Of Course I Love You!: Till I find someone better…

by Durjoy Datta

I was woken up by the front door swinging open slowly.

  Chapter 23

  There was nobody at the door. I had forgotten to bolt the door after the courier guy had delivered the brown envelope.

  I went with groggy eyes to close the door. As I locked the door from inside, she called out. My mind imploded with possibilities and questions even as I tried to come to grips with reality.

  Think Deb, think. What does she want? What do you want? What does she want? Why is she here?

  She must have walked in when she saw the door open and now was standing right in front of me. ‘Deb, come here,’ she said.

  She stood there in a black shirt and deep blue jeans, both of which clung to her body. I could have fed on her for days. Just when I started walking towards her, she ran up to me and ploughed into me, pushing me against the wall. She stapled me to the wall, my hands outstretched and pinned to the wall, palms up. She stared deep and hard, came close and licked my lips once. She bit my lips and I tilted her backwards until the first drops of blood seeped out from my pursed lips. She looked hungry and so was I. She thrust her lips and tongue into my mouth, and hurt me with every bite. We fought for dominance, sucked and bit wherever we could. She slipped her hand down and grabbed hold of my thing, and tried to push her hand back along it. It sent me into the throes of ecstasy.

  ‘Like it?’ she asked as I pulled back from the kiss, grimacing in pain. She let go of me and stepped back. She unbuttoned her shirt but didn’t take it off. She unzipped her jeans slightly but didn’t take them off either.

  ‘Strip,’ she commanded. ‘I want you out of those clothes right now.’

  I stripped. Out of my shirt and out of my shorts. And everything else. She moved further away as I moved towards her. Her smirk teased me. She had me naked and looking for cover. She didn’t need any. She looked gorgeous in her unbuttoned shirt.

  ‘What do you want?’ she asked in the wickedest sense possible. She was staring where I was the hardest as if mocking its size, presence and helplessness.

  ‘I want you.’ I was breathing heavily by then.

  ‘I don’t think you will be up to it.’

  ‘I definitely will.’ I grabbed her and she dug her teeth deep into my neck, pushed herself into me and grabbed hold of my ass, digging her nails in, and squeezed it. She climbed onto me, her legs wrapped around my waist and I carried her to my room. I dropped her on the bed, on the bound pages of Our Story. She invited me with a naughty smirk on her face. I slipped off her shirt. I pinned her to the bed and kept her from grabbing hold of what was erect and rendering me paralysed till she was naked. I pulled off her jeans.

  ‘Like it?’ she said again. I was too frenzied to appreciate her lingerie.

  ‘I don’t think so. I like you better naked.’ I grabbed it by my teeth and pulled it off slowly, never taking my eyes off her. She looked down on me, her eyes half closed and asking for it. I pulled it off slowly and bent over her.

  She tried covering her breasts naughtily but I pulled her hands away to take one hard look at her. She was naked. I went down on her and fed on her body. Her eyes never left mine as her hands guided my head to places she wanted me to touch and lick and eat. Her moans told me I was doing what she wanted me to do. In those moments, I was her slave and she could have me do anything that she thought right. I ate her to my heart’s content and I relished it.

  We crashed the television, we rolled over my laptop. I fought, I grabbed, I groaned. I was inside her. She bit, she clawed, she moaned. The more we became one, the harder she moaned, the more I groaned. Our passion spent, I rolled away from her, leaving her body blue and battered. I was exhausted. We had our first sex … and I realized there were a lot of things a girl can do than just lie there and let the guy do all the work. It was delightful.

  ‘I was scared,’ she said.

  ‘About what?’ as I outlined her breasts with my fingers. They looked gorgeous with my love bites on them. We had been barbaric.

  ‘I thought you wouldn’t be this good,’ she said and grimaced as I pressed the biggest love bite I had ever given her. It was a huge bluish mark on the inside of her left breast.

  ‘I was always this good,’ I said and squeezed her right breast hard enough to get a shriek out of her.

  ‘I don’t think so, Deb,’ she said, clenching her teeth.

  ‘What made you come back, Avantika?’ I asked.

  ‘What we just did.’

