By Alexis Rae

There was a certain pride in the way my hands carried the evidence of my labor, a quiet assurance that they knew how to endure.


At night, when the house fell silent, I rummaged through my bathroom drawer, my fingers skimming past half-used tubes of lotion, crumpled receipts I had forgotten to throw out, and makeup compacts that had long since lost their color. Little bottles that promised softness, tools that claimed to smooth rough edges, and untouched Sephora birthday gifts that had collected dust.

I told myself I kept them because they might come in handy one day — as if I would magically become the kind of person who actually followed a skincare routine instead of slathering on CeraVe moisturizing cream and calling it a night.

My bathroom drawer was a collection of all the products I could ever need to make myself feel put- together.

Somewhere beneath the clutter was a cheap set of nail polishes I had picked up at the Omega Dollar store for $1.99. The colors ranged from yellow to pink, purple, red, and black. I raised my hands toward my face, examining which color would best complement my skin tone.

Red brought out the harshness of my hands. Yellow was too bright and not my style. I stopped contemplating and went with my usual black polish.

My nostrils flared at the pungent smell of the polish as I twisted the creaky cap. . The brush was frayed, leaving drops on the white floor. I swiped the first stroke and hesitated for a moment. It was uneven, streaky almost. I tried to smooth it out, but the more I worked at it, the messier it became.

I sighed in defeat as I wiped at the edges of my cuticles. The pores along the crevices of my hands seemed to scream back at me, as if I’d done them a disservice by trying to drown out their appearance with nail polish. My cuticles became dry, my hands rougher than I wanted them to be.

I flexed my fingers, expecting them to soften under my gaze — to shrink into something more delicate. Under the harsh bathroom light, they turned into something crude. In such a vulnerable state, I looked at my horrible paint job and thought about all my hands had been through, what they had done to deserve my merciless judgment.

---

I grew up in a house where hands were meant for work, not decoration. Most of my adolescence was spent scrubbing plates until my fingertips wrinkled, cutting prickly thorns off nopales that left splinters around the edges of my hands, and getting scars from baby goats that  bit me as I fed them.

I was used to the rough, grainy side of being a young girl — getting excited to do yard work with my dad, pulling weeds from the garden until my hands ached, and feeling a sense of pride in the work we’d done together. As much as I yearned to listen to stories of Disney princesses and happily ever afters, I craved the satisfaction of dirt under my nails and the warm sting of the sun glaring at my back.

There was a certain pride in the way my hands carried the evidence of my labor, a quiet assurance that they knew how to endure. But endurance was a double-edged sword. The more I worked and lounged in the sun, the more the pigment of my hands deepened.

I compared my hands to those of my father. Mine were small and delicate compared to his large and weathered palms. A lifetime of hard work was etched into his skin, reflecting everything he had sacrificed, while mine were barely learning the language of responsibility. I felt as though I could never match the weight of his hands.

They trembled beneath the pressure of his touch, unable to bear the same burden that seemed so natural for him. His fingers were thick and calloused, rough in texture, always trimmed to avoid injuries while doing outdoor work. My younger self wished I had the same depth to my hands that he had, minus the calluses.

As I grew out of my single-digit years, an insatiable craving for change overtook me. I wanted to appear softer, more mature, and less awkward in my own skin. I longed for the kind of elegance I lacked in childhood.

At the age of 10, I began frequenting the local nail salon with my mother.I would beg her to let me get acrylic nails longer than I could manage. She would look at me like I was crazy, but the desperation in my eyes eventually pushed her to say yes.

The nail artist quickly became one of my best friends. She asked the same questions every time I sat in her chair:

Do you have a boyfriend? What's a pretty girl like you doing without a boyfriend?

I was only 10, wearing a red M&M shirt and flip-flops my mother had purchased for me at Walmart.

No, I don't have a boyfriend.

She would graze my hands softly, occasionally stopping to ask if it hurt. I always shook my head no, although I hated the friction of her e-file machine. The high-pitched whirring sent a shiver up my spine. She always worked with gentle precision despite my slightly-clenched fists, pausing every so often to blow the dust from my fingertips. It was a strange kind of tenderness — one that made me feel cared for, even as I winced at the sensation.

I would turn to my mother, also getting her nails done at the table next to me, and ask her opinion on my new set. Her eyes would linger on me for a moment as if weighing each detail before giving her approval.

Que bonita, mija, she would reply before reaching her hand out and gently brushing a stray lock of hair behind my ear.

Her hands were gentle but firm. They had a calm certainty in their touch. They symbolized security — her hands were a place I knew I could always return to if I ever got lost.

---

It was a quiet insecurity, something no one pointed out, but one I felt in the way my fingers curled into themselves when I spoke, how I hid them in pockets or under my sleeves. When my friends pulled out their cameras to take group photos, I made sure my hands wrapped around my back so no one would notice the chipped polish or the unshaven fingers I had forgotten to maintain the night before.

My girlfriends instinctively knew how to pose, their fingers delicately draping over the edges of their clothes, knowing which angles suited them best. I admired their beauty and confidence, how they exuded that confidence onto me when I felt like I didn’t belong in the same frame — gently caressing the sides of my arm while shifting positions for the photo. Their hands softened the roughened edges of mine, pulling light from my palms I didn’t know existed.

Echoes of laughter and music filled the night. The beat of the music thumped through the floor and into my chest. I stood surrounded by my friends, feeling the pulse seep into my bones. One of my friends caught my eye, grinning wildly as she grabbed my hands and spun me around, pulling me into the center of the floor. I laughed, incredibly dizzy, but she held onto my hands and never flinched at the way they felt in hers.

I lost myself in the joy of it. Our bodies moved in tandem, our laughter mingled with the music. For once, I didn’t worry about the way my hands looked or how they felt. I just danced.

I failed to realize that the party actually sucked and we were the only two girls dancing. It was so freeing, to be able to live in the moment without the shackles of my insecurities holding me back.

I can’t quite pinpoint when or where people begin to realize the best aspects of themselves hide in the places they least expect, but slowly, everything started to fall into place. My hands became a an ode to the young girl who grew up with dirt under her nails, scrapes on her knees, and a longing for the sound of rocks crunching beneath her feet as she ran without destination.

She learned the language of tenderness from her mother, whose touch eased every biting nerve. Together, they spoke a language of patience, each caress a verse of a calm lullaby. Over time, her fingertips came to understand all the languages of love they had ever held.

---

I stood at the door, watching my reflection in the glass. My fingers hung by my sides, still and patient as the polish dried. The muffled sound of my favorite songs filled the room. Slowly, my fingertips began to move along to the beat with no hesitation, no second-guessing.

My hands represented home, a letter to every moment I lived. ■