‘W
30
Three months later
ho is it?’ I said. I walked up to answer the doorbell in my nightclothes. I was watching the
Filmfare Awards at my home in Hong Kong. The film Queen, about a woman who took charge of her
life, was sweeping all the awards. The doorbell rang again.
I opened the door.
‘Neel?’ I said. I checked the time: 11 p.m.
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you,’ he said.
Neel and I had some unspoken rules. He never came to my apartment. I had never gone to his
house either. We had never got together in Hong Kong. Somehow, intimacy on a business trip far away
felt less sinful than in the city we lived in.
‘What’s the matter?’ I said.
‘Can I stay here tonight?’ Neel said.
‘Why?’ I said. ‘I mean, we don’t really do that.’
‘Kusum and I had a fight,’ he said.
‘Anything major?’
‘Things escalated. I didn’t want them to get worse. I told her I had to go on a business trip and
left. I thought I would go to a hotel in Hong Kong but.. .’ he said and looked at me.
But what? You thought, why pay for a room and be alone when you can get accommodation
and sex for free? I thought.
‘Yeah, of course. You can stay here. Come in,’ I said.
‘Thanks,’ he said.
‘Hungry?’ I said.
He shook his head. He held me by my shoulders. He kissed me. He smiled. I did not.
‘What am I to you, Neel? A stress ball? To come and play with when you are hassled?’
‘No. Not at all, Radhika,’ he said. He sounded shocked.
‘So why are you here? Didn’t we have this pact that we don’t do anything in Hong Kong?’
‘Did we? I mean, what’s the difference?’
‘There is, to me. Business trips feel less.. .wrong. There’s also a clear boundary. This is.. .I
don’t know what.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I don’t know when you will show up here and when you won’t. Today you are at my