Complicated relationships. That’s what they mostly are! What this even is, who knows! Most of the time, it isn’t a relationship at all. Two people exist, close to each other, side by side, yet somehow absent too. Two people at a distance where they could touch, yet when you reach out—nothing! Sometimes even the fear of reaching out! What that fear is about, neither of them knows. It happens too that both know what they’re doing, the way they’re thinking, all that’s happening—none of it is right, yet they can’t extract themselves from it. Every person carries within them a certain fear of loss, the fear of losing something most precious. The funny thing is, often that precious something is actually not theirs at all, yet around it grows an infinite sense of ownership. How can you lose what was never yours to begin with? Still, people live in that fear. The tenderness that has formed between two people—if they were to break free from it, living would become difficult for both. Better this way. Let it remain, as long as it can be kept! Two people love each other, yet neither wants to take responsibility for that love. Often, both decide they will never give each other time again. But when they don’t give time, time refuses to pass at all. Once again, mistakenly giving time to the wrong person. They know it’s wrong. They also know that escaping from life is far easier than escaping from the mistake. When life itself is built on mistakes, removing the mistake from life isn’t easy. Or it happens like this too: both love two other people, but that love for those others doesn’t quite draw them close. Love doesn’t only pull you near. Many loves become more meaningful precisely when they push you away.
Dola knows that even if she wanted to, she couldn’t bring this relationship to a beautiful conclusion. Perhaps it has no conclusion at all. Some relationships don’t have that—where there’s never any “and then they lived happily ever after.” Such relationships have no “thereafter,” no before-and-after, nothing at all. Dola needs to get out of this right now. Right now means this very instant! But the problem lies elsewhere. Dola simply can’t get out. Why? To want to leave, she would need to do it for her own sake. What need would that be? Surely the need to survive. To live a little better. For that, above all, she needs love for herself. Someone who doesn’t love herself can neither survive nor save another. Dola has kept no love for herself. When you give all your love to someone else, something terrible happens—a person can no longer stand alone on their own feet. Dola fears that if somehow her mirror understands this condition of hers, she won’t be able to step away anymore. Dola desperately wants to hide herself. She searches for a place to hide herself. Searching and searching, at some point she becomes exhausted. These days, they say love doesn’t contain pure emotion anymore. Then where does it exist? In those complicated relationships? Many complicated relationships are greater than socially committed ones.
No one else knows about this tug-of-war. Only the two of them know. Two, meaning Dola and Borno. They wonder—do they even truly know? They know; yet again, they know—even thinking this fills them with dread. Dola often feels that if she can’t tell someone about this matter, she’ll simply die. But whom can Dola tell? Whoever she tells will judge the whole thing from a social perspective, won’t be able to understand its psychological dimension at all—judging comes much later. Some relationships can’t be spoken of to anyone, simply can’t be told. In every person’s life, they encounter such unspoken relationships. People keep dragging themselves out of such relationships while simultaneously keeping those very relationships alive.
From childhood, Dola grew up in a very organized way. She studied, read books, loved listening to good music, chatted with friends. Just like any other ten healthy, normal girls grow up, that’s exactly how Dola’s childhood passed. From her mother, a certain understanding had been planted in her mind from that very childhood—the notion of individuality, of thinking about one’s own life in one’s own way. From girlhood itself, her mother had taught her that besides being someone’s wife, sister, or mother, she needed her own distinct identity. Everyone lives in society, but only a handful can become a special part of that society. To distinguish yourself in a crowd, you have to do something different. Those whom we know surely don’t think like us, don’t see life like us, don’t act like us. If you spend life like ten other people, living the way ten others live, that’s just existing. Unless you understand how great people spend their lives and practice living in that manner in your own way, it’s impossible to make your own life like that. These very thoughts were Dola’s inspiration. The dreams through which she had grown up—she suddenly began discovering that they were slowly dying away. Her mental strength was gradually getting exhausted day after day. People live and work through the strength of their minds. When that very strength begins to get depleted, living becomes very difficult. Spending life and dragging life forward are not the same thing. Dola is dragging her life forward with great struggle. How much longer can this go on?
Dola’s
cousin Niloy loved her impossibly. He was an Air Force pilot. Handsome, refined, caring. His sense of humor was extraordinary, and he would talk with Dola with such wonderful ease. With other girls his manner was
terribly polite, restrained. From the time Dola was in ninth grade, Niloy had loved her, but worried about harming her studies,
he had never proposed to her. He had taught Dola to dream. Without Niloy’s approval,
Dola wouldn’t even buy a hair clip. Dola understood everything; that Dola understood, Niloy understood too, but he wouldn’t let Dola know that he knew she understood. Their understanding was
exquisitely beautiful. Both families had given their silent consent to this marriage. Niloy would
give Dola small replicas of different airplane models as gifts, tell her delightful stories of his flying experiences. Niloy was brilliant at mimicry.