  ‘This? Which means you missed it. It proves my point. I was good.’ I had expected something else. I wanted her to tell me she still loved me.

  ‘Maybe. Or that I found no one better.’ She laughed out. She was still so gorgeous. She sat up and tied hair into a neat bun. Girls look better after sex, Shrey once told me. So true.

  ‘I don’t need any of that,’ I said and kissed her thigh, ready for another go, but I needed some answers first.

  ‘Easy, Deb. Just sit beside me,’ she said as she fished something out from her bag.

  ‘Here.’ She handed out some sheets to me.

  It said—Chapter 22.

  What?

  ‘Deb, this is our story,’ she said.

  ‘Wh … at? Fuck. It was you? It was you? What for? It was you? I thought it was Amit! How could it be you? How do you know? But the last chapter about Amit and me? How did you know about that? Oh Avantika, I love you. But why?’

  For the third time, the flapping of the tongue. How does she know about Amit? She is a witch.

  ‘Hear me out, Deb. I have answers for everything. A few days back, someone from Bramha Publications read your blog and mailed me. They said they really liked your blog and wanted your story in book form. I thought I wouldn’t do it, but I missed you so much and I thought it would let me be close to you again. So I started writing and I wrote it for them. I sent them the first few chapters and they really liked it and wanted me to complete the book. This is what it is. The last chapter of our story. The end of our story. The end of me,’ she said and started to look the other way. She had tears in her eyes.

  The end of me?

  The last part shook me to the roots and the pages fell out of my hands, trembling, shaking, reaching out to her.

  ‘The end of … you?’ I asked as I fixed my eyes on her and choked on my own words.

  ‘I am dying, Deb. I am dying.’ She broke down, turning away from me and dug her face into my lap.

  ‘What do you mean? What … What are you saying? Tell me you are kidding. What …’ I went blank as I grabbed hold of her and made her look at me.

  She looked up, her eyes filled up with all the sadness in the world, held my face with her hands and said, ‘I have cancer, Deb. The drugs killed me. They killed me. Doctors say I have just a few months to live. That is why I came back. To spend my last few days with you. Please don’t leave me, Deb. I want to live. With you. Please Deb. Don’t let me die. I don’t want to die. Please Deb, save me, please save me,’ she broke down and sank into my lap.

  ‘Huh?’

  I lost my senses. I felt numb. I looked at her. She was dying. Avantika was dying. The person I had dreamt of spending my life with, was right there in front of me. Dying. In my lap, begging me to save her, to give her the life I promised I would. She was right there, asking for what she deserved. She wanted me to keep her alive, save her, love her. She was back with me, just as I wanted. But only to go forever, leaving me behind, forever, alone … with the guilt that I couldn’t save her. She would be gone in a matter of days and I would see her crumble and die in front of me. But I was helpless. I had failed. I felt cheated. I felt punished for the times I had wronged other people. But why her? Why not me? Why would anyone punish her?

  I mustered up courage to look at her again. She hugged me as if to never leave. I never wanted to let her go. She was beautiful. But I noticed things I was too lost in her to see before. Her eyes were tired. They had lost the twinkle, those eyes in which I used to get lost for hours, eyes that said more than her lips, eyes that winked naugh
tily, eyes that saw a great guy in me. She had gone weak, her muscles were wasted, and her wrists barely had any flesh on them. She was all bones, her collarbones were prominent, her thighs were thin and scrawny and she looked terrible.

  The love bites, which stood out, were on pale yellow skin, not on the glowing skin I used to touch on one pretext or the other. She barely had any strength when we made love, I remembered. I held her face, wet with my tears and hers, and noticed the change. Those pink lips had gone pale, that complexion had lost its radiance. She was sick, and it showed. There was hair lying everywhere I saw. Chemotherapy makes you lose hair, I had heard. I imagined her like other cancer patients, bald and strapped to a chair with needles dipping into her veins. I cried.

  I looked around to see Our Story scattered beneath her hair, beneath her dying body. Beneath a dying me. Beneath a dying us.

  I wanted to die. I wanted to die before her. I wanted to die with her.

  ‘Avantika, what did the doctors say?’ I asked as tears flooded my eyes.

