Lesbian God Says To Let It Go
God’s bangles chime as she gestures around her.
God tells me I don’t have to stay in Heaven if I don’t want to. She says there is no such thing as Heaven really, it’s just where they put the people who believe so strongly in it they can’t imagine anything else. She says what Heaven actually is, is infinite choice.
“It’s your dream, honey, go for gold.” God’s bangles chime as she gestures around her.
I say, thank you Lesbian God, but I have to stay, because, as you said, the people who strongly believe in Heaven are here.
“Not her again.” God shifts and her sari slips off her shoulder, angles and curves glistening.
Yeah. Her. She was the one who told me all about Heaven. She told me while we played with her Malibu Barbie Dreamhouse with the Corvette parked out front that I never got to drive because I was always Skipper. She told me about God, and purity and how Barbie would definitely go to Heaven, but Skipper hmm, Skipper she didn’t know.
“Sweetie, how long ago was all this?” God crosses her right knee over, her dimpled ankle flashing rubies.
We had so many sleepovers. She showed me the high pressure knob on her shower and how to angle it just so. She laughed at the face I made, her brown eyes bright, said I was tainted for sure. Bet she’d be surprised to see me here.
“So you want to show her up? Is that it?”
She dragged me into all those stupid drinking games. Always dared me to kiss her, Always darted her tongue like a snake, sniffing a way in.
“You could have said no, babe. Just saying.” God shrugs, pursing her plump lips.
And all the times she’d let me try on her stuff, how she’d smooth the fit over the curve of my breasts. “Just making sure it sits nice,” she’d say.
God picks my chin up, looking into my eyes. “Heaven means infinite choice, darling. Infinite choice.”
Heaven is only for little girls who have pure thoughts. Heaven is for those who have Barbies. Heaven is for those who know that kissing girls is just a game, just a show for the boys. Heaven is for those who know the line. Heaven is a fumble while half-asleep, a rogue hand finding your epicentre, another hand across your mouth to keep you silent. Heaven is a moment that never happened in the still, dark night.
“Sure, honey, that can be heaven if you want. I’m just letting you know there’s other places where people look in your eyes when they kiss you.” Lesbian God stands up, and she is infinitely tall, and just the right size, and she sashays towards a light so honey-gold, warm like a midday lake, sweet like mango, soft like my own heart, and all I have to do is follow.
Sumitra Singam is a Malaysian-Indian-Australian coconut who writes in Naarm/Melbourne. She travelled through many spaces, both beautiful and traumatic to get there and writes to make sense of her experiences. Her work has been published widely, nominated for a number of Best Of anthologies, and was selected for Best Microfictions 2024. She works as a psychiatrist and trauma therapist and runs workshops on how to write trauma safely. She’ll be the one in the kitchen making chai (where’s your cardamom?). You can find her and her other publication credits on Bluesky: @pleomorphic2
