BADANI, Sejal - The Storyteller's Secret

THE STORYTELLER’S SECRET
by Sejal Badani

QUOTES FOR DISCUSSION

It’s not who I ever thought I would be, but then I’ve learned life rarely works out as we hope.

Pg. 3

As if I were a science project, she tells me my future in clipped words devoid of emotion.

Pg. 4

When we finally became pregnant...

Pg. 13

Since I never confided in them before, I don’t tell them the truth now—that moments of blackness still follow me everywhere and that the pain from the D&C is a daily reminder of my loss.

Pg. 16

My mother was physically present for me in every tangible way that could matter. It is the intangible connection we have somehow always lacked.

Pg. 17

“She’s hurting right now.” Anger stings me. I am hurting too, but my father always has taken my mother’s side first. “She received some news from India,” he explains.

Pg. 18

I am escaping my reality in the hopes of saving my sanity.

Pg. 28

... nothing has prepared me for the reality of my parents’ homeland and its contrast with mine.

Pg. 29

Your grandmother believed photographs hid the truth about a person, offering only an illusion.

Pg. 36

“It was because I was unwanted, dismissed as a burden on society, that I met your grandmother.” His face softens at the mention of her. “For that I would live a hundred times as an untouchable.”

Pg. 37

I keep an eye out for wayward reptiles while I bathe quickly

Pg. 41

My instincts caution me to run, to refuse his offer, and let my mother’s secrets stay safe. But the part of me that is broken, that yearns for something other than my relentless pain, demands the truth.

Pg. 43

Amisha had stood by Chara’s side when her two daughters were married. Amisha had remembered her own wedding day and had laid her arm across Chara’s shoulders in comfort and empathy. When Chara turned fully into Amisha’s arms and sobbed, the two crossed an unspoken threshold and became one in sorrow.

Pg. 69

She then silently wished for the birth of a daughter.

Pg. 71

Desperate to learn, she’d stolen her brothers’ textbooks and read by candlelight after everyone slept.

Pg. 74

“It is probably a neighbor stopping in for some lassi.”

Pg. 96

I will also advise that when they travel in their stories, they respect the people they meet and the values they hold. Their way of life is not for us to judge but our opportunity to learn.

Pg. 108

I had never been a parent before I had you,’ I told them. ‘I am learning to be your mama as you are to be my sons.’”

Pg. 109

I keep the truth from my mother because that is how we operate and I know nothing different.

Pg. 125

Given the freedom to decide, have I ever made a decision, or have I blindly followed the steps laid out for me? When we reach, we always chance a fall.

Pg. 126

“I want all of you to write about creating something you want, destroying something you don’t need, and protecting what is vital. But you must explain how your heart, your soul, and your mind feel about each event.”

Pg. 145

I have always taken my material trappings for granted, but now, seeing Ravi’s pride in the little that he has, I’m ashamed to admit I can’t remember a time when I fully appreciated them.

Pg. 187

Though my leaving for India was an excuse to run away, I have since learned about the women who came before me.

Pg. 193

“You still don’t want to know?” “No story is going to change what happened.” Something in the way she says it catches my attention. “What happened, Mom?”

Pg. 195

As much as she wanted to believe that independence for India meant independence for everyone, she knew it might not be.

Pg. 224

“All the headstones spoke of how loved the person was and of his roles in life—parent, child, grandparent. Not one mentioned the color of the person.” “It did not matter in death,” Ravi says. “No. All that was left of the person was bones. The same as everyone else.” I wondered if they knew that at the end, we are all the same, just a body with only our actions and others’ memories to define who we are. “Whatever separates us in life has no relevance in death.”

Pg. 230

Laws are slow to change what is in people’s hearts.

Pg. 233

I am embarrassed for my self-centeredness, for not having asked more about his life and focused only on mine.

Pg. 237

Their worries would have been about school and friends, the prom, and where to travel for spring break. It both shames and gives me pause that I have lived my life on the sidelines, never knowing or caring that others live in such misfortune.

Pg. 238

“Maybe today, in helping to ease others’ pain, you ease a little of your own?”

Pg. 279

I shut my eyes and imagine my babies playing, their laughter a balm to the wounds that refuse to heal. I would have shushed their cries with hugs and joined in their laughter. To them I would have given more of myself than I had ever given before.

Pg. 318

I think I would give anything to have you as you were,” Deepak answered honestly. “When you were at the school.”

Pg. 340

As a child, Ravi was taught that death was a matter of time, neither to be feared nor fought. Life was a punishment, and the time spent on earth an ordeal. For an untouchable, death provided relief from life’s misery and a welcome return to oblivion.

Pg. 347

My grandmother never believed love was her right or that she would be valued for her writing. Yet I had attained success in both, never having had to make a sacrifice for either.

Pg. 359

It felt like all we had at the end was pain, but when I moved out, I missed everything about you. Your smile, your laughter, your obsession with making sure every word you wrote was perfect.” He takes a deep breath. “I missed my best friend. I missed my wife.”

Pg. 361

I refuse to criticize the man who lived his life with integrity and always supported his friend without judgment.

Pg. 379

Some turns were my choice whereas others were a forced detour. Each one led me to where I am standing today.

Pg. 382