Swati Sharma - Fashionably Yours

Shit!

“OK. But what do you think he can do to get back at me?” I croaked.

“I don’t know. Jeez, Maya, yesterday you acted so rowdy and strong and now you are concerned about what he might do. Fuck him. Who the hell cares?” she grimaced.

“I care,” I gulped.

“Maya!”

“OK. Fine. Leave it,. Anyway it’s not doing me any good thinking that he could get me kidnapped, murdered or at least arrested for peeing in his BMW. And while we are on this topic I am just curious to know that what the hell you were doing with a guy like him in the first place?”

“Well. He may be an asshole,” she started carefully but when she noticed my eyes bulging out of my face on her may be she quickly rectified her statement. “OK. Since our first date I knew he is not a guy with passable manners or even a decent character. But I knew that he would be a kind of guy who would buy me flowers without any occasion and take me to endless dinners, lunches, polo matches and even concerts.”

She took one glance at my scrunched up nose and carried on talking without waiting for me to say anything.

“He did pamper me like a princess. What else could a girl ask for?”

“It would have been better to ask for some respect and commitment as well,” I pointed out.

“Oh come on, Maya. He never disrespected me, not directly at least,” she added hastily as she looked at my unimpressed face.

“He had another girl sit on his lap. That was disrespect towards you and your relationship,” I stated the obvious.

“Maya, seriously it’s better to be with someone than to be alone,” she said irritably.

“And I thought they said that it’s better be alone than to be with someone wrong.”

“Who says this?”

“Errrr … Internet, books, movies …”

“That’s rubbish. Clichéd. OK, tell me what you get out of believing in this shit? You are twenty-five for fuck sake and you’ve never had a relationship. On Saturday nights you sit here and watch crap movies on TV when the entire city is out there; dinning, clubbing and having the time of their lives. I was with him because I didn’t want to be like you. Sitting here, waiting for Mr. Right and sulking. I preferred to be with Mr. Wrong and have fun. What’s wrong with that? He overstepped, I understand and I am so grateful that you stepped in and slapped him. I am happy it’s over but I don’t regret the time I spent with him. Come out of your dream world, Maya, and open your eyes to reality. Live your life for Christ’s sake. Go out, take your chances and have some fun with Mr. Wrong and for the trillionth time just sod-off your idea of the perfect guy. And let me have the honor of bursting the bubble you live in and tell you that there are no Mr. Right or Mr. Wrong. They all are just men and all men are same,” she let it all out.

Crap movies? They were my life. Now I was hurt.

“Anu …” before I could string a sentence together she shoved her hand in my face, signalling me to stop, gathered her stuff and stomped out of the flat.

June 2

On Sunday I woke up with a throbbing headache despite sleeping the entire day and night after Anu stormed out. My mind was still reeling from our conversation. Was she right? About the fact that in twenty-five years I had never had a relationship. But was it actually my fault? Suddenly my life started to feel like one big black hole. Hopping out of the bed, I made my way towards the kitchenette. This flat was more littered than ever. Maybe I should give it a thorough cleaning because I didn’t have anything better to do today.

Oh fuck! Is it actually mine ? I wondered while examining whatever was left of the red-ish looking pants which might have served as breakfast, lunch or dinner to a bunch of rats at some point of time. I had absolutely no memory of possessing any kind of red-ish pants. Chucking it away in a black garbage bag, I made my way through the rest of my closet while praying in my heart that nothing too creepy jumped out of it.

After spending half of the day cleaning the closet, I realized that I didn’t have a single item of clean clothing hanging in there. How could I let things get so out of hand? I questioned myself in vain. Gathering all the dirty laundry from the bedroom floor, kitchen top and from under the sofa, I headed towards the bathroom and dumped all of it in the washing machine and emptied at least half a packet of washing powder in it. It needed a good wash. Once done with the laundry, I hoisted all the empty take away boxes from the floor and shoved them into the garbage bag. The next two hours were spent in changing the bed linen, stacking my magazines in one neat pile next to the sofa, arranging my movie DVDs, dusting the furniture, cleaning the kitchen top, washing the dishes, ridding my refrigerator of the weight of thousands of post-it notes, mopping the floor, cleaning the toilet, washing the tiles, scrubbing the washbasin and finally cleaning the shower area. By the time I was done with all the chores, my flat was looking like a home rather than the house of a garbage hoarder. Dragging three fully loaded black bin bags out of my apartment into the corridor for the garbage man to collect in the morning, I was dreaming about a very very long bath and then eating take away in front of the TV when the lift pinged opened in the corridor and in her super cute mini dress with pointy straight hair, Anu emerged from it. Fabulous, now I felt like shit!

“What are you doing here?” I didn’t mean to sound so rude and as soon as the words were out of my mouth, I regretted them.

“Have you ran a marathon or got someone in your bed? Why are you so sweaty?” she eyed me suspiciously.

“Shut up. I was just cleaning the flat,” I retorted.

“Cleaning? Oh fuck. Did I hurt you that bad?” she looked guilty.

“Yes. You called my movie DVDs crap. What do you expect?” I barked haughtily.

“DVDs? That’s it? Out of the entire conversation, all you heard about was DVDs?” Blatant shock was evident on her face.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you and I absolutely didn’t plan to say any of it, it just somehow came out,” she explained while glancing around my flat. Her eyes dilated. Yes, it looked that good.

“I know,” I said.

“You did all this on your own?” she was in a trance.

“Yes. I did.”

“Come on, Maya. Don’t talk to me in monosyllables now.”

“Anu, what you want me to say? Yesterday you made it clear that you think I am some unrealistic, irrational, dysfunctional woman and now you expect me to hug and kiss you? I mean I am not slapping you, isn’t that enough?” I stated the truth.

Her face hung open very unattractively. That was so un-Anu like.

“I didn’t at all say that you were some unrealistic, irrational and dysfunctional woman. All I said that you need to stop living in a dream. You can’t wait for Mr. Right to come along for your entire life. What if he doesn’t? What if you remain single, forever ?” she said in the hushed tone.

Oh my, that did sound logical. What if she was right? Crap.

“I don’t want to talk about it at all,” I said and it was true. Talking about it was scaring the shit out of me.

“OK,” she nodded in agreement. “Let’s forget about what I said yesterday, I am so very sorry for that and I hope you know it,” she threw her hands around my shoulders and gave me a tight hug. I knew she was sorry. “Anyways, to thank you for showing that son of bitch his place, I want to take you out shopping,” she beamed.

***

“Ta-da!” She threw her arms in the air. Her face was the picture of pride.