In the Key of Nira Ghani

CHAPTER ONE

ISOLATION IS AN ORGANIC COMPOUND

The cow’s eyeball floats in the formaldehyde. It’s disembodied, a part cut off from the whole, just like me, but there’s a difference between me and the cloudy orb. It stares out at the kids as though it knows the secret the rest of us are dying to find out.

McKenzie catches me looking at the jar. “Are you offended?”

“What?”

“We killed a cow. Are you mad at us or something? Aren’t they sacred to your people or whatever?”

“I’m not Hindi,” I tell her for what must be the millionth time.

“It’s pronounced ‘offended.’” She slows down the last word and says it louder, like I’m both illiterate and deaf. Smiles, then glowers when I don’t smile back. “No one’s trying to hurt your feelings. We just like burgers.”

And right there is the reason that when I graduate high school, I’m taking off to a university that’s light-years away from this town. And once I get to that faraway place, I’m disowning my parents for moving us to a neighborhood where I’m the only brown girl in the entire school and have to put up with idiots like McKenzie King. I go back to my staring contest with the eyeball.

“Why?” McKenzie chews on her gum, blows a blue bubble until it pops.

“Why what?”

“Why are cows sacred to your people?”

“They’re not—” Crap. She has me on a technicality. I’m not Hindu, but some of my people are. I sigh. “My grandmother—who, unlike me, is Hindu—says the cow represents growth, life, and nonviolence. That’s why it’s sacred.”

“But you’re, like, Indian.”

“No, I’m Guyanese.” Judging from the look on her face, I’ve just fried her brain cell. Cell. Singular.

“Huh? But you’re Indian.”

“I’m from Guyana. So, yeah, I’m Guyanese Indian. West Indian. It’s a different thing than—”

Her face lights up. “No kidding? Ghana? I didn’t know you were African.”

The next time my parents ask me why my science marks aren’t higher, I’m going to tell them it’s because of McKenzie. Because if I were any smarter in physics, bio, or chemistry, I’d make a laser gun and vaporize the curly hair right off her pink scalp.

The bell rings, and I breathe out the tightness in my chest. For the next forty minutes, it’s physics and the origin of the universe, and I’m craving every second of it. Physics has to have the answer because the other sciences are letting me down.

Biology says the visual system of humans is fine-tuned and able to detect minute variations in color and surface edges. So why don’t the kids at school see me? Even McKenzie, who finds a way to get in my face every day, wouldn’t notice if I disappeared. If the police came and questioned her about a missing brown girl, she’d say, “Brown? Like Indian? That reminds me, I want a burger.”

The door opens, and the teacher comes in, but it’s not Mr. Tamagotchi. It’s a sub. “Sit down, everyone. Let’s take attendance and get started.” She flips through Mr. Tamagotchi’s agenda and laughs. “Oh, an overview of string theory. I bet he’s not talking about shoe strings or cheese strings.”

No one laughs at her joke. For a second, I feel a rush of sympathy. This school is full of kids who’ve been together since pre-K. They’re one collective brain, with acne and a BO problem. I’ve been at the school since my family moved to the neighborhood two years ago, and I’m still the one who’s alone in class when the teacher asks us to pair up or make groups.

“Bye-bye Nira Gee-Hani?”

The class titters.

“It’s pronounced Bee-Bee,” I say, glad my dark skin hides the flush of pink creeping up my cheeks. “And it’s Gah-nee. Bibi Nira Ghani. But I’m just Nira.” I keep asking the school to use Nira instead of Bibi on the class lists. So far, my request is as invisible as I am.

“Okay, thanks.” She moves to the next name on her list.

“Do you have any sisters, Bibi?” The question comes from one of McKenzie’s buddies.

“No. Only child.”

“Well, if you ever do,” she says, “you should tell your parents to name them Cici and Didi.”

McKenzie laughs. “They could go down the alphabet. Until they get to Zizi.”

Her friend can’t contain herself. “OMG. Can you imagine? Pee-Pee!”

“Double OMG, if it was Pee-Pee and a boy?”

In forty years, when I pick a senior citizen home for my parents—and I will because no way are those crazies living with me (and I don’t care what Guyanese culture says about respecting your elders)—I’m picking the crappiest home out there. And when my parents ask why, I’m going to hand these moments out like bitter candy.

