I lived for fifteen years next to a man with whom I never shared a night.
It wasn’t out of anger or heartbreak, but something quieter, harder to name.
To this day, I don’t know when that distance began. I only know that it never stopped growing.
To those around us—the doorman, the gas man, the cleaning lady, the neighbors—we were the perfect couple.
Every morning we left the ninth floor of Gurgaon together, and every night we returned at the same time.
We took out the trash, watered the plants on the balcony, and ordered spicy noodles on Sundays.
Our shoes, lined up like a barracks, waited by the door. Our toothbrushes, always at the exact same angle, rested in their cups.
To the world, everything was harmonious. No one would have suspected that, in our bed, two pillows had slept for fifteen years without ever touching.
The bedroom door was never locked, just like the kitchen or balcony door. But over the mattress, there was an invisible line that neither of us crossed.
He, always with his back to me, under the cold white light of his reading lamp.
I, on the other side, with the warm yellow light of mine, listening to the monsoon rain against the metal roof.
My body instinctively leaned to the left, away from him. Sometimes, at dawn, I felt him move, but never in my direction.
The house was impeccably ordered. I folded his shirts carefully, matching socks as if they were museum pieces. His family adored me. After my mother’s death, he took care of my medications, even remembering our anniversary before I did.
Everyone told me I was a lucky wife. I silently wondered: lucky… for whom?
On our wedding night, as the rain pattered against the windows, his mother whispered to me, „The bride is the one who brings warmth to the home.”
He placed a book on my nightstand, tucked me in, and said, „You’re tired. Rest.” And he turned away.
My hairpin fell to the floor, and the only sound left was its ticking. That same night, our world fell silent.
I thought the next day would come. Or the day after that.
After ten days, I stopped waiting for him. After a hundred, I didn’t even have any tears left.
Every time I tried to get closer, he gently moved away, like someone avoiding a stone that was all too familiar.
The years slipped by. On the tenth, I wrote a divorce paper called der_late.docx. I erased it, rewrote it, erased it again. On the thirteenth, I printed it and left it in front of him.
He just murmured, „Give me time.”
„When?” I asked.
„After this season.”
I never understood what season it was: the season of waiting? The season of giving up?
We went to therapy. The psychologist asked him:
„Do you have desires?”
He nodded.
„Another direction?”
Another gesture.
„A trauma?”
Silence.
One day I returned earlier than usual. The rain was pouring down as I opened the door.
I heard voices in the study: his, and Aarav’s, his best friend. Aarav, the one with the Saturday beers, the one I’d always liked.
„She asked me for a divorce again,” he said, exhausted.
„And now?” Aarav asked.
„I won’t do it. I promised.”
„To whom? To me or to her?”
„To both of us.”
His voice cracked: „I can still hear the tires squealing.”
I froze.
„It’s both our faults,” he continued. „My duty is to let her sleep. Yours is to give me strength.”
That night I confronted him:
„Do you love Aarav?”
He replied: „I love promises. I made them to him and to you.”
The next day, I found insurance policies in his drawer. If the marriage ended within two years, it was annulled. Signed on September 23, two years earlier.
Beside them, hospital receipts. An old photo: me with a boy in front of Delhi University. Rohan, my first love.
On the back, my handwriting: „Rohan, the rains came early this year.”
And a folded piece of paper: „I’m sorry. – V.”
Later, Aarav handed me a letter containing the truth. That night, Vikram had run over Rohan’s motorcycle.
His face was disfigured. Rohan asked Vikram to marry me, but never to touch me. Then he disappeared and took a new name. Aarav was Rohan.
When I confronted him, Vikram just said, „I kept my promise. I just waited for the insurance to expire.”
Then he signed the divorce papers and handed them to me:
„Sign if you want. If not, leave.”
I waited. A month later, I signed.
I left. I bought a new bed. I put down a single pillow.
Rohan called. I answered once. He said, „She just wanted you to know: ‘I’m Rohan, the coward who ran away.'”
I replied, „I’m Aarav now. Get used to it. Learn to say your new name.”
We met on the banks of the Yamuna. I confessed, „I don’t know if love is still alive. But I want to learn how to sleep in the middle.”
He replied, „This time I’ll wait. „I’ll stay.”
In the end, Vikram left. He left behind a rent check and a letter.