  ‘A few months. Last stage, Deb. A few months is all that is left for me now …’

  I grabbed her and we cried out aloud. She broke away from my embrace and started kissing away my tears. Just as I had done on the first night-out.

  It had been hours. I lay there looking at her, still in denial that she would be gone. I had lived these three months of separation, hoping that some day, some damned day, she would come back to me and we would be what we were again. She was back. But …

  She spoke. ‘Deb …’

  I hung on to every word she said. If I survived this, I would need every bit of her memory to carry on. I wanted to tell her how much I loved her. I wanted to hear the same from her. As many times as life would allow her. I would need her to say that she loved me with every breath she took. I would need whatever was left of her.

  She locked my eyes in a gaze and said, ‘Deb, they said … I will die in a few months … if I …’

  ‘If …?’

  ‘If I don’t get enough of you, my sweetheart!’

  ‘WHAT?’ I let out, shocked.

  And there it was, then. Her wink! She winked. And burst out laughing!

  ‘What the fuck? What the bloody … Are you crazy?’ I shouted at her as I jumped on the bed. How could I forget, this was Avantika! Was this a joke? Damn!

  ‘Aww … I am not going to leave your worthless life so soon, Deb.’

  ‘You are an ass, you know that? Damn you! Were you out of your mind? I could have died, you bloody witch!’ I shouted and swore happily.

  ‘Why? You have cancer or what?’ she stood up and hugged me. She laughed.

  ‘No, I don’t. But I have a great fucking girlfriend without whom I cannot live. And if she ever dies, I will go with her,’ I said, looked at her and kissed her nose. Then, we cried a little more.

  ‘Okay, Avantika. Does cancer spread through sex? Because I am ready to do it again, baby.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ she smiled and winked. I pushed her onto the bed. I forgot about Chapter 22. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be better than this.

  We spent the whole day on the bed making-out whenever I was capable of it. It got wilder with each time and that’s where the hair on the bed came from. Apparently, her weight loss was because of her aim to reduce to size zero. I categorically told her that it was absolutely unnecessary and she was perfect the way she was. She couldn’t hold her laughter once I told her what I had imagined. Deb and the Cancer Story, it would forever stay.

  ‘Deb, you have twenty missed calls on your phone. Pick it up.’ I picked it up and she put me on loudspeaker. It was the guard from my office.

  ‘Deb sahab? Deb sahab! I have been calling you since the evening. They caught me punching the cards today. They have taken both your cards. What do I do, Deb sahab? The vigilance team wants to talk to me tomorrow. What do I say, Deb sahab?’ he asked frantically. There was a reason to be frantic. Suspension was a given for such an offence. I knew Goyal was behind it. Nobody otherwise gave a shit about who punched your card. He wouldn’t let this one go, I thought. Bastard.

  ‘Arjunji, it’s nothing to worry about. Tell them you just punched my card. Not a word about Amitji. Get that? Just my card and tell them I asked you to hand over Amit’s card to him as he forgot it on his desk. Just tell them that, I will handle the rest,’ I said.

  ‘Okay, Deb sahab. Thank you.’ He hung up.

  ‘Avantika, can I have the laptop? If there is anything left of it, I mean!’ I said.

  ‘Why? Seems like you pretty much lost the job, didn’t you?’

  ‘Seems like it.’

  ‘I am so unlucky for you! If we are to be together, I think you will have to make do without a job!’ she chuckled. ‘So what are you going to do now?’

  ‘Nothing much, drop some shit on people before I leave. That won’t save my job, but it will save my face, I guess.’

  I didn’t care about the job. I had Avantika. Jobs would follow. Although we hadn’t exchanged a word about our relationship, I just knew she was there to stay. And there were plenty of jobs out there.

  I typed out a long resignation letter addressed to Mr Malhotra. I accused Mr Goyal for mental harassment and all Amit’s not-so-loved colleagues for making life hell for me, as they couldn’t stand me being so smart. Therefore, I had no choice but to start working from home. Mr Malhotra would believe me as he had already seen the results.

  ‘So what do you think? Will it work?’ she asked.

