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I don’t think my parents were ever in love. My older sister swears they were, but not in a good way. They had that all-consuming love, the type that destroyed everything in its path. They would fight over anything and everything. They’d break plates, and photo frames, and eventually they broke each other. I mean that in both a figurative and literal way, my mom broke my dad’s finger once. After their fights, my dad would just disappear and my mom would beg him to come home or sometimes even send my older sister to act as some sort of mediator. I remember my parents got into a fight over one of my dad’s friends named Shathi about a week before the beginning of my middle school career. He didn’t talk to anyone. He’d go to work, come home, and pass by us with tired eyes. My dad had a lot of “friends”.
I think the worst one was his dead brother’s wife. My parents got divorced during the summer before my junior year of high school. I can remember the day it happened clearly. My parents were arguing about how my father was taking trips to Bangladesh to visit other women while he was unemployed and we were living in a basement. Eventually, my father started to get angry. He grabbed my mother’s hair and started beating her with a broom. My four-year-old brother was sitting, sobbing as the whole spectacle unfolded before his eyes. I picked him up and went to another room and locked the door. My mom started screaming my name and telling me to call the police. My aunt overheard the commotion and she started screaming at me to call the police. Everyone was screaming at me, a girl who was a few months shy of sixteen. As the cops pulled my father away from my mother, I texted a boy I would soon be “friends” with. I’ve witnessed firsthand how badly cheating can ruin a marriage, ruin a home.
I have also been a mistress or as my generation would fondly refer to a side hoe. It sucks on all fronts and hurts everyone that’s involved. “Sexy” by Jhumpa Lahiri was the first piece of writing that actually resonated with me on a surface level, instead of a thematic level. I related to most of the characters in the story and it made me feel less alone. “Sexy”, a short story by Jhumpa Lahiri, is centered around a young white lady named Miranda who is having an affair with an older Indian man named Dev. Miranda meets Dev while she is browsing in Filene’s cosmetics department and Dev is purchasing facial cream for his wife. Dev’s wife is away so Miranda doesn’t feel guilty about her affair. As she continues her affair, her Indian coworker, Laxmi, is giving her updates on a situation happening with her cousin. Her cousin’s husband fell in love with a stranger that he sat next to on a plane. He leaves his family to pursue a relationship with her. It crushes Laxmi’s cousin, leaving her unable to leave her house and take her son to school. Eventually the inevitable happens and Dev’s wife returns. The thrill is gone. The breaking point of the affair is when Miranda babysits Laxmi’s nephew, Rohin.
Major motifs in “Sexy” are race, maturity, infidelity, and the difference between lust and love. Miranda is attracted to Dev for two primary reasons, his age and his race. Dev is the first adult man that Miranda has dated. He is mature, wealthy, and polite. Lahiri expresses this sentiment when she wrote, “Unlike the boys she dated in college, who were simply taller, heavier versions of the ones she dated in high school, Dev was the first always to pay for things, and hold doors open, and reach across a table in a restaurant to kiss her hand.” This detail proves that there is definitely an age difference between Dev and Miranda. Miranda is fresh out of college and Dev has already established his career. With age, there tends to be a shift in the power dynamic of their relationship. The age and racial difference causes Miranda to perceive Dev as exotic and cultured. After their first encounter in Filene’s, Dev follows her out of the store and remarks that the beginning half of her name is Indian. She is immediately intrigued by this. Dev symbolizes a new world to Miranda, something other than what she’s used to, what she’s known, and what she’s experienced. Dating Dev broadened Miranda’s world. Upon questioning Laxmi about what the Taj Mahal is like, Laxmi describes it as, “The most romantic spot on earth.
An everlasting monument to love.” Miranda fantasizes about going there with Dev. Dev is exotic to Miranda since she lives in a predominantly white neighborhood and has only met one other Indian family. Miranda feels that dating Dev will almost be as if she is experiencing his culture. She moved alone from the Midwest and her isolation is coupled with a feeling of inexperience. She tries to learn Bengali, write her name in Dev’s language, try more Indian cuisine, and recalls with shame an incident from her childhood. She is ashamed that she was not more understanding with the Dixit family and dating Dev can absolve her of that shame. She loves Dev despite not knowing much about him. In the end, she realizes that she has fallen for the surface and not the person. The initial novelty of the affair soon wears off after Dev’s wife comes back from India. The relationship soon goes from going to restaurants and romance to staying inside and sleeping together. After Dev’s wife returns, Miranda purchases items that she believes to be fit for a mistress. She buys a silver dress with chains for straps, black stockings, a slip, a robe, and high heels. Lahiri marks the shift in the affair by having Dev reject the clothes that Miranda bought. He completely ignores what she is wearing and after he finally notices, he urges her to take it off so that he can admire her legs. The fantasy of the life Miranda thought she and Dev would have fell apart and their romance fell victim to routine. Babysitting Rohin, Laxmi’s nephew, is the breaking point of the relationship. Rohin urges Miranda to put on the dress that she bought to look like a mistress after he discovers it in a heap on the floor of her closet. At first, she declines but she soon yields to his request. After seeing Miranda in the dress, Rohin declares that she is sexy.
Miranda then demands him to define the term. Rohin then explains by saying, “It means loving someone you don’t know.” Loving someone you don’t know is precisely what Dev, Miranda, and his father are doing. In his phrase, Miranda understands both that she is drawn to Dev for his surface value and also that Dev does not love Miranda for who she is. Even without the dress, she is simply a mistress to him. Miranda thinks back to what she believes was a defining moment in their relationship. Dev called her sexy in the Mapparium. Miranda asks Dev if he remembers what he said to her in the Mapparium and he says he doesn’t. Jhumpa Lahiri creates an amazing balance of “Sexy.” She tells the story using foils instead of focusing on one side of the spectrum. Miranda is dating a married man, whereas Laxmi’s cousin is getting a divorce. It is through hearing Laxmi talk about her cousin that Miranda feels guilty. Through these two women, we see the opposite sides of the affair, the cheated with and the cheated on. I have experienced both sides of the spectrum personally and they both have their pitfalls. Jhumpa Lahiri uses foils in an extremely effective way and that’s why I decided to analyze this story.
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