Years do what they always do: they stretch people into versions of themselves they sometimes like, sometimes do not. That careful emphasis which bought Maya her flat, a flat she had always desired to afford, made her climb the ladder at her firm, with an attention so obsessive that she might eventually have afforded the flat she had always desired. Arjun received awards and features and his name was featured in galleries and publications. On paper they were thriving. They quarreled at home on where to get a breakfast since what was at first a question of taste had hardened into law: who should flexible, who should stand square.
Their case was not the dynamite, but a gradual undermining. This made Maya resentful when Arjun went to a shoot at dawn and came back at the end of the day, as every time he did this, she remembered how lonely she was terrified to be. Arjun was put in a strict position when Maya spent their savings to take a course that would mean more evenings out at the office. I do not want you to be a person I have statistics about, said he. I said, I do not want to play the part of supporting character in the life of another.
The thing about love is that it acquires new languages--habits, rituals, grieves--that only those within it know. The lovers who had fallen in love under a bridge started recording diaries of complaints rather than gratitude. They would sleep together and rise with different maps.
Then there was the night when such an event occurred as Arjun received a message by his former girlfriend, a woman called Clara who mentioned she looked like a specter in photos and commented on social media, congratulating him on a recent exhibition. The message was innocuous but it opened an argument of a different color. Clara was one of the chapters of his life which was never actually closed. Her message provoked a discussion about availability and recollection, whether re-connexions were betrayals.
When you say we at some future day, do you mean I? Asked Maya. He hesitated. He loved her. He loved his work. He fancied the liberty of wandering. His silence was a bruise.