Forbidden Desires

by Banerjee, Madhuri

  ‘And ma’am, drunk driving is an offence,’ the police officer sternly reminded. ‘Delhi drivers think they can always get away with it but not with me.’ Gaurav sat sullenly at a table behind them. She paid the bail money, signed the documents, and took a very morose-looking Gaurav back to her car.

  ‘No one ever gets caught in Delhi and I’ve got caught thrice. Meri kismet hi kharab hai,’ he grumbled.

  ‘What the hell were you doing driving drunk again anyway? Who were you racing this time, Gaurav?’

  ‘Watch your tone, Kavita. I’m allowed to have some fun. I work hard for a living. I can’t afford a driver.’

  ‘You can take a cab. You haven’t learned your lesson from the last two times? You could have killed someone!’ Kavita found it hard to concentrate on her own driving with all the anger boiling inside her.

  ‘It’s not my fault people just cross the street in the middle of the night thinking they own it. It’s the bloody population of this country. They live everywhere. They feel they own the streets. No one looks left or right anymore.’

  ‘So you think what you did was okay?’

  ‘No I don’t,’ Gaurav sighed. ‘But I’m stressed. I drank a little too much with the boys and was driving home. The streets were empty. It’s Delhi for God’s sake! Every street is empty at one in the morning. No cops are ever around.’

  ‘Except Inspector Arvind, obviously and he is very vigilant. One wrong swerve and you could have been in a serious accident.’

  Gaurav sulked all the way home and didn’t say another word, not even to thank Kavita. He crashed into bed the minute they entered the house. Kavita changed and went to lie down with her back to him. He snored lightly as her eyes caught the clock: 3:00 a.m. She had to get up to get her son ready for school in four hours’ time. And then head to work. It was going to be a long day. Now Kavita couldn’t sleep. She wondered if things would have been different if she hadn’t felt so lonely that day. How did I end up being this lonely?

  It was nine years ago when they had first met. She was well into her medical residency by then and was working at AIIMS. She had studied all her life to be a doctor. She wanted to make her mother proud. She wanted to earn enough to look after her mother and younger sister. Her father had abandoned them when she and her sister were little.

  One morning her mother said, ‘Beta, you don’t need to do so much. We’re fine. I don’t want you to wake up one day all alone. It’s important to also have love in your life.’

  She thought she had found that love in Gaurav. He had walked into her office, a Pharmaceutical Sales representative. Tall, broad shoulders, dark, wavy mop of hair. Like those men on the covers of a Mills & Boon. She was instantly attracted to him.

  Though today when thought about it, she wondered if maybe it was only because of what her mother had said that morning, the idea of ending up alone.

  ‘Excuse me, Madam,’ Gaurav, the sales representative was saying. ‘May I have a minute of your time?’ He walked in and took a seat opposite her desk. It was just a coincidence that she was at her desk that morning doing paperwork. Otherwise she would have been on her feet visiting wards and performing operations. Kismet. Is kismet another word for unhappy coincidences?

  She didn’t even have time that morning but he was so good-looking that she had to give him at least two minutes. He was tall, had compelling dark, large eyes and his features were firm. His confident set of shoulders made him even more irresistible.

  ‘I wanted to speak to you about a few drugs that we’ve just got FDA approval for. They’re not out in the market and we wanted you to have them before the other hospitals.’ His smooth olive skin stretched over his cheeks as he smiled. His voice resonated loud and clear but not overbearing.

  This was not the first sales representative who had tried to sell his pharmaceutical products to doctors like Kavita, so she knew how they smooth-talked. And as much as she wanted to spend a little more time with him, Kavita knew it wasn’t in her place to order drugs so she told Gaurav she was not interested.

  ‘But this can relieve your patients from pain. Have you heard of an epidural?’ He spoke almost immediately after she finished her sentence, not giving her a moment to get back to her work, but holding her attention for way longer than she had hoped. She liked how he challenged her.

  ‘Every doctor has heard of it…,’ she wanted to take his name.

  ‘Gaurav. Gaurav Gupta.’ His smile was as charming as his personality.

