“I had always wondered how arranged marriages really work. You marry a stranger and you have to spend your wedding night with a stranger (at least) in bed where he would probably not be able to resist touching you. Is it the most thrilling adventure of their lives? Or is it as scary as it seems to me? Well for me I can say, it was anything but all sunshine and rainbows.
In my head, I had it all painted ever since I understood what couples do in their bedrooms. I had dreamt of a perfect first night with my husband because I knew it only comes once in a lifetime, at least that’s what we wish for. If not with my love, I’d at least fall in love with my husband the first time we sleep next to each other.
That’s what I had thought. Unfortunately, I wasn’t as lucky as my friend Nandini who got married recently and she probably experienced what I only got to dream of. Of course, how could I live my dream? I fell in love with a boy in my college but I got married to my brother. My first cousin. My mother’s brother’s son. Yes, the one I was probably supposed to play house with as kids, I was forced to do “coupley” things with him that were playful only to him. And this is how it all happened.
The little town where I lived with my family was more oppressive than conservative and my mother says she had to endure a lot of hardship to bring me up in the society we lived in because apparently, I was a very outgoing and fun-loving South Indian girl. Is it a bad thing? And is it not her job as a parent to bring me up?
But, I had to pay a heavy price for her misconceptions because she was an overdramatic mother and even though sometimes I knew she was acting, her emotional blackmail almost always worked on me. Fortunately, I left home for my higher education and there I met Deepak, he was my senior in college. He respected me for who I was and not how I repeated my clothes every ten days. He kept telling me that I had potential, and I couldn’t wait to graduate and conquer the world. He and I eventually fell in love.
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