“Nira,” says McKenzie, “we’re just joking.”

It’s not an apology. It’s what it always is, McKenzie being insensitive and justifying it by suggesting I don’t know how to take a joke.

“Okay,” the sub says when she’s finished with attendance. “Give me a second to read over your teacher’s notes.”

“Hey, Nira,” says McKenzie.

I hide my face behind my book.

“Nira, hey, Nira.” She won’t take the hint.

“What?”

“Did you ever ride elephants when you lived in Africa?”

I go back to reading.

“Sorry,” says the teacher. “I may have missed a student. Who’s Nira?”

Seriously. When I talk, does the air from my lungs lack the necessary force and pressure to reach people’s ears? “Me.”

She frowns. “Aren’t you Bye-Bye?”

“I’m thinking of going bye-bye,” I mutter, wishing someone near me would hear and get the joke and smile my way. But when I look up, McKenzie’s gaze is on me, and there’s no smile, just an unreadable expression on her face.

“Your teacher says I’m not to call on you if there’s discussion or questions.” Her frown deepens. “Why is that?”

“Because she always knows the answer,” says McKenzie. “And he wants the rest of us to”—she takes a breath and mimics his nasal pitch—“‘try and put in an effort. Come on, people, give Nira’s vocal cords a rest.’”

McKenzie does a great impression. She even screws up her face the way Mr. Tamagotchi does when he thinks we’re not trying to reach our potential.

“Oh, uh—” says the sub.

“It’s not fair.” McKenzie leans back. “Real life is all about collaborative problem-solving.”

Unbelievable. Now she decides to grow a second brain cell.

“If she knows the answers, let her talk. Her people have been oppressed enough. She has a voice, right? Let her use it.”

God, I hate my life.

My usual table’s waiting when I get to the cafeteria. At the back, in the corner. The other two walls are floor-to-ceiling windows, but only the popular kids get to sit in the sun.

Emily waits for me at the corner table. She’s blond and blue-eyed with freckles, but she also has a scar from surgery on a cleft lip and thirty extra pounds from her love affair with chocolate bars. She waves when she sees me and points to the chair next to her.

I love her for that. I’m irritated with her for that. Waving and pointing. Like somehow the seats at that table are restricted access, instead of perpetually empty. I sit beside her but don’t open my lunch bag. The smell of tuna wafts from it. I glance over at the popular tables, where they’re eating pita pockets stuffed with deli meat, peppers, lettuce, and cheese. It looks so good; I can almost taste it.

McKenzie’s there. Watching. She’s always surveilling us. It’s like she’s part of the nerd police, the number-one detective of the uncool squad. I turn away so I don’t have to see her and her perfect lunch.

I open my bag and peer inside. Remind myself I’m lucky to have food when there are probably starving children down the street. But the sandwich squishes in my mouth. Mom hasn’t figured out the correct ratio of mayo to tuna. It’s either dry enough to use as a desiccant or so wet, I think it could bring the fish back to life. I’ve tried to tell her I can make my lunch, but she’s got this stupid hang-up about being a working mom. Like making my lunch makes up for not being there for parent-teacher meetings and assemblies, or baking me brownies after school.

Emily tips her cloth bag upside down, and four chocolate bars roll out. “It’s been a multichocolate bar kind of morning.”

“Four? What happened?”

“Rope climbing. This body’s meant for a lot of things, but holding on to a piece of rope and climbing for the ceiling isn’t one of them.”

Oh, man. If she had to do it for gym, then so will I. Rope climbing. I barely have the upper body strength to throw off my bed covers.

“Did you see?”

There’s the other reason Emily’s at this table instead of with the pretty people. Her habit of talking in half sentences. It’s like she’s constantly looking for her psychic twin, the one who can finish her thoughts by reading her mind. “See what?”

“The band poster. They’re doing auditions for jazz band.”

The sudden image flashes through my brain. Me, under the pink and yellow lights, eyes closed, wailing a solo on a shiny trumpet. Reality raises the houselights. My parents will never let me try out. “Oh, cool.”

