He turned the key to the hotel room door and walked in. I remained at the threshold of the door. Come in, he waved at me and I reluctantly followed. The room was decorated with rose petals--all over the floor, on the bed and around the bed posts. There were bouquets and flower arrangements everywhere. The sight left a dizzying affect on me but I was enthralled.
We stopped at the foot of the bed and he motioned me to sit down. I remained standing and turned to leave the room but he caught my hand and pulled me back into his arms. He held me for what seemed a long time. I could hear his heart pounding as I buried my head in his chest. I was too nervous to look up. I could feel his taut muscles through his shirt as my hands moved down from his shoulders to his arm. I turned my head to the right and saw our reflection in the mirror. I did not recognize her. She was all grown up, ready to embark on a new chapter in her life, looking scared but willing to take things as they would come.
I felt uneasy but willed myself to comply. He sat me down at the edge of the bed and removed my veil. He gingerly removed each hairpin slowly and took my hand to place each one in it so he would not lose any on the bed. I watched him as he did and studied his face. It was young but very handsome. He avoided eye contact. I stared without blinking. When he took my veil from my head, he opened my hair and let it fall around my shoulders. He caught me staring back and again, averted my gaze. Then he stood up and removed his jacket and tie. I too, got up and walked over to the dresser and removed all my jewellery. I looked in the mirror and he was watching. It sent shivers down my spine. My heart was in my throat. My chest was heaving with deep breaths as he walked over to me and put his arms around me from behind and kissed the nape of my neck. I knew what was coming and I thought I was ready. Until.
Until...
I woke up with a jolt. I was sweating despite the air blowing on me from oscillating fan near my bed. It seemed so real. I was breathing heavily and feeling strange. I looked around the room and realized I was in my bedroom at home. It was 7am. I was not there...in that hotel room. There were no flowers. I sat up and steadied myself. It took me a good minute to understand that it had all been a dream.
It took another good minute for my breathing to slow down...only to start hyperventilating once again. I got up, threw on my bathrobe and ran downstairs to the front door. I went outside and gulped the early morning air while pacing the front porch...my mind was deliriously going in circles but resting only on one thought...
One thought.
"Its 7:30am in the morning on a Saturday! You are like one of my kids--not letting me sleep in!" Yvonne exclaimed. I did not know who to call. She had expressed her doubts in the beginning when I told her about my arranged marriage, in between lectures and breaks at night school. But as she heard more, she fell in love with the idea and embraced the notion completely.
"It's ok. These feelings are natural. Everyone gets cold feet," she assured me.
"You are not listening to me. It's not like I have cold feet. Its just...well, I have barely had a complete conversation with him and now I realize that I...I will be...in one week...you know...I had this dream and I don't think I can do this," I whispered.
Yvonne was confused. And rightly so. I made absolutely no sense and was speaking in some secret language without letting her in on the secret. There was no other way. I just had to come out and say it.
"How do you sleep with a man you don't know?!!?" I yelled into the phone. The startled newspaper boy, instead of leaving the paper on the porch, dropped it at the end of the driveway and walked away slowly. He was scared but intrigued by the sight of a young, petrified girl, dressed only in a bathrobe, with dishevelled hair, pacing frantically and yelling into phone on a early Saturday morning.
Yvonne paused and chose her words very carefully. "Now you realize this? I have been wondering from the time I met you when you were going to come to this epiphany. Listen, even I waited until I was married. It's no big deal. You have your whole life ahead of you," she said calmly. I could feel the bile rising in my throat. I had my whole life ahead of me--with this one man who I had not even kissed, let alone held hands with. I stopped pacing and sat in the wicker chair next to the garden.
My decision to have an arranged marriage was so much bigger than me. It enveloped me whole without chewing or digesting the idea. And it was only now that I grasped the reality of my situation.
"Did you have a bad dream," she asked. I paused and reflected.
"No, it was not bad at all. But it felt real. The emotions were real and I felt everything...the look, the touch, everything," I sighed. It hit me that waking up from the dream was the worst part--it made me overanalyze it all.
"Darling, you made your decision long ago. You married an idea...a notion...a concept. You took it for face value. Now is the time to live it, accept it and move on with it. You don't need me to validate it or talk you out of this. You have pre-marriage jitters and it's...it's ok. You will find every excuse in the book not to go through with this but in essence, even though its an arranged marriage, you are going through the most normal feelings any bride would be going through. I am here for you. Just try calling me after 9 next time," Yvonne joked.
I hung up the phone, went back upstairs and climbed back into bed. I fell back asleep, exhausted and hoped that the dream would continue. It did not come back to me for those few hours. No matter how hard I willed it.
Yvonne was right. I had to let the dream become a reality. It was time to accept the inevitable, the expected. I was no different than any other girl entering an arranged marriage.
And the problem became apparent. I was sleeping with the enemy. And the enemy was me.
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