. Asking me how I would enjoy an evening out at the zoo after school or how about a date at the movies.

***

I had just turned 11 that spring. And was home alone. I sneaked into my parents' bedroom and sat at the dressing table where mother sits. And as if in trance, I opened the drawer. I didn't know how or when I began applying the foundation on my face with my tiny fingers. I didn't know the right quantity, but I did my best to blend it on my skin. From the centre of my face until the end of my cheeks. It had a pinkish hue to match Mother's rosy cheeks, I could see how different it looked on me, but I was at peace.

Mother would sometimes apply blush on my cheeks to tickle me as I'd sit watching her get ready. I had seen her apply it delicately on her cheeks. And I tried to do the same. The girl I saw in the mirror was much more beautiful than the boy I was. As I was admiring my face, I saw mother enter the bedroom.

At first, I thought she was disheartened and disappointed in me. But her expression soon changed to what I think was plain old sadness.

There were tears in her eyes. And I realized how tiny I was in front of her. She hugged me tight and sobbed on my shoulders. She tidied my makeup and made pout to apply her cherry red lipstick. I thought she realized I was her daughter and was okay with it. And that was as close to feeling at one with myself as I've ever got.

She let me put on her earrings and also her sparkly sandals. My old shoes lay abandoned in the shoe rack.

After talking to me for hours and hours she gave me a bath, least father should discover. There weren't any fights that day at my house. But I was scared, one word to my father and I was sure that he'd kill me. Not figuratively, literally.

But nothing of that sort happened thankfully. A week later mother woke me up at night and said, "Sweetie, it's gonna be difficult, but will you promise not to ever forget me?"

My voice seemed to have disappeared as she gave me her green emerald earring, a new makeup box, and a brand new pair of sandals. Just like hers in a smaller size.

"Remember, I'll always love you and you are perfect just the way you are", I wish mother didn't leave my room. I was scared. Why wouldn't she take me with her. I froze.

The tears in her eyes and the red suitcase told me life is gonna change now. I saw her head out the door, wiping her eyes. From the window, I saw her cross the porch. She stopped and I thought she might look at my window and wave goodbye. But she didn't. I saw the man behind the wheel as she opened the car door. But I kept waving at her knowing well that she wouldn't wave back. 

The sound of the car engine woke up the neighbour's dog, who punched the night with its deafening barks. The car moved ahead without a jerk. Adding inches, kilometres, and light-years between me and mother. That was the last time I saw her.

I was about 13 when father was arrested for assault and breaking in. Soon I saw myself surrounded by my foster family. They were a good lot and always supported me. They were sure someday I'd grow up to be a hardworking man who would take a beautiful wife.

It was that year that I found myself having a faceoff with Max. Who caught me in the bathroom. I had my cherry red lipstick on. The green teardrop earring brushed against my cheek as I struggled to put on the sandals that my mother gave me. I had outgrown them years ago but every day I tried to put them on.

Everyday I'd dressup for 10 minutes. These 10 minutes in the bathroom where I was myself was holier than any sanctuary for me. I was myself then and no longer in need to scream my guts out. Only then could I deal with one thousand three-hundred thirty minutes that were left in my day. I could survive.

Max deciding to take a leak after school, triggered many life events for me. I saw the schemes forming in his mind as he looked at me with that devilish smile of his. And as if by stimuli I went ahead and punched him in the eye. 

At first, I thought I'd killed him but that was not the case. He got up and went running outside. I quickly changed and ran home. 

The next day we found ourselves in Father Dan's office. 

"He is a girl", he said, pointing at me. No one believed him. And when he said he'd kill me that day, all I could say to him was, "Try".

I was a prodigy at algebra and represented the school at the 1500 m hurdles race in the state championship. I was the "Excellence" in 'Pride in Excellence', that was written beneath our school emblem. 

I got an education, became a law-abiding citizen. Got a job. And over the years got into a habit of having an early evening snack at a Hot Dog cart right around the corner.

On my way there today, a homeless person came to me. 

"Miss, do you have any change?"

That voice. It took me back to that midnight. The same music in her voice. The same grace. Only she had a few wrinkles. Mother had changed a lot.

I was too scared to tell her who I wad. About how life had been after she left. With one arm around her shoulder, I took her to the hot dog cart and ordered two corn dogs.

It was only after taking a bite that she looked at my face and on the green teardrop earrings in my ear. Tears streaming down her eyes as she saw her girl, a spitting image of her. Never missing her boy.