Adultery The Aarogya Wellness and Intimacy Clinic

[prasannas2001]

 

 
 
Naveen looked like a man who had no idea that his wife was lying next to him, drowning in a sea of her own inadequacy.
 
She loved him.
 
That was the cruelest part.
 
She loved him, and she couldn't give herself to him, and she didn't know why.
 
The tears came harder.
 
She pressed her palm to her mouth, bit down on the flesh of her own hand to keep silent.
 
The pain was a kind of relief, a point of focus in the chaos of her thoughts.
 
She thought about her mother, who had told her nothing about what to expect on her wedding night.
 
She thought about her friends, all of whom seemed to have managed this transition from girl to woman without any trouble.
 
She thought about the word the doctor would probably use, the word she had already used in her own head a hundred times: frigid.
 
Cold.
 
Broken.
 
Inadequate.
 
She was inadequate.
 
That was the truth.
 
She was less than what a wife should be.
 
The night stretched on.
 
The city outside grew quiet.
 
And Seema lay awake, her hand pressed against her mouth, her body rigid with shame, and waited for the morning that would bring everything into the light.
 
She didn't know what she would do when it came.
 
She only knew she couldn't go on like this.
 
The next morning, Naveen woke first.
 
Sunlight streamed through the curtains, gold and warm, catching the rose petals scattered across the bed like confetti at the end of a party.
 
He lay still for a moment, orienting himself, the unfamiliar ceiling, the soft sheets, the faint scent of jasmine.
 
Then he remembered.
 
And he turned his head.
 
Seema was curled on her side, facing away from him, her body a small, protective shape under the covers.
 
She was wearing his t-shirt, the collar slipping down one shoulder, and he could see the delicate curve of her neck, the small mole behind her ear that he had noticed for the first time on their second date and had been secretly, absurdly fond of ever since.
 
He wanted to reach out and touch her.
 
He wanted to smooth her hair back from her face and tell her it was okay, that he didn't care about last night, that he loved her and he would wait forever if he had to.
 
But he didn't.
 
Because he had a feeling she was awake, and he had a feeling she was pretending not to be, and he didn't want to force her into a conversation she wasn't ready to have.
 
So he got up as quietly as he could, padded to the bathroom, closed the door behind him.