Your separation happened gradually, then all at once. Like falling in love, finding the smile behind the acerbic words and the heart she wore, unhappily and unwillingly, on her sleeve.
It started with Air Force One—or maybe it was after the first time she’d yelled at you. When you prevaricated so much on the exact number of the deaths she’d caused that she’d been willing, for once, to let a matter drop. Or maybe it was the devastation that had been written across her face when Laxmi had told her anyway.
Or maybe it was sharing drinks. Or the incessant questions probing every aspect of your identity, our identity, and her endless dissatisfaction with every bullshit explanation you gave. It had annoyed us—frightened us, frustrated us—and had annoyed you too until.
Until you found it endearing—you, not us.
The way she challenged you, raged around you—because, oh, she had tried so hard to control her temper and your heart couldn’t help but melt even as it threatened to pound out of your chest. Hundreds of hours, thousands of dollars spent on therapy, sometimes court mandated, sometimes from her own initiative, had nothing on the eleven million Swords of Damocles hanging over our heads. Over the heads of our bodies, not people, the loss not nearly as heavy a weight as the one she laboured under.