He would perform with various gestures and expressions, and watching him, Dola would laugh herself to death. Because Dola loved flowers, Niloy would
bring her many, many fresh flowers. These things Dola never had to ask him for.
Every girl deeply desires, in her heart, that her beloved person would bring her favorite things before she even asks, would do the things she loves.
Dola’s
marriage was supposed to take place after she enrolled in honors first year. After taking her intermediate exams, Dola was attending admission coaching. They were supposed to meet on July 16th, Dola’s birthday. Niloy had already taken leave from the office that day after lunch. The plan was that in the evening after coaching ended, he would come to the coaching center with armfuls of
flowers, hold the flowers in both hands with his head tilted slightly forward and propose
to her. After that they would ride together in a rickshaw around Curzon Hall, and in the evening buy a cake, some balloons and candles from Aarong and
go to Dola’s house where everyone would celebrate her birthday together. While rushing to meet Dola,
in his tremendous excitement and haste, Niloy died in a road accident while riding his bike.
The white gladioli lay scattered on the road, turned red in the stream of fresh blood. The blood had covered these few purple letters on yellow paper: “Happy birthday to the most beautiful person I have ever seen.” The ring box kept in his breast pocket had opened, and the ring he had bought for Dola
had mixed and merged with Niloy’s scattered brain matter, disappearing into the surroundings. Seeing Niloy’s delay, Dola was getting terribly angry with him. She kept calling and calling
his mobile phone continuously. She didn’t know that Niloy would never again come to her with both hands full of flowers.
Never again would he suddenly blurt out, “This rotten girl is so wonderful!” The one with whom he had dreamed of spending his entire life—he had deceived her by leaving this way.
While reading Mahatma Gandhi’s autobiography, Gandhi himself had cruelly snatched the book away from her with a violent tug.
After that, Dola fell into a state of profound psychological distress. She had to undergo psychological counseling. She was often ill, suffered from depression, and spoke in incoherent ramblings. That year, she couldn’t take her admission tests. The following year, she sat for the admission tests in a completely shattered state. She got into Khulna University. But depression wouldn’t leave her alone. Niloy’s cheerful face kept appearing before Dola’s eyes constantly. Even in her sleep, Niloy would come and tell her stories just like before. For as long as Dola lived, she would carry the memory of that face with her. Dola would grow old someday, but Niloy’s age would remain forever twenty-three. In Dola’s memory, his existence would remain eternally young. The girl who once spent her days in joyful commotion with everyone seemed to age a year with each passing day! Dola’s current days are spent clutching a framed photograph of Niloy to her chest. She kisses his eyes, gently touches his cheek with her finger, and her tears repeatedly fog the glass of the frame.
Beyond studies and career concerns, Dola had many other beautiful plans. She would be wonderfully domestic, a good wife, an extraordinary mother, her children’s closest friend. She would have a neat little ‘peaceful family,’ where everything would be arranged and organized by her own hands—tidy, perfect. Dola and Niloy had a very good mutual understanding. They understood each other, respected one another. They would talk among themselves and arrange their lives according to their own wishes. Everything was moving forward guided by their desires and dreams. Somehow, a sudden gust of wind came and scattered her life into chaos. In an instant, everything changed, all dreams came to a halt. The dreams we nurture while alive—we never realize how helpless they are before death. Death is greater than dreams, more real than life itself.
Two years after that catastrophe, one day Dola noticed a picture in her Facebook news feed. A girl was holding her umbrella in the rain in such a way that the rain-soaked breeze could touch her body, while simultaneously convincing herself that she wasn’t getting wet because of the umbrella. A sublime coexistence of concealment and revelation. That scene captured the joy of surrendering oneself to the very thing one pretends to stay away from. Looking at the picture, there was absolutely no way to tell at first glance that it was actually an oil painting. Going to that artist’s page, she saw such extraordinary paintings. Pictures drawn not with brush alone, but with the heart. More real than reality itself. Enchanted, Dola looked through all 523 of Barna’s paintings several times over. Never in her life had she seen such beautiful artwork. For three days she was absorbed in the artist’s page and profile. Under each painting were two or three lines of captions, soft and tender like the melancholy sweetness of rainy, cloudy days in the style of Bhaskar Chakrabarty. The stories behind the pictures were written so beautifully in so few words that reading them made it feel as if it wasn’t Barna speaking, but the paintings themselves! After a very long time, the world inside Dola became chaotic again. Barna was an incredibly devoted artist, a hard worker, very active in various social causes. Blood donation, standing by those affected by cold and floods, helping the poor and distressed, teaching street children—he stayed busy with such work, encouraging others to do good deeds through his writing. Dola began floating in the tumultuous madness of adolescent love. With great difficulty, overcoming discomfort, hesitation, shyness, and fear, she sent Barna a friend request and wrote in his inbox: “Friendship begins with the courage to accept rejection—keeping this in mind, I’m asking for your friendship.” “Hey Dola! Hey!! Just friendship? Nothing more? Alright then, what can I do! I agree to that too!” The request was accepted in 1 minute and 39 seconds—Dola had kept track. Niloy always used to call Dola “Hey Dola! Hey!!” When reading Barna’s text, Dola kept feeling as if she could actually hear that old familiar call clearly in his voice. How was such an amazing similarity possible? Like someone madly in love, Dola’s mind wasn’t working properly either.
