A Blind Date

It was a blind date. Quite literally. Wait, before I start let me tell you first that words and perspective will be played around a lot in this story. And I am the only one you can trust, because our protagonists are somewhat maimed by their self-imposed physical and mental impediments.

So, it was a blind date. Literally. He pauses at the door before ringing the bell, takes out a white piece of scarf and ties it to his eyes. Rings the bell again. She opens the door, recognises the perfume – the scent of a man who has no idea what statement he wants to make with his presence today.

Of course, a similar scarf on her face, makes it easier to perceive his confusion – heightened other senses that make up for a lack of sight. But it’s just been ten minutes into her blindness and hence I think she mistook his deliberate attempts to detract for confusion.

He walks in to the house to familiar smells of basil and garlic – pesto not again he thinks, “what is this obsession noveau riche Indians have with Italian food”. But the music playing is better, so he tries to focus on that. “Jesus was a sailor, as he walked upon the water” …. familiar lines from a song he loved once upon a time thrust into his heart a rough knife pulled out too soon.

As he moves in further, she guides him, and the structure of the house feels familiar. Mumbai architects in 21st century can never get too creative, he thinks as he plonks himself on the sofa. She hands him a bottle of beer and sits on a sofa next to him. Both blind as they listen to Cohen croon.

Should they talk about something?

“The smell of the place is quite strong; did you move here recently?” he says

“You never know what turns people on these days. Hahaha” She laughs and continues, “About a year back, couldn’t afford my last place anymore”

Uncomfortable silence ensues again.

“I have something”, breaking the music-filled silence between them he speaks up again

“Is it a gift” she smugly replies.

“No just something you should see before ….. you know”

“Before what? I didn’t take you to be a shy one on texts”, she laughs quietly again

Our female protagonist in this case has a knack for making the most intense of situations funny to the point of making her company uncomfortable. It is usually accompanied by a silent mouth-wide-open laughter but today it works because of the blindfolds. He just mistakes the statements for sincere efforts and answers.

“Making love tonight”, he replies in a matter of fact way

She laughs again. That expression seemed so odd today. It wasn’t like earlier times, it can be hardly used for a one-night thing, she thinks and laughs silently.

The most important benediction unconsciously blessed by the blindfolds was the ability to avoid reading the body language so completely. I mean, you and I know how that has always led to misinterpretations and confusion. Is he folding his arms? Has she crossed her legs? Does she look at him while answering and is she avoiding eye contact? Did he place the bottle of beer between them creating a barrier? Wait, the last one she could still tell, the coldness of beer penetrated through the air between them and hits her bare legs so she knew where he kept it.

Breaking the silence again he says, “So yes, take a look at this. You might have to undo your blindfold for a bit. Don’t worry mine is on.”

He whips out a card in a deft but slow motion. It was really, just a sheet torn from a notebook that fluttered as it handed it to her. She pores over it. A menu card of sorts.

• Service 1: Late-night sex under influence of alcohol……. [ ].

• Service 2: Pre-dawn sex with half-clothes on …… [ ]

• Service 3: Three-minute snuggling post sex followed by smoking cigarettes in silence ….. [ ]

• Service 4: Sleeping spooning together post sex [ ]

• Service 5: Fifteen minute cuddling post sex including non-amorous kissing and discussions on how it was …..[ ]

• Service 6: Sixty-minute canoodling and non-amorous kissing concomitantly with discussions on a random topic …… [ ]

  
  

  Flabbergasted, “Is this a joke Dee”, she asks “Are you running around with a service list prostituting self now”

“Look at it again Mia, carefully.”, he says and after a generous pause adds, “Although it is a kind of joke, a way of bringing things to a speedier and smoother climax than worry reading minds and bodies don’t you think”

She eyes the laundry list carefully and curiously. The services were interesting for sure but what she wasn’t sure was why there weren’t any prices on the right side. It was just empty brackets. How was she to know what she needs to pay for what she chooses. She asks him.

He shrugs and says “Well, sometimes we find the price we pay for things we choose, long after we have bought and used them.”

