The Summer of Absolutely Nothing

14.

Now, much as I like to pretend otherwise, I do subscribe to some of the socially  mocked tenets (a male viewpoint) of being stereotypically female. This is one of them. I can’t say there is no joy in dropping a hint or two with a smile to a close friend. This full-fledged dissection with a group of strangers, on the other hand, unnerved me.

Asmita went extremely quiet, and looked upset. I soon found out why.

Rahul, while he was not orthodox, hadn’t, in the nine months of their relationship, gone very far, physically, Asmita explained, haltingly. They just...hadn’t really pushed for it, either of them.

This had led to tactless jokes, nasty jibes and aspersions to the seriousness of their relationships, ‘all in good fun’, in a group where ‘tell all’ was the motto and physical affection was considered a new and modern trophy of a relationship, to be flaunted and typecasted by.

And they were getting to Asmita, making her doubt what she had - ascribe importance to the act till it loomed large in front of her, shadowing everything else.

‘It's not such a big deal’ I blurted, unable to keep silent any longer.

The small, stuffy hostel room with blackened, scribbled-over walls - devoid of personality save dirty clothes piled on the floor; grimy window firmly shut. The thin, sparse mattress on a creaky iron bed. Him lying beside me, the dull thump on the iron. Clothes thrown on the plastic chair. The whirr of a fan overhead, interrupted the hot mid-afternoon hush.

Warm, close, intimate. Embarked upon without thought, and left behind without feeling.

Sex, sex, sex. Our generation thinks of it as progressive, spurns all tchokes and tomes of older times. A change in thought, I was surprised to realize, happened in USA in the early 1900s, as Sylvia Plath’s views then matches ours now (note:The Bell Jar).

‘In my eyes, the world was not divided by religion, race or age; it was divided into people who had slept with someone and people who hadn’t.’ ‘I expected to see some change when I slept with him, for the world to see - a doll sized version of him reflected in my pupils.’

We were at a time, when it was still considered ‘a big deal’, yet it was not condemned, and hence doable - a turning point within reach.

‘Not such a big deal’ is a misnomer; it did change something fundamental in you, and your relationship. Not because virginity is a prized possession and losing it is an event; or that it will be executed correctly, and unlock in you deep physical feelings, the very first time.

More because, however progressive you may be, virginity is a gift of trust, and the act - exposure and physical contact - is an emotional closeness of a different level in a city and nation where hugging and holding hands between the sexes is still an event.

And whoever it happens with, will not be perfect enough for (the social conception) of what you have done. The taboo of your act will descend upon you then, mingled with society's blown up image of it - television, songs, movies, even Bollywood movies nowadays.

The enormity of what you have done will hang over the two of you like a dead weight, casting a pall over what you have. He will tire of it, not understand, the contract you both have unwittingly signed, as you scramble to hold tight onto your relationship as it is the only way to justify what happened.

When he leaves you (as probability suggests he will) you will be left shattered by the apparent violation of the unsaid promise of your act. You will feel broken, tainted and used; it will have been a secret, for sure - how can you tell the world what you are now? The next person who takes an interest in you, he doesn't know. Your mother, as she hugs you lovingly at the end of a long, tiring day, she doesn't know.

A paraphrased fragment of a terribly tiny tale - ‘I wish she would tell me it's not important, that's it not something valuable I have lost. That along with it, I also lost my innocence. I am no longer her baby.’

You will learn to live with it, but isn’t a terrible price to pay, that secret which burns you up from the inside?

I looked at the sea of blank faces in front of me; they hadn’t expected me, an unkempt nerd from a premier engineer college, to speak up on this topic.

I wearily started a monologue, a summary of the tangled threads of thought within my head. When I finished, there was pin-drop silence; but in their downcast eyes, I swear there was kinship.

One of them got up, looked at me teary-eyed for a few seconds, and hugged me.

I quietly let go of the stiffness which had entered my soul since the day I carried my secret alone; the walled-off recesses in my heart cracked.

Someone understood.