She supposed that all those years of loving a person who was dishonest had taught her a few things. - Jhumpa Lahiri

Each revelation was devastating. Everything she said. And yet, even as my life shattered in pieces, I felt as if I were finally coming up for air.

She learned that an act intended to express love could have nothing to do with it. That her heart and her body were different things.

Nor was her love for Udayan recognizable or intact. Anger was always mounted to it, zigzagging through her like some helplessly mating pair of insects. Anger at him for dying when he might have lived. For bringing her happiness, and then taking it away. For trusting her, only to betray her. For believing in sacrifice, only to be so selfish in the end.