“And then I answered. Mom said, ‘Who are you with? Will call you later’ and she hung up. And so I left his room, went down to my room, and called her back.”
In the conversation that followed, Ananya casually told her mom the friend she was with was James, an African she had met in her class. It was only a month later that Ananya admitted to Samita that she had feelings for James, and they were casually dating.
“I was mad with Ananya,” Samita said. “First and foremost, because he was a black guy that was the first thing that hit me. I told her, ‘I feel you’ve broken my heart, and you’ve broken my trust in you and my faith in you.’
“If he was an Indian, I would have reacted, but not as much. It was a complete shock when she said it was a black guy. So I’m like ‘What the bloody hell? Do you understand like I’m fighting for you every moment of the day, among a million problems? Why can’t you stay straight and just forget about all this and concentrate on studies?’ It was more because he was a black guy, and what that would mean for how I’d have to deal with others because of that.”
Ananya’s understanding of her mother’s reaction was somewhat different.
“I always thought she’d be more open about these things because of her nature. She’s always been an accepting human being. I never had deadlines. She never had trust issues with me. I never ever did anything bad, and I felt in spite of proving myself so many times, just because I liked somebody that I’d broken her trust. It just didn’t seem fair.”
But despite Ananya’s expectation that her mother would be more accepting, why did she still hide the fact she was dating James for the short while that she did?
