The Bandit Queens

by Parini Shroff

She ate no one’s salt but her own.

She identified with the Bandit Queen’s disappointing revelation about marriage: the necklace men tied to them, it was no prettier than the rope tying a goat to a tree, depriving it of freedom. But freedom, Geeta had once heard or read somewhere, is what a person does with what’s been done to her.

“Love can stay. But that’s because it’s not a feeling.” She already disagreed with him but asked anyway, “What is it, then?” “It’s a commitment.” “Like an obligation?” “No, not in a bad way. I just mean it’s a choice you renew every day.”

The amount of bullshit that fell from that fucker’s mouth could fertilize half of India.

She’d expended so much energy vying for a broken seat at an uneven table. Fuck it, she’d make her own damn table.

For me, fiction is when research meets compassion; I believe this is often why facts don’t change people’s minds, but stories do.