I flew back to New Delhi after an overseas trip; can't quite remember from where. The monsoon season was at its peak and we landed in the middle of a very heavy thunderstorm. Parking bays at the airport seemed at a premium as a result of which there was a fairly long wait after touchdown till the pilot was cleared for an aerobridge. Although immigration and baggage clearance didn't take too long, I spent a fair bit of time at the Delhi Duty Free outlet trying to find a couple of bottles of good wine. While searching, I suddenly got the urge to buy something for Sunita. That took a while because I wasn't sure what I should get her, knowing her rather frugal habits. I decided on a small bottle of perfume, naturally French. By the time I got out of the airport and found Bahadur, it was almost 1 o'clock in the morning.
The heavy rain, and Delhi's unfortunate state of road drainage coupled to add another hour and a half before we finally reached my apartment. The rain had stopped and although I suggested that Bahadur could stay over, he insisted on returning to his home with a request for the morning off on the following day. It was Saturday in any case so I told him he needn't come in for duty till Monday morning. Bahadur helped me with my suitcase, placing it in the elevator, before we wished one another a good night. I pressed the penthouse button and leaned back against the walls of the lift, feeling very tired and exhausted.
I had promised to send my notes to some colleagues in Paris and London over the weekend so I knew I had a couple of hours work ahead of me before I could actually relax over the next couple of days. The lobby light came on automatically as I stepped out of the elevator and walked to the door of my apartment. Being as late as it was I didn't want to disturb my maid who was possibly asleep, so I fished out the keys from my briefcase and opened the door. The bedside lamp was on and partially illuminated the living room. Across on the other side I saw Sunita's bedroom door open just a crack but with no light on inside. I quietly pulled my suitcase in, shut and locked the door behind me, and went into my bedroom.
It took me half an hour to unpack, throw clothes for washing into a corner of the room, rig up my laptop, have a quick shower, pull on a pair of old faded jeans and a t-shirt, and make myself a Jack Daniels on the rocks. I decided to sit down and get as much of the work out of the way so I could enjoy the weekend without too much tension. I laboured for two straight hours and finished the report but chose not to send it immediately, thinking I would review it sometime later in the day after I had rested. It was almost 5 o'clock in the morning and I was unsure of what to do: should I go to bed and try and sleep? Should I go out for an early morning drive? I wasn't sleepy enough but I was too tired to drive around aimlessly. I stepped out on to my terrace and breathed in the cleanly washed air; the rain had stopped and it was relatively cool outside, especially if I could catch a breeze. I removed my t-shirt and felt the cool but damp air against my skin. The sun would start its journey across the sky in about an hour and a half, making the day muggy as it went along.
I stepped back into the apartment and slid into my leather recliner, pushed the backrest to an angle, raised the footrest and lay back. But I was restless, and unable to understand why. I didn't want to put on any music for fear of waking Sunita. I wasn't sure what time she normally got up but I suspected it would be soon. I got up and made myself another drink, still wondering what to do. I hadn't had a drink on the flight; in fact I hadn't had a drink for the last two days which had been extremely busy. The alcohol began to hit me; a nice buzz coming into my brain.
For the last week I had kept thoughts of my maid at bay; it was a conscious struggle because every now and again my mind would wander to her, sometimes thinking about what she might be doing at that moment, but more often to a place I wasn't sure existed. Ever since a particular episode some weeks, or was it months, ago I would contemplate the surrealistic hallucination that pervaded my brain. Or maybe it wasn't an illusion, maybe it had actually happened. It was driving me crazy trying to figure out the truth.
I had a not too vague recollection of the night. It had been an emotional day of sorts with Sunita getting strangely depressed and my own inability to fully comprehend her emotions. I had gone out that evening, got slammed with booze at a couple of bars and returned home to crash into bed. But beyond that my recollection is in the fluid phantom zone although I can almost still feel the physical pleasure that I enjoyed after that. I can still feel Sunita's nakedness against me, her large wholesome breasts on my body, her hands and mouth around the thickness of my penis, her tongue licking the underside of my testicles, my own hands running through her hair... It's all so real in my mind.
