It was a cold foggy winter night like the one it had been two years ago when she had lost her husband. She was anxious and could not figure out the cause of her restlessness. She had decided to not check her phone to see if he had replied. It had been about three days now. And then, just as she sat down in her chair, her phone vibrated. With her heart thudding in her ear, she unlocked her phone and stared at the screen. Finally! It was his message.

But when she opened it and read it, she nearly stopped breathing. What was this? The text said “I am dying”. She froze with fear. It was past midnight. She dialled his number frantically but there was no response. After sometime she dialled again and this time someone said “hello”. But it was not his voice. “Can I talk to Vinay?” she stuttered. The voice on the other side responded “Madam there has been an accident. The owner of this phone was drunk-driving on the highway and a truck rammed into his car.”

“How is he?” she croaked in horror.

“I think he is dead” the voice responded.

She hung up the phone and her head was dizzy. Her hands were feet were cold and numb. Her mind had frozen and she did not know how to respond to the news. The night was cold and heavy. She thought there would be no morning to this cold, long night. All the scenes of her husband’s death ran past in her mind. Another winter night, another accident! Was it her she thought? Maybe she was jinxed.

She had met Vinay on the train from Delhi to Jhansi. He was on the berth opposite hers. As was her usual habit she attracted his attention by initiating a conversation and telling her story. She told him that she was a widow at fifty and was travelling back to Jhansi to her home after visiting her son who worked in Delhi. Vinay had been sympathetic and told her that he too was going to Jhansi where he was posted as a doctor while his wife and school-going daughters stayed back in Delhi with his parents.

“He is dead!” she sobbed on the phone.

“Who? Who is dead?” I asked.

“Vinay,” she replied.

“Who Vinay?”

“I told you about him, the man I met on the train last time I was coming back from Delhi,” she replied.

“Oh Ya! I remember now.” I said. “But why are you crying so much?”

“I, I had got close to him,” she sobbed. “He came home a few times after that”.

“Oh!” I responded surprised.

“He, (sniff, sniff) texted me last night before he died” she said completely breaking down. 

I held the phone to my ear for a few more minutes and heard her crying loudly and incessantly.

Finally I muttered, “Please take care! I will call you tomorrow”.

I had known her for a few years now. I first met her when I moved to Jhansi on a work assignment. She lived next to the apartment my office had provided to me. On the other corner lived Sharma Uncle and his wife. Together the two couples would watch out for me and took turns to send me cooked food when I got back from work. The weekends were fun-filled too. We all came out of our apartments and basked in the winter sun. Sharma Aunty would make tea while she with her usual agility would fry pakoras for all of us.

The two couples would laugh and chat tirelessly but I would withdraw indoors after sometime to finish my pending office work. I heard their lively noises outside as I worked on my laptop and felt thankful for not being lonely in a new city. Her voice and laughter would be the loudest matched only by Sharma Uncle. Her husband and Sharma Aunty were rather passive during such animated conversations among the loud duo.

Our social lady was quick and agile at her work. She drove to work, got back home in the afternoon for her meal and siesta and in the evening she would quickly whip up some snacks and dinner before her husband got back from work. They would then enjoy their tea chit-chatting and nibbling the snacks. Sometimes they would drive to the temple and shopping place nearby to pick groceries. They seemed to be a perfect couple completely in sync with each other. While she was a clever, ambitious woman, her husband was rather laidback in life. She desired the enjoyments of society and loved to party, while he loved to enjoy a quiet drink at home.

The Sharma couple was exactly the opposite of this. Sharma Uncle was a dominating old man who wanted everything his way. His wife was a submissive person who assented to everything her husband said. She was a dark and passive lady who had spent most of her life cooking meals for her husband and children. Sharma Aunty was a slow worker unlike our socialite. She would spend most of her day doing household chores and yet her kitchen always seemed untidy. She herself wore an unkempt look. Often, as I crossed their window in the morning on my way to the office, I heard Sharma Uncle criticising her or asking her to learn something from her neighbour, who was always well turned out and efficient in everything she did.

I noticed that Sharma Aunty was getting quieter by the day. Often I saw her talking to herself. She would step out for a walk every evening. When Sharma Uncle came home at many instances he would find his house locked up and then our lady social would step out of her house and hail him in for a cup of tea. Sometimes she would call me as well but I would refuse politely to avoid invading their privacy. The loud sounds of laughter however kept me company every evening.

Sharma Uncle was a socialite. He was a member of several social clubs unlike her husband. She would gravitate towards the Sharma household often, demanding every wee detail of what was happening in that house including what was being cooked for the meals and who was visiting them. Her eyes were fixated on the Sharma household like a hawk for any avenue of fun which she didn’t want to miss out.

One evening Sharma Uncle and Aunty went to the club. For the next few days I noticed that the two couples did not gather outside for their tea and chat session. I met Sharma Aunty in the passageway and casually asked her why they hadn’t met up all these days. I was not hearing their chatter and laughter any longer. She said that she didn’t know why her neighbour had stopped responding to her calls to come out and have tea with them.

