“No matter what they wish for, no matter how far they go, people can never be anything but themselves.”

I remember reading this particular line in a Haruki Murakami short story, and for some reason, it has stuck with me to this day. Maybe, because every morning when I’m getting ready for work and I find my husband hogging the entire space in front of the dresser, my mind immediately goes back to our first meeting when he said he doesn't care for his appearance. 

“I’m a simple man, my work is my first priority.” 

“Sometimes, I wonder if you’re the same person I married.”

“Huh, what do you mean?” he asks, a sprinkle of sheer innocence dripping off his words like the remnants of honey on a dipper stick. He remains still in front of the dresser, fixing the last few unruly strands of hair.

“Nothing...I was just reminiscing our first date.”

“The one before our engagement or the one after that?”

“The one where you perfectly demonstrated what a good lawyer you are.”

He still does not grasp what I’m hinting at. I guess we’ll be late again today. And he’ll be diffusing the blame on me, again. What am I supposed to do with this stupid man, who for I lost the count after the first ten times, calls himself the most happening and hotshot taxation lawyer in South Delhi? I mean there is confidence and self-love, but the level of self-adoration my husband exhibits is almost narcissistic. He does not limit it to just his work, in his head, he’s a jack of all trade and for some reason, I find that admirable because I can never carry this level of confidence in myself even if I know I have gathered enough understanding and nuances of a field. But my husband...he’s just a nutcase...and—

“And you love me, I know.”  

“Sidharth, being narcissistic is one thing, but you’re also delusional. What the hell did I marry myself into?”

“Love, wifey, love.”

Okay, maybe, just maybe, it was love that made me say yes when he popped the question in the most unromantic fashion you could not expect from him – it remains as my most lethal weapon to emerge victorious in our fights and he hates that, losing I mean – since my husband, Sidharth Mehra, is what you call a loverboy. Yes, this man is such a loverboy (despite his extreme self-adoration tendencies) that everyone calls him that, including our five-year-old niece, who thinks it’s cute that her chachu would quietly watch princess movies with her on my insistence, not that he does have any issue with it either because he absolutely loves Amaira and he keeps telling me that we should have a child soon...I’m sorry I’m deviating from my initial point, what I’m trying to say is that my husband’s a kind of man who goes mushy on me at every possible opportunity but he proposed me in the most unromantic manner possible — THROUGH A TEXT MESSAGE! CAN YOU EVEN BELIEVE THAT? HE ASKED ME TO MARRY HIM THROUGH A TEXT MESSAGE! JUST ONE SENTENCE – WILL YOU MARRY ME? THAT’S IT! No fancy words to entice me, or some promises of a happy life together. No, none of those. All his text had was four words, and it brought me to tears because I did not expect him to even consider marriage when we were just seven months into our courtship. But he did and our families were happy, too. At that moment, I did not care about the lack of fancy or creativity he could’ve shown because, for me, it was the end of a miserable time I do not want to recall. BUT HELL DO I CARE NOW! WHY DID I NOT GET A PROPOSAL?

“You know I get what the older generation means when they that the real cards are only revealed after marriage,” my husband muses, turning the car in the direction of my workplace. It is eight forty-three on the dashboard clock. The lecture which with my day begins today is at 8:45. He waits for me to respond.

“And why is it so, please enlighten me.”

“Before marriage, you’re kind of in a trance-like state where everything your partner does is admirable and awestriking, so you build this image of your partner which is all good and rosy because you’re in love,” he pauses to take a look at my face, which does not conceal my annoyance at getting late – it’s eight forty-nine, “but once you get married, you finally come face-to-face with the reality, where your partner stops living up to the image you’d created of them, or let’s say that rose-tinted layer with which you looked at your partner, fades away and all you’re left with is this real person, full of flaws and imperfections that you were or chose to be oblivious to, and the only reason you decide to make the relationship work is that – you love them. Like I love you.”

“Hold on, did you just say I have ‘flaws and imperfections’. What is this behaviour, Sidharth?” 

This man! 

“No. I said I love you despite everything you are or are not.”

“You’re totally a nutcase, Sidharth. If I wasn’t running late, this would’ve gone down as our fifth fight this month. Argh!” 

Do I see a grin on his face? If this goes on, I think I’d divorce him even before we celebrate the first year of our marriage. We’ve already fought four times and it’s just been fifteen days into the month! Ganeshji should have mercy on him or else...Sidharth won’t survive for long!

“Khushali, I love you. I don’t know how else my life would’ve turned out to be if I hadn’t married you. You’re the best thing that has happened to me. I love you a lot...please fix our dinner tonight. I’d have shahi paneer and rice. Thank you. And here, you’re glasses. You keep forgetting them.” 

He chuckles, leaving me fuming with anger. We have just reached but I’m anyway fifteen minutes late for the lecture. On top of that, this is what my husband had to say to me. Talk about a good morning. And my glasses, as if it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t keep forgetting my glasses.

“I’ll see—”

“My face? Bohat handsome hoon main, pata hain.”  

“Whatever!”

I can’t! I can’t with this man! So, I begin for the assigned classroom where my students must be waiting for me, cursing me for being late. All thanks to my stupid husband. But just as I leave, I catch a glimpse of my husband. I don’t know how to put this but there’s this dark expression that I’ve noticed a few times on his face that makes him seem like an altogether different person, someone that I'm not familiar with, someone that I have never seen. I can’t decipher what it is, but it terrifies me to think if that what Sidharth may go back to being – that is what Sidharth has always been.

How would I know? I love him.

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Republish: March 16th, 2020

Music: ‘Main Kya Karoon’ from Barfi