  ‘Yes…Gaurav,’ She remembered he had mentioned it earlier. ‘I don’t need an epidural.’

  ‘What if I told you there was an alternative to the epidural that would not have such alarming after-effects? Would you still think about the drug?’

  ‘Is it IV?’

  Gaurav smiled. Now he had got her interested. That’s exactly what he wanted. ‘No. It’s orally prescribed.’

  ‘Does it have the same effect as an epidural? How? Isn’t that unsafe?’

  ‘I can leave some samples and written documents that we have on it. Here’s my number,’ he said as he took out the samples and his card from his bag. ‘You’ll have all the information on that. And I can tell you more about it over dinner, if you’re free.’

  She was offended by this man’s gumption, asking her out for dinner!

  Kavita shook her head. He may be gorgeous but he was a stranger. And love couldn’t distract her now—not even the idea of it. Love took away from ambition. She would tell her mother that love would have to wait. She told Gaurav, ‘You’ll have to talk to the product manager. I’m not really in charge of this.’

  But he was persistent, like any salesperson was. ‘Once you approve, we’ll head to the product manager and make a deal. Right now, I want you to see what this miracle drug can do and how you can ease the pain of your patient’s lives! Wouldn’t you like that?’

  Kavita nodded and then shook her head. She was a renowned gynaecologist. She had delivered thousands of babies. She had performed hundreds of operations and her research was published in various medical journals. Why was she feeing like putty in this man’s presence? ‘Fine, Gaurav. I have rounds now. Thank you for your time.’

  As they both stood up to shake hands, there was a strange electricity that passed between them. He smiled and left. Dinner would have to wait.

  She sat looking at his card for a long time. This man had made her feel strange. She had been too busy all her life trying to study to be a doctor and then trying to prove she was a good one. Later she would tell her sister, Kaajal, ‘I don’t go for just good-looking men. I’ve seen enough of them. What was it about him?’

  And Kaajal would reply, ‘Sometimes, when you know, you know. There’s no logic involved in knowing if he’s the one. There’s no logic for falling in love with a person. It just happens. And when you have love, you’ll have it all.’

  Now Kavita was in bed, trying to find sleep as Gaurav slept soundly next to her. She watched the digital clock turn to four. She stared into the dark, empty night. The house was completely quiet. Did she really have it all?

  She was a successful gynaecologist in her mid-30s. She lived with her younger, unmarried sister, Kaajal, and their mother. Gaurav lived with them because her mother’s was a large enough house for the entire family. Gaurav was staying in a rented place when they met. His parents lived in Jaipur along with Gaurav’s two sisters who were also married.

  He got by on charm. Kavita and he had had great sex in the beginning. And then work took over. Her time was spent in the hospital and that was when he lost his first job. Things went downhill from then. Two years into their marriage, Kavita knew it wasn’t working. She wanted a divorce. She spoke to Kaajal about it. Kaajal was then finishing law school.

  ‘It will devastate mom,’ Kaajal had warned in reply. ‘She’s too traditional, Kavi. Don’t do this. Have a child. Maybe that’ll save your marriage.’

  Why is it that even when women know that it’s the end of a relationship, they’ll do wha
tever they can to save it for someone else? Gaurav was happy to have a baby. He was a pretty good father. He couldn’t always change nappies but rocked Vansh to sleep every night. His career took a back seat. Not that it was going anywhere to begin with. He was fired from the pharmaceutical company when they had a class action suit against them. They thought it was his fault. He was unemployed for several months. That was the first time he got arrested for drinking and driving. Kavita and he went to marriage counseling and things were better for a while after that.

  But Kavita now had to work hard to support Gaurav and the needs of a new baby. She hired a nanny to help. She worked extra hard. She didn’t spend a single pie on herself. And yet Gaurav began to hate her more and more.

  Gaurav eventually found another job as a sales executive in a TV channel. He enjoyed it for some time till he got fired again. His ego didn’t allow him to take orders from a boss who was younger than him. Again he stayed at home with her mother and their son. Somehow through Kaajal’s contacts, he got a job in an event management company and that’s where he had been for the last two years.

