Adultery The Aarogya Wellness and Intimacy Clinic

[prasannas2001]

 

Scene 3 - The Doctor
 
 
The fifth week, she made an appointment.
 
She discussed with Naveen to consult a gynecologist.
 
Immediately she looked up a gynecologist in the city, Dr. Priya Menon, who had a reputation for being discreet and thorough.
 
Both Seema and Naveen went to see the gynecologist on a Tuesday afternoon.
 
The waiting room smelled of antiseptic and jasmine.
 
Naveen sat in a plastic chair bolted to the wall, a magazine he hadn't opened lying on his lap.
 
There were three other people in the room, an elderly woman with a walking stick, a young mother with a sleeping infant, a man in a faded shirt checking his phone.
 
None of them looked at each other.
 
This was a place where people came to be invisible, and the invisibility was a courtesy.
 
He had been here for twenty minutes.
 
Seema had gone in first.
 
Dr. Menon had wanted to examine her alone, just routine, the receptionist had said, and Naveen had been shown to this chair with a polite smile.
 
He stared at a poster on the opposite wall.
 
A happy family, mother, father, two children, all of them smiling.
 
Below it, in red letters: A Healthy Family Is a Happy Family.
 
He read it three times.
 
His mind wandered where he didn't want it to go.
 
He thought about the wedding night, the way she had frozen, the way she had cried.
 
He thought about the weeks since, the careful distance, the way she had started going to bed early and waking up late.
 
He thought about his own failures.
 
The moments he had reached for her and felt her stiffen.
 
The nights he had lain awake beside her, wanting to say something and never finding the words.
 
Maybe it's me, he thought.
 
Maybe I'm the problem.
 
He had never been with a woman before Seema.
 
He had told her that early in their courtship, and she had smiled and said it didn't matter, that she hadn't either.
 
He had been glad of it then.
 
Now he wondered if it made him stupid.