Marketplace

The fish market smell comes back at one in the morning, the way it always does in this part of Kolkata where I live, and it carries something from sixty-six days ago, a gathering where five of us sat together and said honest things to each other and let them stay honest instead of smoothing them into something easier to hear. One of the five was Tunolk, a friend who doesn't flinch from saying hard true things to my face. She told me I'm still trying to solve this instead of live it, and she's right. I can feel the difference now, the way holding your ground can look identical to just standing still out of fear, when the two are not the same thing at all.