When the Tables Turned…
As she stood on the balcony of her 8th floor flat, the Mumbai sunset seemed more radiant than ever. But her heart pined for his presence by her side. The lockdown had separated them for almost a year now. Even the video calls could not really reflect the aura of his presence in real life. She gulped down a lump in her throat and gazed longer at the setting sun when suddenly her phone beeped and a whatsapp message from Rohan drew her attention. “I’ve been thinking about us…and I need to tell you something…”, it read. Almost immediately Ankita realized that it had been a week already. A week from that dreadful fight with Rohan that had taken them both by surprise. A week since they last spoke to each other.
Ankita closed her eyes, and permitted her memory to jog back to the moment when she was introduced to Rohan. Almost a year ago she had broken up with her last boyfriend over his lack of emotional availability. No matter how much she tried to make that relationship work, she always found herself being taken for granted. And so, after a lot of deliberation Ankita had put an end to it. She deserved better.
And serendipitously, soon enough Ankita was introduced to Rohan by a common friend. She was told that Rohan had been single for a while and had to end his previous relationship with someone who always took him for granted. A coincidence in Ankita’s mind that made them perfect for each other. And in many ways, they were. Rohan was an antithesis of all the men Ankita had ever been with. He used to check-up on her, even when he was out with his friends and appreciated even the smallest of the things that she did for him. And unlike the whirlwind of romance that lasts only the initial few months of any relationship, Rohan continued doing these things long after the newness had fizzled out. Doubtless to say, Ankita was happy and knew that they had a future. Even though, there were times when Ankita felt unnerved by the sheer amount of effort Rohan put in. She was contended to have found the man who cherished her presence in his life.
But fairy tales have their troubles too. And it was during this blissful period of their relationship, that the pandemic made its foray into India, putting an end to the usual way of life. The series of lockdowns and unlocks that followed chained both the lovebirds into their respective homes. While Ankita struggled to strike a work life balance in her compact Mumbai apartment. Rohan dealt with boredom in his luxurious and rather spacious bungalow in Delhi. The lockdown surely did make their hearts grow fonder for each other. Ankita reminisced how they kept a count of the seconds, minutes and hours awaiting their video call catch ups at the end of the day for the initial few months. But it also shed light on the stark differences that protruded from their individual worlds, harmlessly overlooked during the pre-pandemic days.
Ankita lived in a nuclear family where both her parents worked and often needed their own space to take calls from home. She even had a younger sister who took classes online often resulting in a struggle for space in a house that was only meant to serve as a night abode for the family. On the flip side, Rohan’s family business could be easily managed from their in-home office downstairs. In the absence of domestic help, Ankita had to participate a lot more in the household chores, while Rohan never lifted a finger thanks to their stay-at-home maid supervised by his homemaker mother. These heterogeneous worlds had happily coexisted in the pre pandemic era without any need for interference. But the lockdowns resulted in frequent bouts of friction between the two, leaving an indelible mark on this match made in heaven.
There were times when Ankita was so occupied with her work and household chores, that it left her no time and energy to engage with her lover. Then there were moments when she was free, but had to limit their interaction to the rigidly timed video calls. To make matters worse, flying down to meet each other always carried the risk of infection. But that wasn’t the only villain in their love story. Unlike earlier days when Ankita’s family used to step out for work and other recreations, Rohan could not simply sneak into her house anymore. Likewise, with work from home being a norm everywhere, even Ankita could not convince her parents to travel to Delhi that easily. To state the obvious, the lack of physical contact along with irregular and interrupted video calls added to the stress of the pandemic. The miscommunication led to fights between the two, which started erupting every other day, as if it were an active volcano. And though these fights were triggered by the limitations outside, it also revealed the truth within. Making them both question everything about their relationship.
The emotional availability that had drawn Ankita closer to Rohan was now becoming the source of all the tension between them. While she wanted some respite from the pressures of WFH and household chores, Rohan wanted to connect with her at a deeper level just like old times. The pressure to be intimate escalated to such an extent, that she started cutting his calls and making up excuses to be with herself. Soon enough, her behaviour came under the spotlight, and she found herself now being accused of emotional unavailability.
This situation shamelessly mirrored her fights from the past relationships that would often escalate to breakups. But this time the tables had turned on her. And somehow without a fault of hers, she had become the very person she once detested.
Ankita looked back at her phone and read the first message from Rohan, suddenly shivering, convinced that he would break up with her. Just the way she had all through her past relationships. And soon enough, her phone beeped announcing the arrival of another message from Rohan. It was a long one and read, “… Someone just told me …‘Relationships fail because people take their own insecurities and twist them into their partner’s flaws’. Guess I’ve been blaming you all this while …the way I’ve blamed all my ex girlfriends…but I need to work on myself too.Let’s try to make it work together? ”
Ankita let out a sigh of relief as she read the message. She called Rohan immediately, thanking him for understanding her. They both laughed and cried over everything they had experienced in the past few days. But most importantly they agreed that pandemic or no-pandemic, they had been blaming their partners all through their relationships because of their own insecurities. And so this time they would let go of it, instead of the relationship.
A year later, nothing changed around Rohan and Ankita as they continued to live in a pandemic world. But strangely enough the intimacy that they both craved for, found its way back to them, once they decided to look within.
First published in Chandigarh Literary Society, Annual Short Story Writing competition 2021