  Their son Vansh was now six and a half years old. He was quite independent, though he had the luxury of having enough family members and maids around to manage his life.

  But Kavita felt she should have known better. If she hadn’t called Gaurav about those samples, if they hadn’t gone out for those few dates, if she hadn’t so desperately wanted to be in love for the first time in her life, if her mother who had raised her and her sister single-handedly had not wanted her to get married so quickly, none of this mess would have happened. There were too many factors. A lifetime of reasoning and pondering.

  Gaurav was so good with their son. He was brilliant as a son-in-law. He looked after her mother the way she herself never could. She was always at the hospital. He was the one who drove her everywhere, took her for anything she wanted, and spent hours listening to her. Even Kaajal, who was a lawyer and several years younger than Kavita, didn’t have time to be with their mother as much as Gaurav did. How could she divorce such a man? On what grounds? Love is always the stupidest factor to get married. And falling out of it is the stupidest factor to get divorced. If only couples realized it before it was too late on either accounts.

  And what would Vansh say? He would definitely choose to live with Gaurav. Kavita would die if that ever happened. Marriages weren’t meant to be ideal, happy, romantic scenarios. They were a slice of life with two people compromising for a greater good.

  So she let Gaurav be. She pretended it was a great marriage. She found common ground. She forced herself to have sex. She let some things go for the greater good.

  The clock showed six o’ clock. Kavita was already awake. She took her pink yoga mat and went to the balcony. She practiced yoga every morning before the house woke up. It was her time to exercise in peace and gather her thoughts. She did one hundred surya namaskars before she went to wake up her son.

  ‘Mama, you’re all sweaty,’ he said as she snuggled next to him.

  ‘Hmm. I love you, my pudding pie.’

  ‘Mama. Please don’t call me that now. I’m a big boy.’

  ‘Okay okay, baba. I won’t.’

  ‘Mama, can I ask you a question?’ Vansh said feeling shy and looking away from his mother who was lying next to him. She nodded her head. ‘Can I have a sibling?’

  Kavita sat up, ‘What?’

  Immediately Vansh changed the topic, ‘No no. It was just that all my friends have brothers and sisters. So they can play with them. Otherwise you always have to fix play dates and tell Maasi or Papa to play with me…It would be easier if I had a sibling na?’

  Kavita sighed. After last night, she never wanted to sleep with Gaurav again. Thinking about having another baby was far from her mind. ‘We’ll see. And everyone likes spending time with you and your play dates are for you to have fun. Now go get dressed please. Let’s not be late for the school bus.’

  Vansh jumped out of bed and gave his mother a hug. For him, she hadn’t said no. He would work on her later. He would also talk to his father!

  Kavita saw her son off to school and sat at the kitchen table with her cup of coffee. She couldn’t have another child. She was just too tired. Even though she delivered babies for a living, she didn’t plan on having another one herself. It would stunt her career and there was no love between her and Gaurav anyway. She decided to stay at home that day and clear her head.

  19

  It was a large house. Both Kaajal and Kavita had been born and brought up there. When their father left them for someone else, their mother got the house. She never chose to leave, believing with all her heart that he would come back one day. She worked really hard to make sure they went to medical and law school. She raised them well. When Kavita began to earn, she handed all her pay cheques to her mother. Since then they had managed to renovate their four-bedroom house and turned it into a modern abode. A large lawn was in the backyard. Vansh had good friends in the neighbourhood, not to mention so many people at home who made sure he felt loved and that all his needs were attended to.

  Kavita’s current worry was Gaurav: he had to put an end to all the risqué behaviour, engaging in shady deals and having near-misses that almost landed him in jail.

  The morning after she bailed him out of the police station she decided to talk to him. She found him in the kitchen making himself coffee. ‘Gaurav, what’s going on?’ He didn’t answer. He continued making coffee, not looking at his wife, slowly put a teaspoon of sugar in his cup and then poured in some fresh milk. He tasted it and added a little more sugar.