  ‘It has to. If not, Dad will pull me out of this mess. So, it’s not a big deal. I have you now. Nothing else matters.’ I hugged her.

  It got to me later that I had done a pretty good job with the letter. The vigilance team was off me and I still had the job. But I resigned anyway. I would have sounded guilty if I had not. I couldn’t have possibly disappointed Dad. I wanted him and everyone else to feel that I was a victim of office politics and I didn’t want to continue any more. Amit wasn’t touched and that was all I cared about. Astha’s parents wouldn’t accept an out-of-work suitor. Goyal missed another promotion.

  ‘So Avantika, you still haven’t told me … what brings you back?’ I asked.

  ‘Sri Guru,’ she said.

  ‘Not again. He was the reason we were in this shit in the first place. Nothing would have gone wrong had he not meddled.’

  ‘Shut up, Deb. At least now I know that I cannot live without you. And for sure that you love me as much as I do.’

  ‘Big deal. I could have told you that. Anyway, continue,’ I said, happily irritated.

  ‘I was back to my alcohol habit. The only time I didn’t drink was when I was writing this book. I was fucking myself over, all over again. It was then that I met Sri Guru again and realized I was running away from something that is truly mine. I was running away from my responsibility. You. I am ready to take that now. If something happens to you, I will make sure I set it right. If it is because of me that you see the bad times, it will be because of me that you will see the good ones,’ she finished.

  Thankfully. I never got her philosophical nonsense.

  ‘You bet! Whatever. I generally don’t get this bullshit philosophy of yours. What I do get though, is that you are a great kisser. Can we do it again?’ I leant forward to get what was truly mine.

  She leant away. ‘Before everything else, you should thank Amit. He read your blog and mailed me, days after I met Sri Guru. He seemed to know a lot about me. That is when it all started to fall into place. He told me about you guys, and everything you did for them. I thought if these guys get treated so well, I should be in for super-special treatment!’

  ‘Ohh! Yup, I missed that. That is how those chapters came up. This is how you knew all the details? But can we kiss first?’ I leant forward and she leant away again. ‘Now what? You still have something else? AIDS? Hepatitis? Whatever it is, I don’t mind. Can we kiss?’

  She again fished something out from her bag.

  ‘Yes, there is someth
ing else too. Here goes. The first cheque from Bramha Publications. Our Story is being published this year. Like that?’ She smiled and handed over the cheque to me. I read it aloud. It wasn’t much, but it was an assurance that it would be published. My story? Our story? Why would anyone be interested in reading that? Why would anyone want to know about a loser like me? It was unbelievable.

  ‘What the …? Shit, this is unreal, man! I so fucking love you! I so, so, so, so, so damn love you! Can we please kiss now?’ I jumped onto her, pinning her on the bed.

  ‘We have to. The last chapter ends with a kiss.’

  We kissed.

  Epilogue

  And that, folks, is where my story ends. There was a lot of kissing, jumping on the bed, partying out, eating out that followed when Amit and Astha came back, but let us keep it for some other time.

  Avantika had her posting shifted to Delhi and I was still looking for a job. We decided that being together was more important than job satisfaction. Or even having a job for that matter.

  Shrey was to come to Delhi in December, with his German girlfriend in tow. He could even speak a little bit of German. It was cute to see them fight in a mixture of wretched English and equally bad German. He was in love again. When they came, they wrecked my place, which Amit had so lovingly decorated now that Astha was a regular visitor. Shrey, among other things, made Astha and Amit kiss. Their first kiss, a month before they got married. I remember how happy we were that day.

  Viru and Yogi came for a visit, too, and promptly asked all of us to treat them, for all of us had a reason to celebrate. I loved them all; they loved me back. Deb was back. Good times were back.

  Life had turned a full circle. A screwed one, but a complete one.

  Just in case you are interested in what happens a couple of years down the line and are wondering if the good times lasted. Here it is …

  Shrey, too, bought a copy of my book. Pirated. But he made quite some money in Germany and ordered the legal one. He was doing well, too. He almost married the German girl he was dating and was disinherited from his family. He became the youngest person to donate to the National Physical Laboratory. He hacked Suhel’s account and somehow got him fired; that is what he tells me.