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Three is Company

Uday Mukerji

    “Hey, what are you up to?” texted Jenna.
    “Not much ... watching the game ... in bed,” I replied.
    “Where’s she?”
    I looked at Kim from the corner of my eyes and wrote back, “Right here ... browsing on her phone.”
    “By the way, thank you for a lovely evening. I had fun.”
    Oh, no ... I quickly turned off my phone and stared at it blankly for a while. at was I thinking?
    But I soon realized that not replying to her text might land me in a bigger mess – even more awkward at the office tomorrow. I texted back, “Me too.”
    “Well, I better leave you to your game. Catch you at the office tomorrow.”
    Thank God. I breathed a sigh of relief. I put down the phone and went to the washroom. Did I make a mistake? But that was just a dinner with a colleague ... I loved Kim with all my heart.
    I threw cold water on my face. I rubbed my wet hands against my neck and the back of my ears. It took the edge off, and I felt much better.
    As I came back to the bedroom, Kim said, “I’m turning in. Do you mind using the headphone?” She turned her face to the other side.
    “Don’t worry, I’m done watching the stupid game. Who misses a freaking penalty kick? ... And it’s a replay, anyway,” and I turned off the TV.
    “Sorry about that but thanks ... good night,” said Kim without looking at me.
    I also turned off my light, but I wasn’t ready to go to sleep yet. It took me a while to adjust to the darkness in the room. However, the residual lights from the street lamps below, coming through the white lace curtains, helped defuse the darkness. We lived on the fourth floor of a refurbished, pre-war old house, facing the canal, in the beautiful Jordaan district.
    I looked at Kim ... she was still facing the windows toward the canal, making it difficult for me to know for sure whether she had gone to sleep yet. I didn’t want to wake her up, although I would love to talk. What has happened to us? She’s lying so close – next to me, yet we’re so far from each other. An invisible thick wall between us seemed impenetrable. We were like two strangers living in the same house. How did we get here?
    I stared at the ceiling, and the events of the evening started rolling in front of my eyes – in black and white – like an old movie.
    Earlier in the evening, after I had finished my work in the office, I turned my chair toward the window and looked blankly at the slowly darkening sky behind the rows of the tall office buildings in the south of Amsterdam. Summer evenings were long here unlike in Singapore. It was close to nine o’clock, yet there was some daylight outside. But I couldn’t see anything beyond a blurry skyline. My thoughts were all jumbled up. Kim and I had been slowly growing apart for the last few months, turning my life upside down. And I had no idea how I could fix it.
    Like in any international financial firm, we also had a mix of people from all over the world. I came here three months ago from our Singapore office.
    “Rough day, huh?” asked Jenna from the other side of my desk.
    “Whoa! When did you come in?” Her voice had startled me.
    “In my defense, I knocked though.”
    “Don’t worry about that, what can I do for you, Jenna? More importantly, why are you still here?”
    “I was on my way out, and I saw your lights on. So, I came to check. Why are you still sitting in your office while the US Market has closed over half an hour ago?”
    I wished I had the answer. I could feel Kim was slipping, but I had no idea why. I couldn’t blame it on the new city. I had already seen the signs in Singapore during the last few months before moving here. We were losing steam. I had thought a transfer to a new city would help us with a change of scene. But that hadn’t worked.... When had we ever run out of words before? But recently, I had noticed we chose silence over talking as if the words went missing from our vocabularies. And I kept asking myself ‘why.’
    “Long story.” I sighed.
    “I have time, but I’m also very hungry.”
    Who knew Jenna would be opening a floodgate? I had told her everything over dinner, maybe a little more than I should have had. “Kim and I were colleagues at first, and we started dating after a year. But to avoid any conflicts at the workplace, she moved to retail banking at the end of that year. And two years later, we got married.... Kim is an amazing woman. She sacrificed her career in Singapore for me.... You know what, she moved here without any job, although now she found something. But it seems, in the process, we lost each other somewhere. Now everything is just routine. Every day is just another day.”
    Words had gushed out my mouth like water from a burst fire hydrant. I needed to tell someone, and Jenna was a good listener. I had known her for a long time. She had also worked in our Singapore office for a short while, although that was before Kim had joined the firm.
    Jenna was from Austin, Texas, and she had been living in Amsterdam for seven years now, while I was still settling down.
    The wailing siren of an ambulance from the main street brought me back to the present. If it was just dinner with another colleague, then, why was I still feeling guilty? Did I share too much?

***

    I didn’t want to lose Kim, and I certainly didn’t want to lose more time. So, before leaving for the office the next day, I asked her, “Are you happy, Kim?”
    “Of course, I am. Why are you asking?”
    “Look at us now. We hardly talk to each other. Remember, how we used to spend hours doing just that?”
    “I do.”
    “Do you think we need help?”
    “You mean couple counseling?”
    “Maybe ... I don’t know.”
    “Well, I gotta go now. Can we talk about this in the evening?” asked Kim as she finished her coffee.
    “How about we go out for dinner tonight and talk? ... For a change of scene or like the old days again maybe?”
    She picked up her purse and said, “I like that,” and she hurriedly walked out of the door.

