Dadu grins, reaching over to run a hand over my hair. “A rascal. He would get us into all sorts of trouble. I thought I would handle it fine because of all of my older brothers, but he was just...different. He treated me differently. I never realized until I met your grandpa, but my brothers were always so careful around me. They treated me like a precious jewel that could break at any moment. Only once I met him did I realize how sheltered I had been to the absurdity of the world around me. It changed me to see the manner in which your grandfather approached things. It made me realize that maybe I wasn’t the person I thought I was. My family believed me to be one way, but I was quickly learning that I was someone else altogether.”

I’m not the way my family believes me to be, either is on the tip of my tongue. But that’s not a conversation for right now.

Dadu swallows roughly, her eyes glimmering in the candlelight. “Your grandpa never treated me that way. He always saw me for who I was, even before I saw it myself. His equal. He was free with his thoughts and actions around me. Wild in a lovely and terrifying sort of way. It was so unfamiliar. I didn’t know what to do with him at first.”

That sounds increasingly familiar. “What did you do?”

“I calmed him down,” Dadu says, her voice quieter. The words send a chill through me. “And I think he needed that on occasion, the same way I needed his boldness. I was able to ground him in reality.”

“How did you do that?” I ask, equally hushed.

Dadu looks away, her gaze somewhere distant. “By loving him.”

I inhale sharply, not having expected that answer. Dadu looks back at me, her eyes alert again. “Is there a reason you’re asking, Myra?”

“No,” I say, scratching my nose. “I was just curious.”

Dadu considers my expression. I have no idea what I must look like to her, but I doubt it’s the perfect picture of innocence.

“Myra Apu has a cruuuush,” Samir’s voice says behind me, and I turn to see him leaning against the dining room’s entryway, holding a tray of Oreos, likely stolen from the pantry as a snack. There’s an infuriating grin on his face.

My neck burns. “Shut up. I do not.”

Samir wiggles his eyebrows at me suggestively. I reach for a napkin on the dining table, then toss it at his head. He ducks out of the way, sticking his tongue out at me. “Don’t forget to call Ma,” he says, laughing when I throw another napkin. “I was just on FaceTime with her, and she said you’re ignoring her calls.”