There's Something About Mira

by Sonali Dev

Bandaging festered wounds always makes them worse in the long term. You have to open them up, let them breathe, treat the infection.

“People are dicks, Miru. Society has given them permission to be dicks as long as their evil is focused on those who can’t protect themselves.”

“I don’t know why people associate that word with the physical. If you’re in love, if your hearts recognize each other as a piece of themselves, you’re lovers. When will people stop using lust to devalue love?”

Even after everything, I do believe that our families who separated us did want us to be happy. They just couldn’t define happiness as anything outside of what they were taught to define as normal.

For the first time in my life, my mother doesn’t yell at me when she’s angry. I’m so grateful to whoever invented the silent treatment, I send up a prayer to rest their passive-aggressive soul.

“When you’re true to yourself, even when something hurts, it feels good. When you’re betraying yourself, even when something is supposed to feel good, it hurts.”

“Tell me you’ll be okay, Krish.” He takes a breath. “If returning to your old life will make you happy, I will be okay. As long as you feel seen and cared for, I’ll be okay. As long as no one makes you feel like you’re lucky to have them, I will be okay. As long as you promise never to put yourself away again, I will be okay.”

We have no way to predict the future, but the star in Druv’s life will always be Druv. The thing that’s changed is that I no longer want to be part of the Druv story, and I can see the labor I’ll have to do to shift our relationship from that to the Druv and Mira story or the Sometimes Mira and Sometimes Druv Depending on the Situation story. With Krish, we’re already there. I’m already part of a we with him.

With Druv, who I’ll be is who I’ve trained at being all my life: first a wife, daughter, daughter-in-law, mother. With Krish, my conditioning digs into my skin. My shields block my view. With him I’m Mira first.

There’s something about me when I’m with him. And I think it’s that I really like who I am.