Non-erotic Bonds of Love by sfraza

[pastispresent]

Chapter 7

The awkwardness Neeta felt being alone with Milind soon dissipated when she found that the Piper Pub and Grill Bar exuded a warm energy. The ambience was great, and the restaurant was pleasantly and cheerfully crowded. They ordered exotic sea food and tested their palates with red wine whose soothing richness calmed her nerves and soon she started enjoying herself.

Neeta and Milind talked about mountaineering for a while and then about his passion, her children, IT industry, H1B visas, India. Polite conversation, so generic it did not matter at all but continuously flowing like a stream rushing from one rock to another. Milind was wearing his trademark checkered shirt and formal pants. He sat with his hands folded on the table also his trademark posture. He was a modern-day hippie who loved each day as it came and enjoyed a good conversation. He told a funny story about skiing which had Neeta in splits. Not that she could hear much of the story above the general din of the bar which also had light music playing in the corner, but she laughed heartily, throwing her head back

The effects of the wine took her as her muscles relaxed and her toes uncurled. She had never drunk like this before. It seemed to her that this was the first time she had ever truly enjoyed drinking.

“I should get you back to the hotel while you are still walking”; Milind commented looking at her amused.

“Oh, I never lost control, I know my limits”, Neeta boasted though she recognized some truth in his words.

“You should let others decide your level of intoxication”

“I have let others take care of my life for too long”, Neeta answered, she did not care today what she said.

They were quite for some time.

“I find you very intriguing,” Milind said after a little while focusing on her.

“You do”

“Yes, I was sort of a rebel in my childhood, my parents wanted to raise me with Indian values. But I could never associate myself with the culture that was foreign to me, I wanted to be as American as possible, so I always did whatever my white friends did, celebrated Christmas, not Diwali, did not visit the temples, never dated any Indian girl just to prove my allegiance. But now that when I thought I have distanced myself enough, now when it does not even matter to my folks what I do. I want to spend time with you. This is strange”

Where was he going with this?

“You want to rediscover your Indian roots through us”, she laughed feeling the irony of it.

“Maybe it is just you” he shrugged and smiled.

“What do you mean”, she replied a little too quickly.

He flexed his shoulders and got up.

“Let us go outside, we need to clear our heads before we can drive.”

He held her as she got up unsteadily and they went out on the porch. Some garden chairs were lying around and they each took one. It was so chilly, no one was outside. Everyone preferring the warmth of closed doors. But the cold wind ruffled her hair and she felt at peace as they sat in silence looking at the mountains for a long time.

Later that night when the alcohol was wearing off her system and a mild headache took over, Neeta wondered if Milind had a soft spot for her. The thought simply amused her; and not frightened her in any way, she had been married way too many years to find this dangerous at all. Her marriage was like an impenetrable armor, an unshakeable fact of life like sun itself which could not be questioned; so she allowed herself to flirt with her fancies for a while. Her inner self-became aware of his masculinity and the glamorous way he moved around in his athletic manner. How his eyes cringed at the sides when he laughed, she had not paid any similar attention to any man’s facial features for a long time.

Milind did seem to enjoy her company. They went skiing, pubs, restaurants, malls. Sometimes Kabir accompanied them but now and then he was busy or simply unavailable and they found themselves alone together. Milind however was always the perfect gentleman and Neeta really began to believe that her suspicions were the consequence of an overactive imagination. She anyway felt that she was acting crazy enough these days and subdued her instincts. But he sought her out so often that it was hard not to be continuously in doubt. He after all looked like a man who would not waste his time with anyone.

The only time she ever truly felt guilty was when Milind would sweep her off to desolate landscapes at the oddest of times and sit with her in silence for hours. Like during a fishing expedition all day when the freezing surface of lake would not even break into a ripple or on a stroll through the city parks as the sun left its last streaks of orange on the dark green trees. He would just stare at the starlit sky, feel the wind, soak in the sunrise. Neeta felt that the quietude and comfort that developed between them during these long silences was more inappropriate than all the hanging out they did together. Close acquaintances, friends did not have right to such contentment in each other’s company.

Once they broke that silence on a weekend trip to a skiing resort. Milind played their instructor teaching them how to ski. Neeta and Kabir were hopeless in their lessons. Neeta would fall frequently and Kabir was worse, every time he went down the slope, he veered off and crash into the trees. This would crack Neeta up and she would fall still more. After some time, all of them were exhausted and hardly ever skied. Milind gave up, they had early dinner in the evening and Kabir retired to his room.

But Neeta stayed on, she sat with Milind on the snowy mountain summit and they talked for hours. His life and hers. Her marriage, his parents, her job, his hobbies, her kids, his girlfriends.

Nothing in common between them. She had lived life as if synchronized to the tunes of a marching band. Left, right, Left, right she had followed all the steps until she was unable to take a free step of her own without guilt or anger. He was a free spirit, always rebelling until there was nothing more left to rebel to.

The night sky was now strewn with bright stars stretching into the horizon as far as eyes could see. The snowy cliff was bathed now in a silvery glow, the landscape dramatic and vivid as if in a dream All the holiday revelers have left by now and the valley looking hauntingly beautiful in its strange desolation. It was so cold; the wind was biting; Neeta wrapped her arms to herself. None of them fully understood the sense of unfulfillment they faced inside them; yet somehow, they did not feel so alone now. When it was too cold to bear, they went back to their respective rooms.

Aditya had learned a couple of things about his life in his wife’s absence. First was that he had to handle the demands of a chaotic life on his own and no friends or kin will be coming around to help him out. His ailing parents were no help and he had to be careful not to snap back when his hypochondriac father demanded a doctor for the 40th time in a day. His mother had her routine which was not to be disturbed or questioned. Anjali was no angel, but at a delicate stage and needed to be managed even more tactfully. She responded more to love and affection anyways than direct orders. Rohit was to be reined in and he relied on purely tyrannical fatherly behavior for this; any psychological damage to his nine-year-old can be assessed later; he just hoped that in six months not much harm would be done.

He tried to be in control, though, even though sometimes it felt the nerves on his forehead would explode with the effort and he would start yelling at someone. But he maintained his composure. This was not an ideal family where almost everyone attended to their own needs and did not care for the other. Aditya realized he will have to be the kind dictator, the patriarch, the trunk of the tree which held it all together. He was awfully lonely. His office work was suffering, and it was only the goodwill he had maintained over the years that was helping him string along. It was literally survival from one day to another. The only silver lining was that the passports and visas were ready and just after a month they would be gone on a two-week vacation to the USA.

He swore that when Neeta comes back he will never again side with her daughter in conflicts or tell her how useful his mother had been. He will have a heart to heart discussion with her when the time was right. No matter what happens when she comes back, he will do everything in his power to make things right between them. They needed to be a team, not a winning team, not even a potentially strong one, but they needed to be together. He did not even care what went wrong, how the script of his story had twisted like that, whether he was to blame or she. Neeta was a person, not an instrument to get what he wanted. He would cater to her needs whatever it maybe because she was the only person capable or available to cater to his.