Dola was seriously ill at the time. She had fallen down the stairs and broken her leg bone, had just started recovering somewhat after surgery, couldn’t walk properly, and had to walk with great difficulty using crutches. When people become very sick and it takes a long time to recover, at some point this fear enters their mind: “What if I never get well again?” Dola kept thinking she might never be able to walk again. She was very depressed about this. It was during this melancholy time of lying in bed day after day that Dola had discovered Barna’s profile.
The story that followed their introduction was like a poem by Jibanananda, like a song by Rabindranath, like a short story by Banphul—or even more beautiful than all of these!
Dola had fallen in love with Borno from the very beginning. Reading his writing, watching his work, talking to him in their inbox conversations—again and again Dola found herself thinking, “This is exactly the kind of person I was searching for in my heart.” She decided then and there that if she had to love someone again, it would be no one but Borno. Dola would never let Borno slip away. Even if it killed her, she would hold on tight. Borno wasn’t as handsome as Niloy, but what did that matter? The beauty of his mind and the beauty of Niloy’s mind—both were equally infinite. Generally, men are drawn to women’s physical beauty while women are drawn to men’s inner beauty. Men’s eyes seek the color of women’s bodies, women’s eyes seek the color of men’s souls. Whether a man’s hair reigns on his head, his cheeks, or anywhere else—women don’t particularly worry about such things. Men are mad for beauty, women for character. This polarity of thought is what draws them toward each other.
They began chatting regularly. Borno stayed busy at least fifteen hours a day. Yet managing everything else, he made time to give Dola every kind of mental support. Whenever he found a moment free, he would give his time to Dola. Mentally, Dola was becoming increasingly dependent on Borno. She couldn’t do any task properly without Borno’s guidance. She wouldn’t take a single step anywhere without consulting Borno first. Dola lived on the fifth floor of her hostel. With her injured foot, climbing up and down the stairs was tremendously painful. Sensing Dola’s suffering, Borno would tell her, “Baby, don’t worry at all. I won’t let you suffer. Imagine in your mind that you’re standing with your feet on my back, and I’m lowering you down very slowly, very gently. You’re not having any trouble at all. You don’t feel any pain in your foot.” When Dola couldn’t sleep, Borno would put her to sleep over the phone, stroking her head again and again. When she didn’t feel like eating, he would coax and convince her with such tenderness that she would go eat. Because of Borno, Dola’s heart couldn’t stay sad even for a moment. Borno could bind others’ imagination to his own with tremendous intensity. When talking with him, Dola felt that reality itself wasn’t as real as this. She could see everything happening right before her eyes. “What are you doing?” “Just sitting.” “Oh my! My baby is just sitting there. Don’t you notice that I’ve been standing behind you all this time? Tell me to sit down too!” Borno’s way of speaking was so amazingly believable that Dola would suddenly start, turn around, and search the entire hostel corridor for Borno. She had insomnia—sleep wouldn’t come at night. Dola felt that if Borno stayed beside her like this, she could spend her whole life smiling without sleep. Night after night, Dola spent her time like this, sitting beside Borno in her imagination.
In this world, Dola listened only to Borno’s words. Due to some family reasons, the distance between Dola and her father had grown. Following Borno’s advice, she had written a letter to her father and bridged that gap. Two-thirds of that ice-breaking letter was actually written by Borno. He always said one thing: “I’m right here beside you. I’m with you, and I will be.” Even this simple sentence seemed extraordinarily beautiful to Dola. Once a woman falls in love, that love only grows and grows. Then even the most trivial words from her beloved seem utterly extraordinary. When Borno would say “Here I am, right beside you!” even that would make Dola weep with joy. Someone from deep within Dola kept telling her repeatedly, “All this time I was simply waiting for him.”
