Fiction: A drag queen from Mumbai returns to their ancestral village to confront a demonic tree
· Scroll
When I was twenty-four, I washed up in a downmarket pub in Mumbai. During the day, I needed to help the chef; in the evening, I worked as a waiter. At night, I would clean up the pub after the patrons left. Often, my work extended into the wee hours, and later, I would lie awake in the corner of the utility room, watching the fan move in infinite circles.
Visit asg-reflektory.pl for more information.
Months passed by. I floated through the days, keeping myself busy doing my chores, smiling occasionally, and humming to myself. The pub owner seemed to be a good person, and I made friends with the chef and the bartender. To the world outside, I was a well-groomed waiter – white shirt, black trousers, black waistcoat, and a pair of perfectly polished black shoes. But deep in my heart, unuttered questions sedimented and weighed me down like a grindstone. Who am I really? What have I turned into? How long can I pretend to be a man? I evaded them, just like I avoided that full-length mirror in the pub’s toilet. I hardly looked at anything reflective, be it the bar’s mirrored wall, the polished granite tables, or my heart. And then, I came across...