Jhumpa Lahiri Quotes

It's easier to surrender to confinement.

She had denied herself the pleasure of openly sharing life with the person she loved.

No more bells ringing in the middle of the afternoon demolishing the rest of the day. No more waiting for the situation to change.

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.

The blood of too many, dissolving the very stain.

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.

On weekdays, as soon as she picked Bela from the bus stop and brought her home, she went straight into the kitchen, washing up the morning dishes she'd ignored, then getting dinner started. She measured out the nightly cup of rice, letting it soak in a pan on the counter. She peeled onions and potatoes and picked through lentils and prepared another night's dinner, then fed Bela. She was never able to understand why this relatively unchallenging set of chores felt so relentless. When she was finished, she did not understand why they had depleted her

I owed the greater apology, but at the same time I knew that was done was done, that no matter what I said now I would never be able to make it right.