She stifles a gulp and a tear-shaped ball rising up from her gut. At first the idea of a list appeared extremely flagrant to her but now she was piqued. What am I in for today? A ridiculous date, she thought. Lack of alcohol was making the decision easier which she hated. I mean, she mostly wanted to laugh out loud, but I am doing it for her in this case. I am telling a simple story you see, in which people don’t really laugh or cry out loud but do it under their breaths like rational well-bred adults so the story can be more life-like and real. Anyway, she didn’t laugh or cry out loud in this instance. Although she wanted to do both.

After a long pause, she says “Six” and gets up and walks past him, brushing her scarf on his knees. As if on cue, he gets up too and follows her to the predictably located bedroom. For once lights don’t need to be turned off. But that’s a lie, her white blindfold allows her some leeway on his form she can see only in the light, so she is a little slighted he asks for them to be turned off again. She rolls her eyes beneath the scarf.

“Another compromise?” she asks, “I’ll have the just the side lamps on?”

“You will be happy to know I have a lot of experience in compromising”

She adjusts the lights and they begin.

The routine seems well rehearsed, or more like a forgotten school routine, whose next steps come to mind as soon as one is done. I can see him forgetting and needing more time than she did though. She mistakes the fortuitously timed delays for his desire to soak it in and take things slowly. A different person for a change, she thinks.

In the middle, he pulls down his black skeleton of a cloth slightly. It has come to be wrapped loosely, thanks to the activity, but he wants more. The hands continue their work, but he needs to break this one rule. Several rules and promulgations have been broken anyway - what’s one more, he thinks and zones out. He watches her face, made more attractive by her white blindfold and the half- contortions he could witness in that moment. “God, speed your love to me”, the Righteous Brothers speaking in the distance.

A few moments later, about after the time of the second wind, she finally takes it off for a moment too. After all she has been thinking about it since they started. She’s also a little hurt that he hasn’t done it so far not having realised it in throes of her orgasm that he did too. She looks at him for one whole verse of “Everything in its right place”, and then plants a few tender kisses on his forehead as if by default under the duress of a force she couldn’t control.

To me, the innocent bystander, looking at the two of them, on top of each other with nothing but two blindfolds on, him caressing her arms and her kissing his lips one millimetre after one millimetre with him not making any attempt to kiss her back while Thom Yorke played was the most beautiful moment of that night. Everything indeed seemed to be in its right place.

At the end of it, unlike the usual expected though, no cigarettes are brought out. After a short interlude of laying on their own sides of the bed, she walks to the drawing room to bring the warmed-up beers and hands one to him.

They take a few gulps in silence and as usual, he breaks it to say, “That was ……. different”

“But you knew that with a person like me it will be, didn’t you”

“Yaaaaa, I did kind of expect it, but you know how we spend most our lives, foreseeing entirely different versions of life and future than what people around us actually make”

She doesn’t respond. Both were aware it was time for last part of the selected choice. But I know she has changed her mind now.

“I was thinking Dee, maybe we cut it short, can I change the choice I made earlier”

He is caught unaware on this as he is about to reach out to cuddle her.

“Are you sure, I have been practicing this last part quite a bit” he says and smiles for the first that evening

“Also, I am yet to have the pesto pasta you made”

She smiles too, just for a fleeting second, but a worried look overcomes half her visible (to me) face quickly. “I think this meeting will stay better this way, Dee”

“Ok, then I better be going.” He fumbles around his side of the bed for his clothes. She follows and then redundantly guides him to the door.

“I never said it then, but this was nice.” he says, “Never thought we’ll see each other again since you moved out of the house” and starts walking out slowly, “Ever since you’ve been gone, I’ve never got anyone to choose the last one”

“Well, we didn’t technically see other though”. She smiles. Gulps. Avoids the part about the missing hug. She’s careful not to let the wetness of her eyes seep into her voice and looks in the direction of the video-camera in her room.

This last part is not true. There was no video camera. I wish she were weak enough to do that though. But I guess characters in stories are usually the better versions of one self aren’t they.

Anyway, there is something about lack of sight which makes these bonus nights between ex-lovers easier, isn’t it?