One day in the fading evening. “Dola, I love you!” The moment Dola discovered this text from Borno in her inbox, she went completely mad. She had already fallen in love with Borno before this. Hearing words of love from Borno too, Dola began jumping with happiness. She turned off the chat, ran out of her room in one breath, and stayed on top of a small hill until evening, playing with herself, lost in her own joy, crying tears of happiness. When she returned to her room in the evening, she found 96 messages in her inbox, all sent by Borno. She was thinking, “Can even dreams be this beautiful?”
Borno’s relationship status was married. Dola had never asked him any questions about this. Borno had never said anything about it either. Borno had many, many female fans. Dola had simply assumed that Borno had written it as a joke. Or perhaps he had written it so that girls wouldn’t bother him. Exactly four afternoons after that afternoon, one day Dola finally asked Borno, “Tell me, are you married?” “Yes. Why?” “Oh come on! You’re just joking. Tell me you’re not!” “Not joking, seriously!” “What do you mean?” “Yes, I got married a long time ago. I even have a 3-year-old son.”
Borno was joking to shock Dola—though Dola wanted to believe this again and again, at some point she had to believe the truth. Like ten other cruel truths in this world, this too was true—Borno was married. Dola had almost gone mad. “I don’t believe anything. This can’t be. You’re joking with me! Just tell me you’re joking!” Dola was screaming over the phone. Dola’s entire world was destroyed once again that day.
Within just two months of meeting Borno, Dola had received this shock. In those two months, Dola had become completely dependent on Borno. When Borno told her, Dola would sit down to study; when Borno told her, Dola would listen to music; when Borno told her, Dola would walk a little from the field in front of the hall; when Borno told her, Dola would go eat in the dining hall. Whatever Borno asked her to do, Dola could do. Borno had completely merged with Dola’s dreams. Gradually, Dola had forgotten to distinguish between what was dream and what was reality. She could not separate her world of thoughts from Borno in any way.
Dola
wasn’t looking for any logic, only wanting to cling to Borno even more desperately…. In the most literal sense,
Dola had lost all strength to stand alone. She had wanted to die many times. Only the thought of Borno had kept her from dying. If Dola died, he would do something terrible too. Borno
truly loved Dola. So many thoughts would come to mind. Then, forgetting everything again, Dola
would try to save herself. She would convince herself, “Whatever happens in the future, will happen. But right now I can’t lose him.” There come times in life
when a person doesn’t even have the strength
to think about the future. Without speaking to Borno even a little, Dola’s life force would completely drain away—she couldn’t carry on with studies, eating, sleeping, anything at all.
Better this way, let it continue like this. Whatever happens when it happens.
Borno
also suffered tremendous mental pressure. The guilt of deceiving Dola, of getting her accustomed to false dreams, of destroying both her present and future—all this ate away at Borno bit by bit.
Again and again he would vow to cut off contact but couldn’t do it, would come running back. Borno too wasn’t well, fearing that Dola’s life would be ruined. On November
12th they met for the first time. Borno held Dola close and wept like a child.
Dola didn’t want to embarrass Borno because she loved him deeply. Still, at one point in their conversation
she asked, “I may not have known anything, but why did you enter this complexity knowing everything?” Borno
said through his tears, “I had no choice but to love you. I couldn’t stop myself. I believe we came to this world only for each other. We just met a little late. But we’re still us, aren’t we? I find peace with you. If I can’t talk to you I feel crazy,
my insides
become completely restless. I won’t be able to stay away from you.”
Dola
can no longer dream those childhood dreams—marriage, family, children—nothing at all. Only one image of life appears before her eyes—emptiness. Because of longing for Borno’s face,
she can’t see anyone else’s face. Day by day Dola is becoming
a half-dead person. She truly doesn’t know what she’ll do in the coming days, which direction her life is headed, what delusion is preventing her from facing the truth. She wants to think—”I want to work only for my personal identity. My own
life can’t end this way.” These words don’t come from her heart; sometimes she forces herself to say them standing before the mirror. She no longer feels any kind of strength from within. It seems like for all 24 hours something is
jumping inside her chest, writhing, trying to get out, disturbing her peace. Sometimes she
wishes, “If only I could scream loudly and get everything out from inside!”
