Everyday with the businessman

I call him a businessman instead of my husband because that’s what he is.

A complete businessman. I wait all day long for him to come home and I wait all night in bed for him to join me and all I do is watch him pace or sitting with his laptop or talking on the phone, It started with a pleasant arranged communion. He came to see me, smiled at me and I was definitely gone...his sweet smile captured my heart.

But some time in the later years my soul was lost.

I never found him with me with all his heart. It was either few a nods or a few grunts that followed and then slowly filled up my days and nights.

One day I sat all alone staring at space when he came back home. There was a frown on his handsome forehead and his lips were thinned with worry. I wanted to ask him what was wrong but nothing on his face showed a sign that he wanted to share anything at all. So I did what I always did…I ignored.

My married life was not going well…any fool with eyes and ears could see that. In the company of my family I was the gay one and my husband would sit staunch and uncomfortable. When we would reach home, there would no communication but there was always lovemaking. I don’t know if I should use the word ‘love’ because the kind of lovemaking we did was only on bed.

There came a point when the situation at home was becoming stifling. I wanted an outlet and I wanted it soon. It wasn’t intentional…this man I met up with.

I was alone at home, as usual loneliness eating me alive when I logged into this new area of ‘chatting’. It wasn’t that new to me because I did chat with my friends who lived out of India.

But I wanted someone else. I wanted to talk to another person who didn’t know me and didn’t expect me to be the dutiful wife. I met him just two days of this unhealthy affair of asking people about their sex lives and their partners. I didn’t know that it was effecting me in anyways. Many people did it, so why not me?

Two months later  I had a lover who loved me and a husband who didn’t even look at me. It was soon turning out that I no longer liked this part of my life.

All I wanted was a husband who would respond me the way I wanted him to.

“I know what you are doing”, he said quietly just after when I thought I would tell him about my affair,  his eyes were fixed on the screen and I heard the quite clicking of his keyboard with heart in my throat.

I stiffened on the bed beside him, “Hmm?”

“I want you to stop meeting him”.

Surprised I looked at him with  eyes wide open. His words may have sounded mellow but there was underlying tension rumbling and I shivered despite the heater in our room. He turned suddenly and his eyes burned through me, “What did I not give you?”

“Love”, I fired back and for a moment he looked astounded.

“We are married since three years!” there was no longer any mellowness, only anger, “What do you want me to do?”

Tears were steaming down my cheeks and I didn’t even realized that, “I’m deaf in this situation! Do you suppose I’m supposed to look into your eyes and know that you love me? Because even if you want me to do that…I see vacuum. I can’t see any feelings in you!”

His face had paled and I was afraid that he was going to hit me but all he did was get up and leave as quietly as he came in the evening.

I didn’t sleep that night. I lay all night in bed contemplating my life with my husband…but I couldn’t recollect anything at all. I got up in the morning tired and hurt knowing that he was not coming back…at least not now.

The knock on the door was sudden.

Frowning I wondered if it was my lover. Feeling disgusted with myself I went to open the door and when I saw my husband I stepped back in surprise…

“It isn’t going to happen”, he began and his voice was sounding so uncertain that my surprise and curiosity grew, “I can’t change overnight…and I can’t change what you had done. If you are asking me not to blame then I’m sorry I cant do that either..”

“Are you trying to say something?” I drove the point knowing that we had to discuss it now or never.

“Why did you marry me?”

That wasn’t a difficult question and I responded easily, “I love you”.

A frown was marring his brow, “I didn’t even talk to you”.

“I know”, my eyes grew solemn, “I fell in love with your smile”.

He opened his mouth to say something but he seemed to be stuck. Good, I thought relishing his uncertainty for once.

“Business has made you mechanical …you no longer smile, you no longer enjoy, you no longer give yourself freely…mostly because maybe you never trusted anyone at all in you field…”

“After that affair you are having, you are asking me to believe you, trust you?”

Wincing at the barb I nodded, “Even after all that…yes I ask you to believe me. Trust me. All I want is your love… is it too much to ask for?”

I looked at him…waited for several minutes…held my breath…

 “And all I ask you to do is acknowledge my presence! And realize that I’m not a living doll…that I have feelings too. That If I can’t show, I do feel them. I can get hurt, I can cry, I can…do everything. All I wanted you to do was to be faithful”

“You gave me no reason to”, I murmured, miserable to my crux.

That night, dread and horror filled up my heart. Somehow knowing that I was going to loose my husband, I realized that I never actually minded him being a businessman. After all I had never been a perfect wife either. Had I ever made him feel comfortable?

“Can we start again?” I said in the middle of the night, touching his shoulder.

The moon was still full and I could see his eyes flickering as if waiting for this moment all his life. One more thing I noticed was that the curve of his lips was turned upwards…my husband was smiling!

“What if I had an affair?”

My senses turned numb that moment and I didn’t answer.

“But my reasons are not strong enough, I guess”, he looked calmly furious that moment, “I’m letting you free…that’s what you wanted, didn’t you?”

“No I…”

“No more lonely nights anymore…you have the world to yourself. Instead of making our relationship strong, you choose the wrong way…”, the lights outside our bedroom were dimming and I could no longer see his face. All I knew that the dread carrying inside my heart had come to reality. I’m free but would living without the man I loved the most is worth the freedom?