Interpreter of Maladies

Miranda’s office colleague Laxmi tells her about her cousin whose husband has run off with an English woman, leaving the cousin and their son, Rohin, behind. Normally Miranda listens in on Laxmi’s phone calls and would have heard all about it already, but today she has been on the phone with Dev, a married Bengali man she’s begun having her own affair with.

Miranda met Dev at a makeup counter a week before; when she saw him, she didn’t want him to walk away, and as she interacted with the woman at the counter, who convinces Miranda to buy an anti-aging cream despite being in her early twenties, Dev lingered. He followed her and confessed that he was purchasing something for his wife, who would be gone for a few weeks.

Now they are together every night, and Miranda feels as though she is being seen by a man for the first time. He compliments her and is kind to her in a way she hasn’t experienced. They go to the Mapparium in the Christian Science center in Boston, which is a stained-glass globe of the world that visitors can go inside. Dev explains parts of the world to her that she’s unfamiliar with, and then, when they’re alone in the globe, he has her stand in one spot while he moves to one far away; because of the acoustics, she can hear him whisper, “You’re sexy” (80).