There's Something About Mira

by Sonali Dev

Why is there a cruelty to friendship? All my life I had this need to come first for you. Now I would gladly be standing all the way at the end of your priorities if only I could see you one more time. I’ve often wondered if the life you gained when we lost each other was worth it. I suspect there is no easy answer to that. I know you’ve done amazing things already and you will do more. There are too many fatal diseases that are only fatal because you haven’t found a way to stop them yet. I can see it already. Work you’ll do. Machines you’ll create to break down cells that kill us. Magic you’ll make to heal the pieces that make our bodies breathe and hurt and bleed. I can see the trance in your eyes as you dig and push and inhale entire libraries so you can move something into place. The nights you stay up, the days you forget to eat. That’s the life I imagine you living. I hope there’s someone there telling you how beautiful you are, someone to cherish the force of nature you are, someone to scold you to rest. Another jealous and brutal piece of me wishes it’s me still, who sits on your shoulder, who makes you care for yourself because you can’t bear to upset me. I am there, you know. On your shoulder. As you are on mine. If there is happiness in this world it is knowing that we have that forever.