Glaring Shadow - A stream of consciousness novel

Chapter 19 - Pats and Slights

"If love denied me the ecstasies of sex, it was sex that gave me the joys of love,' he continued the intriguing account of his life. "Maybe vexed with the propensity of love to fail me at the threshold of possession, sex might've thought 'enough is enough'; so, it seems to have induced fate to let Raju play his part in bestowing its final favor on me; we were in the same place then and didn't drift fully apart still. There lived a desirable girl, a block away from his; when I told him that I would like to try my luck with her, he felt that it would be a wild goose chase as she was already betrothed. Yet, as I pressed my suit, she resigned into agreeing; is it not said that there is no woman chaste enough to resist man's seductive talk; that night, my long awaited first night in which baring our bodies and souls to each other when we sought to discover each other in the candlelight; she surrendered in ardor as I possessed her with passion; urged by her surge, as I entered into her with all my longing for a female, she took me in with all her wanting for a male; in that lovemaking, so to say, as she had a measure of her femininity, I had the grasp of my manhood; while the ecstasy of sex gripped us all night, the fulfillment of it eased my body for days; well, reminiscing about the nuances of our coition, I realized that the essence of sex lies, not in the physical release it affords the mates, but in the gratification of their union that it entails them. But it was my contentment—I wonder how I became insatiable in later years—coupled with the dangers of our liaison that kept me away from her until she turned into a gatecrasher. When she said that she desperately wanted to have me again, I felt that I owed it to her to satiate her urge, never mind the risk I might be running in obliging her for I came to know that her father was a ferocious character. When I made it to the rendezvous, she said that she wanted more of me before her beau got the better of her; about her liaison on the verge of her nuptial, she said that she was only following the dictates of her heart amidst the realities of life. Maybe, you may say that she was romanticizing her lust, but I believe she had only rationalized the leanings of her heart."

"Maybe lust features on the reverse side of love's coin."

"Beautifully put, but I may add that lust is the abettor of love for without it, there can be no lovemaking," he said. "Well, I imbibed her philosophy of love, and all was okay till I wavered from it to impress Ruma, which was much later. As if sex gave me my due, it forthwith put a price for its favors, and I too was willing to pay for it as I had been on my own by then; and maybe, it was prognostic of my sex life that the first buy in a way was a rare buy; it's a rickshaw-wallah doubling up as a pimp, who took me into a dimly lit middle-class brothel; how odd I felt as I came face to face with the madam! Though the way she received me was promising, to my disappointment the girls she fetched were no seductresses; so as I tried to excuse myself, a stunning dame stepped out of the shadow near the entrance; well, I failed to notice her as I made it there in the fashion of those who enter brothels, focused on avoiding the focus of the passerby. When she wondered how none of the girls impressed me, I told her it was possible that none of them might've liked me; saying she was bowled, she led me into her chamber."

"Looks like you're lucky with those."

"Maybe, my innate love for women tended them to be affectionate towards me," he said. "From then on, I sought her at every turn and she gave me the time of my life for long; but as she began to bloat, she said she was sad that her body could no more provide what her love craved to give me; how moved I was for her sensual concern for me, but when she offered to turn into a procuress for me, I told her that I wanted to remember her as a mate and not as a madam. How sad that the charms of these women are so short-lived; it's as if by giving in to all, they lose all they have. Whatever, I always cherished the romantic times we have had."

"Won't it make an interesting contrast, your romantic negation of favors on offer with that of Devdas's sexual abnegation of an alluring Chandramukhi?"