I ran into our social butterfly a few hours later and asked her laughing, “Hey how are you? I don’t see you out much these days? Are you very busy at work?”

“Well! Ya sort of! Anyways I don’t want to socialise too much with that Mrs Sharma. You know how dull and boring she is!”

‘Wow! People are complex’, I said to myself. There’s no way one can understand these complexities, I thought. I had seen her ever so often flirting with Mr Sharma, that too in the presence of her husband and Mrs Sharma! She was too sweet on their faces and this is what she was telling me behind their backs.

Every time the Sharmas went clubbing, I noticed that she got more and more vexed up and stopped talking to them for the next few days. One day she said to me in her frustration, “How selfish this couple is!”

“Why?” I asked astonished.

"I and my husband always gave them company. They were so lonely when they first moved in here. Their kids are settled abroad. I have cooked for them so many times. I have been so giving and kind but look at them. They go partying without asking us out even once,” she said.

I wondered if she was being too unfair to them. After all, they must have cultivated their friend circle over the years and here she was demanding to be introduced to people she hardly knew. Her husband scarcely had any friends since he was an introvert. She craved to be among people and be the centre of attraction since she did look quite young and attractive for her age. She also talked and laughed loudly and possessed all the skills of a socialite.

No wonder Mr Sharma was so attracted to her. He belittled his wife in front of her since she was rather ordinary looking and an introvert. I saw the two women gradually drift apart. The comparisons drawn by Mr Sharma between the two women and the vexations expressed by her had taken a toll on the neighbourly love that I had seen when I first arrived.  

A year had elapsed since I arrived in Jhansi and my assignment was almost over. I was packing my bags to leave for Delhi, my home. The two couples were getting quite emotional as they saw me doing so. Over the last year they had come to look on me as their daughter and I had enjoyed all my festivals with them.

I promised to be in touch with them and returned to Delhi.

Once in Delhi, I called them every fortnight. Gradually I got absorbed in work and the frequency of phone calls decreased. It was a year since I had moved back to Delhi and one day I called Sharma Aunty to find out how they were doing. In a mundane tone she informed me that her neighbour’s husband had passed away in a road accident. I was shocked and called her the next day.

I heard a meek “hello” from the other side. It was an awkward moment since I did not know what to say. After a few difficult sentences I told her that we must meet whenever she visits Delhi.

She came a few months later but was a completely altered person. There were dark circles around her eyes and her face seemed shrivelled and sad. She had developed high blood pressure and suffered from hypertension. My heart went out to her. She had been so in love with her husband and was totally grief-stricken.

“How are Sharma Uncle and Aunty?” I asked her.

“They are fine,” she answered.

“Are they keeping you company these days?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I hardly step out. I lie on the couch the full day. I have lost the sense of time. My relatives have been coming to feed me all these days. I have stopped cooking.”

“Oh!” I said not knowing how to respond.

We sat silent for a few moments. Tears had welled up in her eyes and she began to sob.

After a few moments she said, “You know Mr Sharma...he is literally hounding me!”

“What!” I exclaimed in horror.

“Two months after my husband passed away, I received a text from him asking me out for lunch,” she said.

“Together with his wife you mean? Like the three of you?” I sputtered.

“I don’t know, I mean I am not sure! The text was quite suggestive that it would be the two of us,” she said.

I was quite horrified by this time.

“What did you reply then?” I asked

“Nothing,” she said. “I just ignored it. I haven’t seen them for months now. He just keeps calling me on my cell phone. But I never pick up the phone. They have not bothered to pay me a visit also. My sisters-in-law who live nearby have been taking care of me.”

“Oh! And when do you intend to get back to work?” I asked.

 “I have resigned. I don’t want to go back to work now. I want to spend some time with my son here in Delhi and then decide what I want to do.”

“Oh good,” I said pressing her hand. “It will be good to be with your son”.

We met a few more times and then she returned to Jhansi. Once in Jhansi she told me that she had met an interesting person called Vinay on the train.

I asked her if Sharma Uncle was still calling her.

“No,” she replied. He had stopped calling.

After a few months she moved back to Delhi. She seemed to have recovered from Vinay's death. One day I called her up and asked, “Hey do you want to meet up today? There’s a good movie showing in the cinema hall nearby, we could catch up!”

“Well umm not today,” she replied, “I am going to meet someone else today!”

“Oh! Nice whom are you meeting today?” I quipped.

“Hmm, well this person I chatted online with a few days ago.”

My heart missed a beat. As usual she didn’t fail to surprise me. Sweat broke out on my forehead as I wondered if she knew the risks involved in such a scheme of things. Perhaps she did! I was much younger than her and how was I to advise her about the risks of meeting strangers in a city. How could I interrupt a coquette at work!