“Are you not afraid of seeing me every weekend? What would your wife think about you if ever she comes to know what you are up to during your working weekends”: she said playing with his thin salt and pepper hair. “Tell me don’t you love me or who else keeps meeting the same girl for such a long time. It’s going to be full three years this 31st December night and I still can’t forget your first message on tinder: I wanna eat you. Who comes up with such a cheap pick-up line! I can’t even correctly recall why I had swiped right on your profile in the first place. Maybe you looked so innocent in your pic and your intro was way too gentlemanly to be on a dating site. Maybe you were too honest there too. Who else professes about his married status! Maybe I was too desperate and thought like going with a married guy was a safer option despite you clearly communicating that you were just yearning for some casual stuff. Now I feel like our association is too long to be called fleeting friendship” and she started giggling with the air of an old friend. The guy grew uncomfortable and wanted to change the topic of conversation. “Are you not getting late? It’s already evening.”
“I have told my parents that I would be late. There is too much study to do”: She winked.
“Yaar, I will have to freshen up. My wife is reaching tonight.”
“Aha! So finally she is coming back. Was she not supposed to go to your parent’s place just for a week?”: she prodded.
“Even I am wondering what held her up. This time even Ma had a great time with her: eighth wonder of the world. Otherwise it is always two or three days and she will come back fuming and my mom will release a barrage of complaints against her over phone. These saas-bahu ke jhagde! I really get tired. Anyway you should be happy there was no one to interrupt you and me.”
“My parents are bigger interrupter than your wife baba. Even today I had a tough time explaining where I am going and what time I will get back.” Some thoughts crossed her mind and all of sudden she stopped stroking his hair and sat up.
“What happened to you, is everything alright?”
“No, no..I just feel like having some food. Where you wanna go? Treat will be from my side. Just to prepare you to face your wife”. She giggled and started tidying up her hair and clothes.
Guy was still lying lazily. Even he was feeling the pangs of hunger but didn’t feel like going outside and having anything. He had tried almost all restaurants, streetfood and dhabas in the city and nothing excited him now. He wanted to go back to his village and taste dishes cooked by his Naani and Daadi and of course his mother. He missed them so sorely. No restaurant was there to serve that kind of foods.
“Chalo, lets order something online. I don’t wanna take risk going outside and being seen by some gossipy auntie or who knows even my own mom.”
“Achha tell me what you wanna have?”
“You choose. It’s always me who orders. I am not gonna do this time.” She feigned anger while applying lipstick on her thin baby-like lips. The guy rose up to pick up mobile and started scrolling to find something interesting. As always, nothing appealed him and frustrated he looked at her pleadingly.
“Achha Janab. I will do” as she flung stole over her shoulder.
The bell rang. The guy put on his pullover and proceeded to open the door. As expected, the delivery boy was standing. He made the payment and took the package
“Look treat is from my side, I will transfer the amount ”: she screamed.
They both ate together. It lasted more than the duration of their physical intimacy. Guy was just trying hard to swallow his morsel. If he was not exhausted and hungry, there was no chance he would have agreed to eat. She was tired of ghar-ka-khana and even mediocre outside food gave her far more pleasure than such casual physical intimacy she had just a little while ago.
“We are poles apart, don’t you think so”: he blurted suddenly in between his bites.
“So what, we are not going to get married anyway. And by the way I am less “poles apart” than your wife. She is malyali and you are Bihari. If you can manage with her, you can manage with me too as well for god sake.”
He started thinking: is he just managing with his wife! Wasn’t it a love marriage! She was the most sophisticated girl in the batch and I was the one who had least knowledge of manners with the accent people found amusing. I have not understood till date what she saw in me and we ended up as a couple. But I did love her. I had never imagined in my wildest dreams that such a beautiful girl would one day be with me and sacrifice her bright career to raise our babies.
“If you don’t wanna eat anymore, just leave”: She yelled. He came back to present. How much things had changed. Despite his great love for his wife, he ended up on Tinder, met Diya and started going with her every weekend like a ritual.
Weekend filled Diya with much anticipation. Her body used to ache and she felt like something was tormenting her. She grew even more uncomfortable in this new black body-hugging dress and heels she had put on just now- gifted by him. His call was about to come today but it didn’t. She tried to ring him many times but his phone was unreachable. She grew impatient. It was not that she could not get a suitable boy but perhaps she had grown fond of him. She looked forward to spending weekends with him and mere thought of staying alone during the weekend was killing her. She texted him on his phone and waited impatiently to get the reply. Nothing seemed to work. Frustrated, she logged into her insta account and started scrolling random pictures: a muscled guy here, a beautiful bride there. She clicked his insta page. Just a few hours back, he had posted pictures of some food she could not figure out. The caption of the pictures read: the most awesome food I had today made by my wife and it tasted just like my mother’s food! Love you Shrimatiji.
Diya never heard from him. Only consolation for her was his insta pages which got updated almost every day with strange-looking dishes captioned with “the most awesome food I had today made by my wife and it tasted just like my mother’s food! Love you Shrimatiji”.
The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
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