I even feel the huge explosions of semen gush from my cock into her mouth, her swallowing every drop. In fact my memory of the intensity of my ejaculation, the violence of my thrusting into her mouth, still amazes me with its reality. I even remember waking up with no sleeping clothes on, at least not the tracksuit bottom I generally wore to bed. Yet, I cannot say for sure that it happened, or for that matter what exactly happened. Maybe it was just a dream, another one of my many nocturnal emissions with Sunita playing havoc in my subconsciousness. And my maid had neither spoken nor hinted at any such occurrence; and I was simply unable to ask her about it.
Now, still restless and slightly on the edge, I walked with whiskey tumbler in hand towards her room and peered in through the crack in the door but couldn't see anything in the darkness. With the toe of one foot, I nudged the door in by a couple of inches but still couldn't make out anything. Whether as an excuse or some other reason, I convinced myself I was getting worried not knowing whether Sunita was in her room and whether she was alright. With my free hand I pushed the door open some more and in the very faint light made out a shape on the bed, covered in a thin printed sheet. The light from my own bedside lamp across at the other end of flat cut through the otherwise pitch darkness of the apartment. I stood in my maid's doorway and stared at the figure outlined on the bed, taking an occasional sip from my glass. Suddenly my throat seemed to constrict; there was a dryness and a thirst that I needed to quench so I took a large gulp of the whiskey and left all rational thought at the door.
I stepped into her room and pushed the door shut behind me without a sound. Draining the last of my Jack Daniels, I placed the tumbler on a shelf and proceed silently and surreptitiously towards her bed. Unable to turn around and leave her presence, I took a few more steps till I reached the side of her bed. Sunita lay on her side, her back to the wall, facing the side I was standing on. There was too little light, almost none, for me to make out the details of her face; the rest of her was covered loosely by the bed-sheet. The air-conditioning was running and kept the room a little on the cool side, perhaps 20 degrees centigrade.
Once again, refusing to let rational thought prevent me from what I was doing, I walked almost zombie-like to the foot of the bed and stared up at her. Although the shape I saw was an amorphous sculpture of cotton bed-sheet, I thought I could decipher the indentation of her waist and the swell of her hips and the tapering of her legs beneath the cover. As I stood there, I noticed the woman's feet were uncovered; I bent down very slightly and rested a finger on her foot just to feel her flesh. A strange sensation ran through me as I stood there; I thought I could feel her pulse as I stroked an ankle with one finger. I felt a sudden warmth in my body and stopped to wonder if it was on account of the alcohol or was something more ethereal happening.
As my eyes adjusted to the near complete darkness, I was able to make out the contours of her face, albeit very faintly. I walked slowly and silently to the head of her bed and stared down at Sunita, my heart now almost in my mouth. It wasn't fear of being discovered, although that should have been a concern. It was once again the captivating beauty of this woman; not just her physical beauty of which I was obviously enamoured, but more of a metaphysical kind, something that pulled at my heart strings. I felt my heart pump in heavy thumps as I continued to stare down at her.
Then slowly, I bent my knees and lowered myself so that my face came in line with hers. This was very brave of me, but rational thought had long left my mind. I stared at her face, now seeing a lot more clearly; her long eyelashes, eyebrows that were thick but looked neatly trimmed, the gentle swell of her nose, a broadish forehead, one ear partially covered by strands of long hair, and her lips. Deliciously full and strangely gleaming in the faint ambient light, and a strong well rounded chin extending to a clearly visible jawline. Again, not knowing what I was doing, and not really caring, I leaned forward and planted a kiss on her forehead. Drawing back, I observed the sculpted beauty of her sleeping face, then again bent forward and touched her lips with my own.
Conscious that my breath would surely smell of alcohol, I withdrew and stood up but found myself unable to leave her side, unable to control any of my actions. There was a heavy but pleasurable weight that had descended over me; an emotional cloak that radiated love for this woman sleeping in front of me. The chill of the air-conditioning was seeping into my body and for one lucid moment I thought of leaving Sunita's room and going back out into the living room, or maybe even to bed. I was conscious that I was not in a state of physical arousal inasmuch as I wasn't sporting a hard-on, but there was a stirring deep in my body that I hadn't experienced ever before.