He's getting married.
It's about time.
They have been dating for a long time, two years. They fell in love in Japan, lived together in LA, will start a life together in Chicago.
'If I can move to Chicago...can't I marry her?' he asks me.
I smile, I'm so very happy.
Then he asks me the question I know he's been waiting to ask me for 12 years.
"Just tell me one thing. Ok?" he asks. My smile grows stale.
"Sure," I say. I breathe out. I wait. I know what is coming.
"Tell me, there's nothing between you and I... right?" he asks. I know he just wants to be sure. I know he's tying up loose ends. I'm a loose end. He's an aquarius, he cannot go to bed with a single thing left undone, how can he get married after all that has gone on between us? But I also know that if this was really a question, he would've asked it before he asked her to marry him. At least, I hope that is the case.
"Raj, marry her. Stop asking questions." I said.
I could've said it so much better. I could have given him some poetic response to his worry that perhaps it was me he was supposed to be with. But now is not the time to explain to him my theory that men and women were like misaligned zippers, Raj with me, me with Anirban, Anirban at the top of the zipper, connected to no one. Except there is no one to unzip everything and try to zip us up correctly again.
I don't know if getting married is the right thing for him, maybe that's because I don't know that getting married is the right thing for anyone to do, or even just for me. I can't tell him he's making the right decision-at least, I can't tell him that and expect he will believe me. I don't believe me, and he knows me better than I know myself.
So instead, I cry. Girls cry. Boys know this and don't question it.
"I love you." He says, and this is supposed to make it feel better, final, anything but what it feels. His announcement, this engagement, feels like the end to a car accident I've been watching for two years: I cannot do anything to stop it. It is what it is. I am not an island, I know he is not. If anyone is capable of loving more than I can, it's him. I didn't wait for Anirban, Raj would not ever have waited for me.
And when did I ask him to anyway?
You might be wondering if I am happy for him. And of course, I am. I know it feels wrong, I know I have feelings about it that are completely inappropriate for the situation. But I want his happiness more than anything. Surely this will make him happy?
I don't tell him I love him, too. I can't form the words.
"I am so happy," I say, through the tears.
Marriage, death, no life event will ever remove him from my soul. He will always be my very best friend.
"Bring him," he says.
"Huh?" I ask. I stop crying.
"Bring him to the wedding."
Who? I as myself. For five years, Raj has done nothing but push me towards Anirban, convince we are meant for each other despite our despotic personalities and incongruent futures, pasts. He's been indifferent to my husband, to Sagar.
'I've seen you with him. That is love,' his voice echoes in my ear, over and over. What he doesn't understand is that love cannot exist in a vacuum...it's an organic molecule that demands nourishment and pruning and guidance. It doesn't grow in a void, it doesn't even survive. I can't call what I feel for him love anymore. I cannot bring myself to tell him that I was wrong and that worse, I convinced him of something that was wrong, something that was wrong and something that got in the way of what could have been Raj and Jennifer. How horrific is that?
My feelings for Raj override my own better judgment...for years I have accepted that he was right, that I did in fact, perpetually love a man who does not love me. I don't want to rock the boat now, I can't tell him that once again I've figured out, however temporarily, that Anirban cannot be the man for me.
So I don't ask him who he means, because I know in the end, whoever I bring will fit the bill for him. Even if I arrive alone.