  ‘Is it something at work?’ she pushed. ‘You can’t keep doing these things, Gaurav.’ She stood at the corner of the kitchen, watching the hall for any sign of her mother emerging from her bath. ‘It’s not good for our name. If people find out about your brushes with the law, my career could be in jeopardy. Even Kaajal’s.’

  Kavita’s was a commanding figure as she stood at the kitchen counter. She meant business and she would not have Gaurav ignore her. She had always been all about no fuss. Whether it was at home or the workplace, she got the job done efficiently and didn’t bother about sentimentality where it wasn’t needed. She was caring towards her family members but she was practical and pragmatic when it counted. She worked hard to spend quality time with her family. She took them on holidays and gave them attention. Last year she had taken them to Bali for a week; another week in Paris, too. Two long breaks when her son’s school had vacations.

  Right now she needed answers from Gaurav. She had tried everything, speaking to him, taking him to a counselor, giving him a roof over his head. She had even considered moving out at one point but figured it would be an added expenditure on her head as he just spent all his money on himself and his car. It was wiser they stayed here where Vansh had support instead of their only son coming home from school to an empty house and a nanny.

  ‘Why don’t you ever think of me?’ were the first words that came out of Gaurav’s mouth. ‘It’s always about your reputation, your career. Your family.’ Gaurav sat with his cup of steaming hot coffee and did not give her a glance.

  ‘That’s not true. You chose to move in here. I had one condition when I got married and it was that I would not leave my mother or sister alone. And your parents live in Jaipur. My work was here. Or don’t you remember that I was already working when you met me? We thought about moving out long ago. Is that it? Do you want to move out, the three of us? Will you pay for the house then? Because all my money goes into this house. I need to pay back the loans my mother has taken for Kaajal and me.’

  ‘Yes yes, you’re the big shot. You’re the one who throws money at our faces.’

  ‘I don’t throw money. I use the money to make everyone happy. It’s not easy for me either.’

  ‘Yes, earning all that money isn’t easy. Showing your family how successful you are isn’t easy. Rubbing it in my face isn’t easy.’

  Kavita
didn’t say anything until he finished ranting. She just looked at him, wanting him to look at her as well. How could this be the same man I fell in love with? His face was still as handsome, sure. But the love had faded. Was this a natural progression of all relationships? Does romantic love always eventually fade to companionship, and companionship to resentment, which would then, inevitably, fade into apathy?

  Why did I believe that Gaurav can change? Kavita scolded herself for being naïve, for thinking that their marriage would improve. For being in denial for so long that perhaps she had made the wrong choice. Whatever it was, she was determined to find a solution.

  When Gaurav ended his rant she said, ‘Why don’t you tell me what you want me to do? I can’t seem to get through to you anymore.’

  ‘Maybe you should spend more time at home.’ He looked straight in her eyes.

  ‘I can’t. Why can’t you understand? I have my own ambitions, Gaurav. I want to make something of my life.’

  He kept looking at her and said nothing.

  ‘You have to accept that I am not only a wife and mother, or daughter and sister. I am a doctor. Doesn’t that mean something to you?’

  ‘First, you’re a mother and a wife, Kavita.’ He was just as sure about his position. ‘You have responsibilities towards us.’

  Kavita sighed, ‘Okay, Gaurav. I will try. But then you will have to contribute to the house. You will need to give your salary to this house instead of spending it on your parents. I will come home early to be with you. I will make it work. But I need you to promise me you’ll make it work too. You’ll stop drinking and spend time with me too.’

  ‘Let me think about it.’

  His nonchalance peeved Kavita. ‘What is really bothering you, Gaurav? Talk to me.’ She wanted to save this marriage.

  ‘It bothers me that you’re financing us.’ There, he had said it. ‘It makes me feel small,’ Gaurav continued. Kavita pulled up a chair and sat down. ‘And you keep showing our son how great you are. How many lives you save. Things that you’ve bought for him. Mummy bought you a new toy, a new book. Hey look, Mummy bought us a new car!’ His sarcasm was so thick you could cut through it with a knife.