Page 103 of The Bodyguard Proposal

Turning to face her, I force words out. “This kind of publicness is what I’m feeling done about. How are we so calm about it? I don't wantmoreof it. It feels like I'm spinning. That I can't stop.”

When Mohinder Uncle starts to argue, my mother lifts a hand. “Mohinder, you can go.”

He reluctantly stands up and walks away. As soon as the door closes again, my mother takes a deep breath. “What do you need, Komal? I'm here for you.”

I’m still clawing at the pillow. She gazes at that, then at my clenched jaw, or maybe my tightly scrunched eyebrows. Getting up, I watch as she locks the doors connecting our living room to the rest of the house.

“We’re screaming,” says Mom.

I don’t know what it means until she grabs a pillow of her own and throws it against the wall, hitting the corner of a vase. It drops and clanks, not breaking. The noise is like the last drop of water on a spoon that spills over. Not sure who starts first, but we are both stomping, and then beating up the couch.This is the real release, not my almost-tears from earlier.

At some point a pillow cracks, and feathers puff into the air. I’m yanking them out by the handful, and my mom is next to me ripping the hole wider, and we are both sayingScrew this!repeatedly.

When the pillow deflates, I move to another one, raising it in the air and bringing it down against the floor. Huffing and heaving, we do this until we’re glowing with sweat and lyingdown. Our heads turn, and we laugh. It's not a fun laugh. It's an incredulous, deranged kind of laugh. Arealone.

“I'm sorry,” my mom says again.

“I know.”

“If we could do nothing, I would,” she whispers.

“I know.”

“And I understand how you are feeling... but Mohinder’s plans work out. Trust that we're in good hands.”

That's not the issue. I don’t think she heard me earlier. Or... I don’t think I told her properly. Or really, myself, before this. It feels like we are on a pendulum of a swing that is going to keep going if I don't immediately park my feet on the ground. And if I don't do it now, it will pick up so much speed that I won't ever feel like I can step off.

Staring back up at the ceiling, I have to wait a few beats before I can finally say it. “This isn’t the life I see when I close my eyes and imagine myself, Mom. Acting—I don't think it's what makes me happy. Actually—I know it isn't.”

The bandaid is ripped. Somehow, I finally said the words out loud that my heart has been whispering to me for so long. Words I’ve tried to bury because they would inconvenience so many people if I dared to say them.

My mother twists onto her side and inches herself up so our faces line up. She’s looking at me with such confusion. “I get you are angry, and rightfully so, but I don’t understand. Since when do you not want to act? Did something happen in London?”

Many things happened, but London didn’t turn me into a brand new person. More like being uncomfortable in a new city stirred the real me out. It made me settle into a braver pattern. It gave me the physical distance to allow experiences to grow in me. To yield, expand, challenge, be troubled, stress, and triumph. So many things the city gave me. When you lose the fear of being reprimanded by others and the world, you findout who you truly are without fear. Living in a vacuum without consequences, even briefly, let me find that ignored voice inside me. It let me start hearing myself.

She sees something in my expression, and she pulls herself up onto the couch. I’ve got no choice but to do the same, because I want her to take this seriously.

“What happened in London?” My mother is gathering facts. “Tell me everything.”

I want her to see me, so I give her more than I expect to.

I tell her about how I had to see London as my last hurrah, how I packed as many adventures into it as I could, and how the longer I stayed there, the more I wanted to dissociate with Pollywood. That I hated getting emails about the movie, and how I got such pangs of envy looking at strangers on the street. How jealous I got because their mistakes mattered differently, how no one is watching all the time, and how they aren’t surrounded by people paid to be there. That being famous is a great life, but not one that I've chosen. That it's given me so much, but I don't want to inherit it in the way she wants.

And then—in a stumble—I say I met someone, stopping short of saying Huan’s name.

My mother latches onto that fact quickly.

“He’s put this idea in your head that acting won’t make you happy?—”

“—I’m twenty-six. This isn’t about some boy, Mom.”

“—think what Mohinder Uncle will say when he hears you are changing your future for a boy. What will your friends think of this behaviour?”

I can’t believe it.

“Did you not hear me? I don’t want this?—”

“—the timing… I had a feeling about London, but I wanted to respect your decision?—”

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