For a month now, there has been almost no normal communication between them. An unnaturally heavy, suffocating atmosphere. Borno has completely fallen apart. The effect has spilled into his family life too. And in this one month, Borno hasn’t painted a single picture, hasn’t done any of his own work properly. He’s simply been running away here and there, wanting to escape from himself. Seeing him in this state, Dola doesn’t feel bad for herself—she’s constantly haunted by thoughts of Borno’s misfortune. Because of him, Dola can’t stay well either. Dola keeps thinking that she’s responsible for Borno’s condition. Dola wants to see Borno well. Borno is terribly introverted. Even if he were dying, he wouldn’t tell anyone anything. It was Dola who would force conversations. Borno keeps making commitments to himself that he’ll never speak to Dola again. Unable to keep that promise to himself, he treats Dola terribly. Then says “sorry.” And so it goes on……
One afternoon, Borno’s call. “Dola, I’ve come to Khulna. I have about three hours. Will there be time to meet?” Dola had almost run out and rushed to Borno. She couldn’t bear to look at him. A person utterly devastated and broken. Borno stares at Dola with shattered, clouded eyes.
They spent almost the entire time sitting side by side in silence. Words and tears had tangled together and gotten stuck in Dola’s throat. Despite trying hard, she couldn’t get anything out of her mouth. Perhaps the same condition existed within Borno too……..A thousand years of silence had descended that afternoon.
They ate together. Borno didn’t eat anything himself……he forcibly fed Dola. Even while eating, Borno’s time ran out…….the time was up, yet nothing had been said still……
Dola went to the bus station to see Borno off. Even then Borno kept talking and talking……he kept losing the thread of his words, but still struggled and strained to continue…….he kept saying over and over, I can’t go on anymore……..my life is finished……..like a madman he got on the bus in a daze………Dola got on the bus and helped him, holding him and settling him into a seat before getting off.
He kept telling Dola to stay well. He said, “Look after yourself, please! Don’t destroy yourself like this. I’m right here beside you. What? Aren’t I here, tell me……..! I’ll always be here! Stay very, very, very well, my dear!”
Sticking his head out the bus window, composing himself a little, he said, “In childhood, our parents did us great harm. They always taught us that boys shouldn’t cry. What wrong words, isn’t that so? Why shouldn’t boys cry? How strange!” And with that he laughed with tremendous sound. Everyone on the bus stared at them. Dola didn’t have the strength to bear that laughter of Borno’s. She almost ran away from there. Dola didn’t have the courage to turn back and look at Borno. Borno didn’t call after her either.
In this entire situation, Dola can no longer remain herself. She wants to give up. She often thinks, “How terribly difficult it is to die while living for someone else!” Dola has become utterly dependent on Barna’s existence. She cannot bear to think, even for a moment, that she would have no connection with Barna whatsoever. Sometimes Dola asks herself, “Does Barna really love me?” Her heart answers, “Barna loves me. Dola’s eyes saw no mistake in Barna’s eyes.” She often thinks, “Why can’t I be with Barna? Why why why?? Don’t I love him? Doesn’t he love me?” For both of them, deciding to marry while thinking of family and society is not easy. Dola doesn’t know what she should do. Swaying back and forth in various doubts and uncertainties, Dola is now deeply exhausted…….losing all interest in life bit by bit each day. Now Dola has nothing to do except think about Barna. Beyond thinking about Barna, all her time feels like leisure. Leisure is such a terrible thing—only confused thoughts come to mind.
Even after spending time in such mental turmoil, Dola cannot tell anyone anything. Dola is very introverted; she never tells anyone about herself. Whenever she thinks of telling someone something, some kind of inferior feeling starts working within her. Whenever she thinks of telling someone something, she starts feeling, “Strange! What kind of person am I? I can’t fix my own problems…..I have to cry to others…..someone is ‘taking advantage’ of my mental weakness and why am I pleading to others about it? Why am I encouraging a relationship that can never give me shelter? Don’t I have the power to dominate myself? Why can’t I keep myself well? Why should I make my pain cheap to others? What obligation do others have to keep me well? Who am I to others? When have I done anything for anyone? Why am I thinking of dumping my happiness on others’ shoulders? Is this who I am, Dola?”
These days, Dola very much wants to believe that no matter how much pain there is, she will keep herself well for her own sake. “Whatever it takes, I will remove myself from this directionless wrong path! Life cannot be about enduring unbearable times. If I can’t die, then why should I live like the dead? When I’m alive, I’ll live well. At any cost, I will make myself happy! I certainly didn’t come to this world to live like this!”
Dola wants to awaken once more, powerfully within herself, the lesson of self-respect she had learned from her mother in that childhood. The memories of old days cannot be erased, but she can try to ensure that the days ahead never become like the old days again. How it feels to live well—Dola will experience this at least once.
July 16th is coming. Before then, Dola will heal all her wounds; if not for herself, then for Niloy!