One day at work, Arup's personal inbox pinged. A one line email.
- Are you mad at me?
He looked up at Rasika. Their eyes met. He looked away and typed a one line reply.
- Why would I be mad at you?
Her reply came almost ten minutes later.
- Trust me, I didn't really have a choice that weekend. His friends were in town from the US. It's been a packed calendar. It's not like I can make excuses every time. There are times you are busy with your wife. I understand that. So you should understand this.
He sighed. Rasika and her flair for whining and drama. Meena Kumari complex, like that one movie said. He was tempted to send a stinging reply. But instead he wrote,
- I am not mad at you. I understand your compulsions.
- Then why have you been so stand-offish lately?
He didn't reply right away. He could see she was sulking. And it annoyed the hell out of him.
It has been two weeks since the time Rasika cancelled the weekend plans that he had been planning to cancel himself. With the colleagues chattering and knowing how temperamental and jealous his wife was, he had decided to lay low. He had not initiated any further hook-ups with Rasika. Their interactions had been purely professional.
Rasika had been feeling very guilty about the affair herself. She enjoyed sex with Arup a lot, especially how dominating and rough he was. But she still loved Nitin and was sure she wanted to spend her life with him. Why then did she keep craving time with her much older and married boss? And why did she feel slighted or ignored by him, now that he had stopped initiating any more sexual romps? It was a big blow to her needy 22 year old self-esteem.
Finally the meaningful stares from Rasika got too much for Arup to ignore. So he replied.
- People are talking so just playing it safe.
He could see her face as she read his email and her eyes went wide. He saw her furiously typing and a reply arrived soon. And he responded. And their conversation went on over email for a while.
- Who is talking??? About what???
- Colleagues have been making snide comments about us.
- Shit, I had no idea! I am sorry!
- No need to be sorry. But best to just lay low for a while and be purely professional. I have a wife I love and you have a boyfriend you love. Let's just end it, what do you say?
Arup could see Rasika reading the email, then looking up at him and staring at him for a few seconds with a sad look. Then she replied.
- Okay, makes sense.
And so for the next couple of weeks, Rasika and Arup went back to just being colleagues. Him happy with his home life and his wife. Her focusing on her long distance boyfriend in Mumbai. Arup initially thought that was for the best. But then a couple of weeks later, something changed.
Veena was flying out Saturday morning for a work meeting in Singapore. After dropping off Veena at the airport, Arup waited to confirm the flight had taken off. Then, after a lot of internal debate, he texted Rasika. They both had the weekend off. He had really blue balls. Veena had been very busy the past couple of weeks and then having her period. So they had not had sex. And he had been keeping a distance from Rasika at work. So he had not had sex in almost two weeks. His horniness got the better of his common sense and he sent the text.
- Wife is out of town. You wanna come over?
He wasn't sure she would respond. She had been sulking for days since he ended things. At work, she had also gotten very standoffish with him. Their interactions were professional but terse. Even the other staff noticed. The office scuttlebutt was that they were having a lover's tiff. Which was true.
But respond she did.
- I am taking a bus to Bombay to spend the weekend with Nitin.
He was tempted to tell her to cancel it. But he knew it was a touchy subject, given how they had last left things. Instead he asked
- What time are you going?
- 3 o clock bus
- We can have brunch. And then I'll drop you off at the bus.
Arup stared at his phone for a long time. The response came after fifteen minutes. And it was laconic.
- ok
Rasika agonized a lot before sending that short reply. Things were, for a change, good between her and Nitin. They had not fought in weeks. He was the man she loved, the one she wanted to spend her life with. When Arup had broken things off between them, she had felt relieved. It took away a big temptation, because she did enjoy sex with Arup a lot more than she enjoyed sex with her boyfriend. Despite how she had strayed, she was still a small town girl. And it killed her to deal with the fact that she had cheated on the love of her life. But something primal and animalistic still felt a strange pull to the married Arup. Physically and also emotionally.
She wanted to talk about it and sort things out. But Arup had been so curt lately that she felt very used and discarded. Beyond just cutting off things physically, he had even stopped being her friend, which she felt hurt by. She understood the need for discretion if people in the office were talking and it might affect his marriage. But she still did not appreciate the total cold shoulder he had been giving her. So when Rasika answered "ok", that is what she had in mind. Have brunch, have a talk about where they stand, and get some clarity or closure. She expected they would eat somewhere, talk things out, close the issue, and then she would go spend another happy weekend with the man she would be spending the rest of her life with.
Half an hour later, Arup was in his car, about to pick Rasika up. He texted her that he was almost there. When he pulled up to her PG, he saw the landlady standing outside. He had met her once before so he waved at her with a friendly smile. She solemnly nodded. And then she stared daggers at Rasika as she walked out to the car.
"I don't think aunty likes me very much." he chuckled as Rasika got in. She was wearing a long cotton kameez over jeans, her most frequent attire. Her thick hair tied into a single ponytail. No make-up. But she still looked radiant and gorgeous. He could visualize her naked body through the clothes, the body he had not seen naked in a couple of weeks. As she strapped on the seat belt, he noticed how it pushed against her ample bosom.
"She doesn't like me either." Rasika tartly said.
"What? I thought she loved you!"
"Loved...past tense."
"What went wrong? Did you have a fight with her?"
"No...it's...us." Rasika said and shrugged.
"Oh." Arup said and shut up.
By now, all the roommates and even the landlady aunty knew that she was having an affair with her boss. Aunty was not a prude and knew Rasika had a boyfriend named Nitin. In fact she liked Nitin. Which is why she felt so upset. She had thought Rasika to be this simple sweet small town girl from Uttar Pradesh and had liked her initially. Which is why it broke aunty's heart when she turned out to be a two-timing slut.
There was silence in the car as Rasika remembered she was supposed to be sulking not bantering. This guy was her boss who had slept with her and then pretty much discarded her. She felt aggrieved and waited for him to mend things. But Arup was not like her boyfriend, cajoling her, getting her to talk. He could sense she was upset and sulking but he didn't care. She wants to sulk, let her sulk. This wasn't a real relationship to him. She wasn't his wife.
As he drove, she realized he wasn't going into the city towards the usual brunch places but the outskirts. But not towards his house either. He was going toward the hills around Mulshi. There was a well known restaurant on a hilltop. She assumed he was taking her there. And she was right. But he had a detour in mind. Halfway up the hill, he turned onto an empty unpaved road. Rasika raised her eyebrows in disbelief. Really? After treating her like a stranger for two weeks, he had this in mind? No way, Jose. Some issues needed to be thrashed out first.
He pulled the car into a small clearing, turned it off, and smiled at her. She had a frown on her face. He didn't give a damn. He unbuckled his seat belt, opened his pants. The thick semi-erect snake rolled out of his zipper.
"Wait!" Rasika said, staring at the thick organ that she had loved inside her before looking into his eyes. "We need to talk."
"Later." he said impatiently, grabbing her by the ponytail. "I have seriously blue balls. Veena hasn't been putting out much."