***

    Jenna suggested I took Kim to Jaspers at Ceintuurbaan. She said, “It’s cozy and the food – French or Dutch – whatever you choose, is amazing.”
    Kim agreed. She asked, “How did you find this place? It’s awesome.”
    “A colleague of mine recommended.”
    Kim looked me in the eye and changed the course of the conversation. “Anyway, I was thinking about what you said earlier.”
    “And...?” I was on the edge of my seat.
    “Did you notice how we are both chatty when we are with other people, but we become silent the moment we go back home?”
    “Yes, now that you have mentioned it, but I never really thought about it that way. I think you’re right.”
    “I guess what I’m trying to say is we have been together for five...six years now? Maybe, it’s only normal. We have already told each other everything about ourselves. There’s nothing new.”
    “So, that’s it? You want to give up?” I pushed my wine glass to the side of the table.
    “Who says I’m giving up? Now that we know the problem, we can fix it.”
    “Fix it how?”
    “I don’t know. Maybe, couple counseling as you suggested?”
    “Or we can actively look for more couple friends here.”
    Kim took another sip at her wine and said, “Well, that only takes care of our socializing part. We can’t always have another person with us at home. Or can we?”
    I looked at her with my eyes wide open. “What do you mean?”
    “We have to spruce up our life at home too. We are in our early thirties. We can’t be bored and tired of each other now. We need to spice it up.”
    But the restaurant was already closing. We both decided to keep talking and find a fix. Before going to bed, I asked her again, “What do you mean by spicing it up?”
    “I don’t know...I’m still thinking. We’ll figure it out.”
    But I was desperate for some answers. “I know you hate porn. Shall we get some adult toys? After all, we are in Amsterdam.”
    “Keep thinking, David. No material thing can bring any permanent happiness. Anyway, can we talk tomorrow again? I have an early morning meeting.”

***

    The next day, as I met Jenna in the office, she asked, “How did it go?”
    “Everything went great, thanks to you. She loved the restaurant.”
    “Glad I could help.”
    I thanked her again, and I walked back to my office. I didn’t want to talk about my personal life anymore. I thought I had already shared too much. But I also knew I needed help to make sense of what Kim had said last night. Another person? What’s happening to us?
    After office, I went to see Michael, my only close friend in Amsterdam. I told him I could use some advice – at least, another opinion to decipher Kim’s words.
    Michael and I met at a café near his office. I told him in a nutshell what I had told Jenna the other evening, and how my yesterday’s conversation with Kim took an interesting turn. I said, “I’m not sure how to read it.”
    “What did she say?”
    “Kim said we needed to spruce things up at home. And I don’t disagree. She is right. When we’re out with our friends, we are fine, but the minute we go back home, we suddenly have nothing to talk about.”
    “If I may ask is everything okay in the bedroom?”
    “I thought so until ...” I paused.
    “Until what?”
    “Until she suggested we could bring another person in the mix to spice things up.”
    “Really? That doesn’t sound so good.”
    “Of course not. I suggested some adult toys to make it more interesting, but she shot me down. According to her, no material thing can bring any permanent happiness.”
    “Hmm.”
    “It’s all so new to me.”
    “Have you guys done that before?”
    “Never.”
    “Maybe, this is nothing; she is just testing you,” chuckled Michael.
    “I don’t think so. She is darn serious.”
    He looked at me and asked, “Well, is she into girls?”
    “Not particularly, but she told me she once fooled around with her girlfriend in college days. Kim isn’t like a typical Chinese girl in Singapore, she is smart and independent. Afterall, she had defied her parents to marry an expatriate who wasn’t even Chinese. Anyway, all that had happened when she was studying in Australia eons ago.”
    “You gotta be careful. With another person, it’s a whole new dynamic in the bedroom. And don’t automatically presume she meant a girl.”
    “You mean another dude? ... I love her, but I don’t think I can go through with that.”
    “Talk to her. See what she wants.”
    “How?”
    “Ask her whether she has someone particular in mind? That will give you a clue.”
    “Brilliant! I love it. Thank you, Michael.”

***

    Armed with Michael’s advice, I was ready to take the conversation forward, although inside, I was dreading the outcome. I was still hoping she would change her mind at the last minute. I didn’t know what brought this on to her. Can this mend the holes and the gaps we feel in our relationship? Sure, with a new person, there’s bound to be new sparks. But is that the only way out?
    After dinner, before I could raise the topic, Kim asked, “So, have you given any thought to what we discussed?”
    I couldn’t believe she was so eager to do this. Is this really what she wants? I said, “Yes, I did. Tell me if you have any choice?”
    Kim burst out laughing. “How to choose? If you’re talking about preferences, no, I have none. A boy or a girl – it’s all the same to me.”
    I looked at her blankly. I didn’t see that coming. I’m sure neither did Michael. My back was against the wall. I blurted out, “So, what do we do now?”
    “We keep trying.”
    “For how long?”
    “I don’t know. We never tried this before. I guess, it all depends. Some people are lucky – they hit the jackpot fast; for others, it takes time. I’m willing to try as long as it takes if you’re okay with that. We have the age on our side.”
    “You’re serious about this, isn’t it?” I asked to rule out Michael’s assumption that it could be nothing.
    “Aren’t you?”
    “Honestly, I don’t know anything, anymore.”
    “But you know that it takes both male and female sperms to make a baby, right? I can’t do it on my own.”
    “Baby?” I repeated after her. “Of course, hon, I’m all in.” I kissed her and pulled her into our bed.

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