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Maybe the cold has gone to my head, but I feel frozen inside. Suddenly every emotion and every heart beat tries to strangle me pulling me down with the pressures of maintaining a relationship that was wrong from day one. I feel the walls around are watching me with multiple eyes and judging me in a crass manner, without hearing the full truth that my heart wants to cry out. Every smile is fake and I hate myself for conforming to the regular juvenile norms of the society. I am drowning in this gargantuan space without someone to look at or talk to. I don't even know if I am alive anymore. Robotic routines, painful socialization, household chores all have started to get to me now. Trapped, is what I feel. In every phase of life and maybe within myself too. Do I break out? I'm not too sure if I have the strength to do it.
A myriad emotions plague me. Each with a different tinge and different hue, leaving me whitewashed and devoid of any color in my life. I feel empty, hollow; almost like life was drained out of me in an instant. It doesn't hold any meaning now, nor any importance. I don't know why am I still tied to the shackles of this meaningless liaison. One with a lover and the other with a husband. Which of it doesn't make sense, I'm not sure of. The man I live with, walks in with different girls in each arm every night. He mocks me and spends the night with them in my very own bedroom. I am left alone in the huge space of the empty house with the freedom of enjoying every fantasy that I can think off. The affair started because of loneliness. Everyone needs someone, don't they? Its not about sex alone, in fact it is never about sex. It is about having someone to talk to and knowing that someone is there who cares for you. Love, maybe. But forbidden.
I feel ashamed, raped and mutilated. All inside my mind and yet so painful. My bones are devoid of strength and my blood reeks of guilt. He was never loyal, but I did not have to get back at him. Believe me, that was not the intention but just the thought of having someone to talk to got me carried away. It would have been easy to walk out of this marriage and start a new life, but it will never be easy for him. Everything he has worked on until now will be taken away from him, but he will not kill me for it. He will keep me as his slave and torture me to death daily one nerve at a time. It does not matter to him if I live or die, but for his career I must live and put up a happy facade as the perfect wife. I must look gorgeous and be soaked in luxury. My words should be sugarcoated and I should ooze charisma as I talk about my lovely husband. For I am, the beloved dutiful wife of the country's biggest superstar.
He is addicted to fame, I would be lying if I said that I did not enjoy the perks. I like being famous, even though it is secondary. But what happens when the greasepaint if wiped and the cameras are off is more scarier then what happens in the movies. He loves me, he says. Rather said. But I'm the one who lives with him outside the house as a wife to paparazzi. But inside he lives with women, who I see eye to eye in every party and every occasion. They smile and pass by me in my own house almost as if I'm the visitor here. My husband doesn't care two hoots about how much he is hurting me. Why am I hurt? It is not because I love him, it is because he doesn't seem to notice what I'm going through. I'm his arm candy in all functions and he is the best husband in the world for those four to five hours. After that he turns into a stranger.
I met my lover on one such occasion. He was the only one who could see the pain behind my beautiful smoky eyes. We started talking as my husband was busy trying to woo a top shot director and we ended up having a good time together. The worst part of it was that my husband never realized that I was talking to someone else. The first time he came home and stayed the night with me, my husband was away. The next time he was home, they saw eye to eye but never said anything. What aches me the most, it is the fact that he knows that I'm having an affair and it does not matter to him. I tried to speak to him about it one day, but he said he was not interested in what I did with my life and walked away. Probably I feel the same about his life too. Actually, I don't. The women I see in this mansion drive me crazy constantly reminding me of the fact that I'm only the wife and not the lover. Or the soul mate. Maybe some of them are that to my husband, or maybe he never never really bothers to have a soul mate. Or a lover.
This morning I called it off with my lover, not because I did not like him. But because I know it is not right. There seems to be still some emotion left in me that I do not want to hurt another person. And that's all there is to it. Everything else is empty filled with a vacuum that drowns me within myself. I have forgotten who I am and what I have become. I have no strength left to fight it anymore. Not that I ever tried before. I know there is nothing that I would get from this. Be it if I'm in this deadlock or if I try to get out. People know me as the wife of the superstar and that is all my identity is. Apart from that they know nothing nor do I. So what do I do now? Nothing. I just don more makeup and get ready for the launch of my husband's new movie this evening. And yes I shall wear the diamond necklace I was asked to purchase for this very event. I shall smile, pose and pretend to enjoy the evening while I await death within myself. For him.
I totally understand your feelings.. Take care da
ReplyDeleteIts fiction Ananya! :)
DeleteVery poignant, Soumya.
ReplyDeleteHope no one has such a life. Real punishment...
That's the hope.
DeleteBrilliant! Love is never easy, is it? Soumya, please please do write that book. I'm so looking forward to a longer read from you. I absolutely loved this one.
ReplyDeleteIt sure never is. Thank you so much Aathira :)
DeleteThis is the most cruel thing anyone can ever go through in emotions. She did not make a wise decision, I would say. She must have called it quits and walked out of the marriage. Not hurting somebody is a good thing but when people are there doing the same thing to you, there's little to be considered for them.
ReplyDeleteLike I said, she enjoyed the perks it provided.
DeleteVery intense post. What happens between a man and wife no one can understand but the couple. Cheers to your candid conversation and honesty.
ReplyDeleteVisit us sometime, we love guests at The Sinhas at No. 302 http://sinhasat302.blogspot.in/
Thank you. I'm off to visit you guys now!
DeleteYou are Fabulous...way too good with words...they seem to dance at your whims..you are blessed soumya..looking forward for your International bestseller fictional novel :)
ReplyDeleteI wish she'd realize that her life amounts to more than being a superstar's arm candy and that, every bit of risk to build a life where she doesn't feel choked in a deadlock. But then again, I'm not in her shoes so my suggestion amounts to little. She seems to be completely immobilized by her idea of her husband - his affairs and apathy - and how her actions and emotions are directly/indirectly connected with him. She herself, as the readers, are weighing her life against that of her husband - and that is what probably scares me the most about a marriage gone sour.
ReplyDeleteAs already mentioned above, a very poignant work. Loved it. Keep it up!
Thank you so much for this wonderful comment :)
Delete