Accidentally Engaged(56)
Saira cut her off before she could finish the sentence. “My mental health?”
“Yeah. Sorry.”
“Why are you sorry? I’m not hiding anything. I’m not ashamed of my diagnosis.”
Reena tilted her head. “I don’t actually know what your diagnosis was.” How weird was it that they’d never talked about it?
Saira shrugged. “When I was in the outpatient program I was diagnosed with depression and an unspecified eating disorder. I was obsessed with the healthiness of what I was eating, not depriving myself for weight loss. Did you know mental illness runs in our family?”
“No. I didn’t know that.” She took a breath. “Did you know I used to take antidepressants?” Reena couldn’t believe she’d told her sister that. No one in her family knew.
Saira tilted her head sympathetically. “No. You should have told me.”
“It’s been a while.” Reena shrugged. “Are you okay now? I mean, you’re still kinda food obsessed.”
“I’m a lot better. Reena, you don’t know how bad it was in my head. All food felt evil to me then. But now it’s about a healthy balance. And finding the joy in food again. Doing this cookbook and developing recipes is helping me with that. I have a good relationship with food and wellness, instead of an obsession.” Maybe to prove her point, she took a cracker from the baking tray and popped it in her mouth. And, true, old Saira would never eat crackers. Even homemade ones.
It was interesting to learn that Saira also looked for joy in food when her mood was bad. Reena had always baked bread when her mood was low. She even started her old blog when her life was in the shits.
The blog that Reena folded indirectly because of Saira.
But it was fine. Saira had been sick. And Reena was proud of how far her sister had come. Proud of how open and unashamed she was, and proud of her finding healthy ways to change her life for the better.
What happened to Reena was no big deal.
No.
It was a big deal. A big deal that no one in this family ever actually talked about what was going on. Saira never telling Reena about her relationship problems with Joran or about her diagnoses. And Reena never telling any of them about her own struggles. Or her dreams and how hurt she was when she lost them. She was tired of everyone hiding their feelings under the rugs, hoping no one noticed they were far from smooth on the floor.
“I need to tell you something.” She took a deep breath. “I used to want to write a cookbook. It was a dream I had for a long time. And I almost did, at one point. But I lost that dream because of you.”
Saira looked at her, dark eyes wide. “What?”
So, Reena told her the whole story.
And Saira said nothing. Nothing except sorry.
“You knew I had the blog,” Reena said, “and you wrote almost a thousand words about how amateur food writers and their decadent creations were contributing to the downfall of society. It was grossly hyperbolic, and it directly attacked something I cared about,” Reena said, strangely annoyed that Saira wasn’t more defensive.
“I know.” Her sister looked down, fussing with the hummus, swirling a deep groove into it with the back of a spoon. “And it wasn’t completely…unintentional.” She sighed, looking at Reena through glassy eyes. “I didn’t think you would lose your blog or anything, I just…became weirdly obsessed with your popularity…and I guess I wanted to take you down a peg. Living with little Miss Perfect messed me up.”
“What? I’m hardly perfect!”
Saira still didn’t look at her, and still spoke quietly. “Seriously, Reena? I have a degree in nutrition and food, and all anyone ever talks about is what a great cook you are. Even in your personal life, you’ve had this best friend for years who is always there when you need her. You and Khizar have a better relationship with each other than you’ve ever had with me. You had a blog with thousands of readers. Not to mention men…I’ve had a grand total of three relationships, and you’ve had, what, eleven boyfriends?”
“Twelve,” Reena corrected. Technically, thirteen, but Reena’s mind still reeled from what Saira had said. Reena? Perfect?
“I was a mess. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.” She paused and looked at Reena. “My therapist is helping me learn to stop automatically comparing my life to others and enjoy where I’m at now. It’s so hard because I hated myself so much…”
Saira hated herself? Well, join the club. At least Reena didn’t resort to ruining family members’ dreams when she went through a bout of self-loathing.
“I’m sorry, Reena,” Saira said again, finally meeting Reena’s eyes. “I didn’t know about your cookbook. Maybe you can try for it again? I can ask—”
“No. It’s not something I have time for right now. Job search and all.”
They were silent for a while before Reena crossed the kitchen and put the lids on the dips. She honestly didn’t know how to feel—she’d had some vague idea that if one day she confronted Saira about how much her actions had hurt her, she would gain closure and get over it. It was supposed to feel cathartic. But it turned out this wasn’t a Lifetime movie, and it wasn’t so simple. Years of sibling rivalry encouraged by their parents and months of resentment couldn’t be tied up in a neat bow and put behind them. Maybe with work, the relationship could be saved, and Reena could learn to appreciate how much Saira had grown. But trusting her now was hard—Reena had been burned too many times.