It was that evening, after they had returned from the party, as he stood lost in thought in front of the sofa, that his wife said, "Ravi, why are you looking so lost?"
He shrugged, "Oh! It's nothing, dear."
She continued,"Tonight, throughout the party, you seemed as if you weren't quite there. What's wrong? You weren't like this before, you would be the life and soul of the party. Always the jokes and laughs; you would tell me stories and fool me all the time. What's happenned to you, Ravi?"
As he remained silent, searching for words to quench her curiosity, she pressed, "You have been like this ever since the Chakravarties moved in here. And every time we go out and meet the Chakravarties, you come back and look more lost." Then she added, suspiciously,"And I can't help noticing you when you meet her - Sharmila."
"Oh! Aruna! Don't start off on your wild suspicions again." He sounded irritated. "You know Sharmila and I are from the same college, she was in my batch, but that was years ago. We have never met in twenty years. Or heard of each other, for that matter. It was quite a surprise when we met at the Super Market a couple of months ago. You have been inviting her to all the parties, introducing her to all our friends."
"She must have been beautiful twenty years ago." Aruna continued, as if she hadn't heard a word, combing her long hair.
"Yes, very beautiful." He said softly.
She thought she noticed a wistful note, and glanced at him. He was sitting on the sofa, leaning back, his head resting on his upturned palm, looking at the corner of the coffee-table, watching his memories of his college years slowly go by.
"And I fell in love with her!" She mimicked him.
His reverie was broken. He turned his head to look at her, his brow furrowed in thought. And then he said, in a voice caught between nostalgia and spite, "Yes, I fell in love with her."
She stopped combing her hair, caught her breath. "No! Ravi, how could you?"
For a moment, he looked as if he regretted having spoken the words. Then, he made up his mind, shrugged to himself, took a deep breath. "We were young, she was beautiful, we shared a lot of common interests. We liked the same music, the same topics in college, the same kind of books. I thought we were a perfect match. Made in Heaven!"
He was quite amused, she was not. She wanted to know more. How far had the affair progressed? Had they kept in touch? Why had he not told her this all these years?
Slowly, Ravi spoke of his years in college, his solitude, her friendship, how they had both planned - in the first year - to do their Masters in Chemistry. Soon after college, Sharmila had married a computer chap in the US. Now, he had returned to set up his company in India. She had done a business management course and now helped her husband with the business. Ravi, too, had drifted away from his plans. He had ended up in Bio-Chemistry and had now become a Professor at the prestigious City University, spending many of his evenings in the quiet seclusion of his library.
"Yes, I know that!" Aruna said icily. "As if your private library is not enough, you spend your Sundays picking up books from the public library."
Ravi thought how little she was interested in "his books". The ones he picked up from the library were rarely technical, most of them were Literature or just the science fiction he dabbled in. Ravi said that was another thing he shared with Sharmila, their common love for Literature.
Aruna pouted and replied, a little defensively, "Well, if you stop picking up all those heavy stuff, and bring back some light reading, even I can read, you know."
He opened his mouth to add that he had recently picked up a magazine of short stories, but thought better of it. After all, he still had the magazine in the drawing-room right here; she would not have realised that, too. He didn't want her to read it, did he ?
But what of his affair, she asked. What had happened, how had they split up? With the curiosity of a voyeur, she wanted to know all there was to know.
He laughed. "We were friends", he said simply. "I thought I was in love with her, but for a long time, I did not have the courage to say this to her. For many months, I had planned out the words and settings and dreamt up the endings."
One evening, in his final year, sitting in the University Cafe, he had gathered up his courage. He had decided that he could not leave it till later; the end of college life was in sight. As they had walked through the rich green paths by the Cafe, he had slowly brought up the topic so close to his heart and had gently steered the conversation to his much-practised speech.
Sharmila had been taken aback. She had never thought of Ravi as anything other than a college friend, someone with whom she could discuss Chemistry and Literature. College to her was a place where she made friends, not lovers. She could not see herself falling in love with anyone, and she had her parents to consider. They were the ones who would find the right match for her; in fact, they had already identified the prospective groom. He was working on computers in the US and would return for a few months early next year, when he would meet Sharmila and get married. Sharmila could not upset her parents. It had all been agreed; there was no chance of change.
There really hadn't been anything to say after that, said Ravi. To her, his unexpected burst of passion had been a surprise, too much of a risk. She did not want this mentioned ever again. He had pleaded with her, but the futility was obvious, even to him. When he realised that he did not have a chance, he had given up. Far from what he had hoped, the few hours that night had begun the rift between them.
Though they had parted agreeing to remain friends, she seemed to be staying away from him, perhaps to ensure that her impending marriage stood in no risk of scandal. He cursed himself for being so late in acting, and - perhaps to avoid facing his own disappointment and failure - had also stayed away from her. Their friendship had withered in the few remaining months of college, and when they parted after graduation, they knew how false the promises of keeping in touch would be.
"So there!", said Ravi with a sigh, "Now you know everything. My dark secret. Your suspicions are justified. But there is nothing to worry about, Aruna - it's all over and forgotten."
As he had told her the story, he had not looked at her at all. He had instead concentrated at a corner of the coffee-table, avoiding her looks. He had not noticed how her expressions had changed, from the original anger and hurt and suspicion. She hadn't said a word after the initial interruptions, and had quietly listened to his every word.
Now, he turned to her. She was sitting with her jaw cupped in her palms, like a child to whom a story had been told, waiting for more. The original anger had been replaced by a glint of a smile in her eyes.
"Ravi, thank you for telling me all this. I really have been a fool, thinking the worst of you. I'm sorry." She was trying hard to sound genuine.
Ravi did not notice the falseness."It's not your fault, dear; it's mine. I should have told you this before, but I had never thought about it till recently."
Suddenly, she laughed. "But this time, you didn't manage to fool me. I know where you got it from this time, Mr. Ravi Thakur."
As Ravi started to protest, she admonished him,"Don't pretend this is true or that it is an original story you made up just now. I read a magazine you picked up; it has exactly this story, let me show you."
"If you write your Bio-Chemistry papers as well as you related this, I'm sure I will read all your papers", she taunted him as she hunted the coffee-table for the magazine, found it, and flipped the pages for the story. "There!", she said triumphantly, producing a story called " A little piece of fiction".
"I know you have read this and are trying to fool me with this. It's about a woman who is suspicious of her husband, and how he pulls her leg with a story that he once had an affair. The Cafe, the computer chap in the US - it's all there! Caught you this time, didn't I?"
"I almost believed you", she said, laughing."If you had changed a few things, I might have. You really sounded so earnest. But you went too much by the book, Mr. Brilliant Actor."
Ravi had stopped protesting. Mocking his earlier ring of truth, he shrugged, pointed dramatically at the coffee-table and announced, "The Truth is out there".
She laughed, "There! You are back to your normal madcap self, always telling a lie", and kissed him impulsively.
"And please don't tell that girl. She'll kill me. Say please!", he said, down on his knees.
"Okay, you are forgiven! I won't tell her, I'll just tell her husband."
"No!! Please don't do that to me", he begged.
Happy, Aruna continued to comb her hair. Ravi smiled mysteriously to himself, picked up the magazine, and quietly placed it on the bookshelf, among all his published technical papers.