For the next few years, what that devi meant kept changing like the colors on a mood stone. Sometimes it was like a slap and a warning; sometimes like the shrug of a friend who chooses to overlook a slip and pretends to forget; and sometimes, it burned through me like muted, imperiled consent. Go away is what one said to the devil, when the devil is already in us, and what he meant with that look in his eyes as he watched me walk away was, If you don’t leave now, I won’t fight you.
