Inspired by the Dave Matthews band's song of the same name.
She doesn't know who comes to whom first.
In one moment, she is sitting quietly in front of the vanity in their suite, relieving herself of the rings and bangles adorning her body and setting the pieces of jewelry gently onto the table. She looks up and, through the gauzy red material of her veil, watches her reflection in the mirror, thinking, 'What a good girl, she is, waiting patiently for her groom—'
"—no, husband."
She tries not to jump in her seat, and almost succeeds.
Although the novelty of "visiting" has worn off, she still feels a kind of rush when she opens her eyes to a different world. Familiar, but different. The scent of jasmine and incense of her room is still there, only subdued; dull in comparison to the dark and dampness of Wolfgang's kitchen. She finds through constant visits with the others in her cluster that, however limited the time of their connection, she can tune her own world out completely if she wants to.
And right now, she needs to.
She turns around in the high kitchen stool she's perched upon and spots him by the counter, sipping quietly from a cup. 'Of coffee, no doubt, black, no sugar,' she thinks, licking her lips. If he is surprised by her appearance, he doesn't let on.
And knowing Wolfgang, he probably wouldn't even bat an eyelash if he was really, truly surprised.
Kala remembers herself and his words. No smiles, no greeting. 'Fine.' She can be just as cold.
"Yes, my husband."
The word leaves a peculiar taste in her mouth, making her grimace. Then the thought of her grimacing makes her want to hang her head in shame, but she is quick to school her features into that of indifference as she turns around, away from him.
"He is a good man."
His statement makes her laugh, but the sound is bitter, even to her own ears. "And who are you trying to convince, exactly? I know he is. I married him." Her words cut through the cold air. "You've never even met him."
She doesn't hear him move, but she doesn't need to; the presence behind her is hard to ignore.
"No, I have not, but you forget," he dips his head to her ear, "I am in your head as you are in mine. I know you. All of you, even if I don't want to. I know the parts of you that you don't show anyone else. I know the parts of you that you don't even know yourself."
He presses his lips onto her hair, "And I have had to sit through countless hours of your mother and aunt and sister talking about how good your husband must be, especially in the bedroom, among other things."
"Oh, woe is you," she says, though she knows that he has won this round; the coldness in her voice is gone, replaced by a light, playful tone.
"Woe is right," he grunts softly.
She surprises herself by letting him run his hands up and down her arms. They are feather-light touches, dancing a path on skin and fabric and leaving a trail of gooseflesh. She hesitates only for a moment before she leans her head back against him.
He takes this as a truce, and proceeds to settle his hands on her shoulders, where he starts kneading the taut flesh in between.
Outside, the Berlin skyline is breathtaking despite the rain pounding onto it in heavy, relentless sheets. Kala closes her eyes and listens to the downpour, a sweet and strange lullaby when combined with the steady beating of Wolfgang's heart.
His fingers dig into a particularly tense knot in her shoulder, and she releases a content sigh.
"Kala," he whispers her name like a prayer, and it almost brings a smile to her lips, "why are you here?"
Almost.
His words are met with silence.
Kala does not know the answer to his question herself, but she can tell him of what she does know.
She knows that somewhere across the world, on a warm, festive night in Mumbai, her body remains, sitting in front of her vanity, waiting for a good man, her sweet husband, wonderful Rajan, to come into the room and unveil her, to consummate their vows before her gods, and when they do, when they do, she can never bring herself to come back to Berlin, to come to this room, to return to him…
The veil is lifted from her head and his hands come around to cup her face, his fingers warm and calloused as they wipe against the dampness on her cheeks. "Why are you here?" He says again, his voice soft, softer than she's ever heard him speak, softer than any self-proclaimed monster can ever hope to speak.
She opens her eyes.
The way he looks at her then, stooping in front of her with irises of the clearest coral blue, makes her chest squeeze, and she doesn't even notice her own hands curling into the collar of his jacket before he closes the space between them.
The kisses come slowly at first—just a brief touch of lips as they test each other's waters, so light that she might as well have been kissing air. Wolfgang pulls back slightly to touch their foreheads together, and holds her.
Kala lifts a hand to his face, thumb rubbing against the stubble on his cheek, tracing the pulp of his lower lip.
'Why are you here?'
No one speaks, but the thought is deafening in the silence.
Then Wolfgang tilts her head back and presses forward in silent challenge and something inside of Kala snaps, her feet finding cold tiles and her body rising to his call. Her hands find the hairs on his nape, nails scratching into his scalp, making him growl into her mouth. His own leave her face to circle around her waist, pulling her closer and closer still, until there is no air left between his body and hers.
This is all they have, all that they can give.
It is not romantic, the way he pulls against her wedding clothes, hands desperate for virgin skin, nor is it romantic how her own slip underneath his shirt, scrabbling greedily at the hard muscles of his back. It is not romantic, not at all, but for a tiny second, Kala thinks that she'll trade romance for this kind of passion any day, if she can have it every single day for the rest of her life.
They sense nothing and then everything all at once.
The heat of the Mexican sun. The Atlantic breeze ruffling their hair. The sharp sting of a needle against a hip. The rattling of plastic pellets in high definition. The ceiling of a prison cell dripping on a cold morning.
The pressure behind her eyes. The tightness in his lungs.
"Goodbye," she forces the whisper against his lips. She thinks she hears the sound of a door opening and Rajan's gentle hello. A single tear makes its way down her cheek and into her mouth, their mouths, both salty and bitter to their tongues, "I've come to say goodbye."
Just as swiftly, the connection is lost, and another pair of arms comes around her in tender greeting.
Rajan's embrace is just as warm as Wolfgang's, if not warmer, but Kala shivers at the hollow he's left behind.