“You should audition. You’re amazing. Every time you play, I think of Neil Armstrong.”

“You mean Louis Armstrong. He was the trumpet player. Neil was the astronaut.”

“That’s who I mean. You make me think of moonlight and defying gravity.”

I may have only one friend in the world, but she’s awesome enough to count for five. I tried to tell her that once, and she said, “Is that a joke about my weight?”

Which made me want to die until she laughed and said, “It’s so easy to screw with you.”

“You should try out.” She shoves the purple paper at me.

It’s a flyer advertising the auditions. Black musical notes border the edge, and in the middle are silhouettes of players holding guitars and saxes. My heart goes liquid at the thought of being one of those figures.

“You’d nail it like a hammer from the heavens.”

I love playing trumpet, but I’ve never had formal training, never been tested by the Royal Conservatory. “It’s a hobby.” I get enough rejection in regular life. My ego’s fine with that. But I’m sure it’ll pack its bags and walk out if I set it up for extracurricular rejection by trying to compete with serious musicians.

“If I could play something, I’d try out.” Her eyes go dreamy. The candy droops from her mouth and a line of caramel forms a soft U.

“You should still do it. Maybe there’s room for a cymbal player or someone who can play a rain stick.”

“I don’t know. How will the audience see me if I’m hidden behind a rain stick?”

I don’t understand why she’s not at a table by the windows. She’s funny and not in an ego-beating way. Emily likes her curves. She likes them so much, she doesn’t mind laughing with them. With them, not at them.

My fingers find the tufts of hair growing on my jawline. I wish I liked my swarthy, dark face enough to joke about it. “Maybe we can drench you with hydrogen peroxide and luminol.” My fingers fall away from my face. “You’d glow like a firework.”

“We should do that for you, too. Then you can do an interpretive dance while I play.” She mimes shaking a rain stick and starts laughing, and her face lights up with joy.

I catch everyone looking our way and realize we’re too loud. Plus, Emily’s miming could look like she’s doing something a lot dirtier than shaking a stick. Before I can shush her or stop her movements, she elbows me and grunts. I follow the line of her gaze.

Noah.

When it comes to me and dealing with the rest of the kids, we’re like positively charged magnets. We’re the same, and you’d think that would bring us together. But magnets of the same charge repel each other. Not Noah. His differentness isn’t a positively or negatively charged magnet. It’s a gravitational pull, and it keeps everyone in his orbit.

I’m probably the only straight girl in school who doesn’t lust after him. Not because I don’t think he’s attractive. He’s all dark curly hair (please, can I touch it?), intense brown eyes (did you just look into my soul?), and great body (hold it against me). I’m just smart enough to know when someone’s not just out of my league, but out of my universe, too.

“I heard he’s trying out for jazz band.”

Of course, he is.

“The guitar.”

Of course, he is.

“But he might be adding sax, this time.”

Shocker. Noah lives the life of legends and dreams. His dad not only gives him anything he wants, but he also takes Noah out of school for a week at a time. They go off and have adventures. Then Noah returns, carrying stories on his back, and wearing souvenirs on his arms and chest. Not the touristy kind. The other kind. The kind of shirts and accessories you get when you don’t just immerse yourself in a culture, but you become the culture itself.

He’s been gone for a few days. Today, he’s wearing a graphic tee, worn jeans. The magical object in question is a leather band around his wrist. McKenzie and her crew are already rushing to him, touching the band, their fingers playing against his skin.

What is it about his different that makes it better than my different? Part of it is what he wears. Clothes talk. They have a conversation with people before you ever open your mouth. It’s shorthand, but it’s a layered, exotic language. They tell everyone about your hopes and dreams, how you see the world, and what you think of yourself. The kids at school, their clothes say they belong, that everything is theirs. My clothes don’t say anything. They just apologize for my existence.

When the bell rings, I head to gym. It’s my least favorite class, but I like the egalitarianism of the red sweats and white cotton shirts. If aliens landed and looked at us, no one could tell I’m poor. No one could see I don’t belong. I finish dressing, lace my sneakers, and head into the gym. And I hold the fantasy of being connected as I walk through the doors. Clasp the daydream close until I’m forced to open my mouth and break the spell.