மோகனீயம் - Sindhu being wingwomen

I had been at him for days. Not with a joke first. With the ask.

Safe sex, I said. No boyfriend. A boyfriend was a problem. A college boy was a story that left the building. He was already in the building. He already knew the worst thing about the house. That made him the cleanest option I had, which was a filthy sentence and still true.

I told him it was the best possible outcome. Not love. Not a future. An evening that did not create a third person I would have to lie to. I told him their evenings had done this. The rooms. The hours I was not supposed to hear. The glass. You do not put a girl in a house where two people take each other apart and then act surprised when she knocks.

I was knocking. I wanted him to take me. I wanted the thing they had been practising to stop being only theirs.

He looked tired of the campaign and of the truth inside it.

“Fine,” he said, tight. “Bring me a woman I choose. Then we’ll talk about you.”

I grinned. Cheap lock, and I had the key.

“‘But’ always stinks, huh. Not this time. Think I’d stumble into that trap? I’d love to be your wing woman, damn fucker. But you’re helping me too.”

Deal. I would bring him a woman who was not me. He would still owe the ask I had put on the table. Last night’s shame lay low in the room. The rest of me was already spending a win he had not agreed to.

Tavern again. Us. No crowd to hide in.

He looked once and stopped.

“Her,” he said. “Get her for me. Wing woman up.”

Janani.

Full suit. Hard edges. Older.

Not a giggling girl. A test. He had picked the one I was supposed to fail.

I went over with the cigarette still going.

“Hey. See that guy? Shy bastard. Needs a night bad.”

Her eyes came up. Broad forehead. Makeup that did not apologise. Forty, maybe. Hair loose. The kind of woman a bar does not soften.

“What’s your angle, kid?”

Ready to throw the drink or leave.

“He’s eyeing you. Good catch. I’m watching from there. You’re bored as shit. Another office night, huh?”

She waited.

I dropped the only bait I had that was true enough to land.

“He’s banging my mom. I’m trying to snag him off her. All mine.”

Her face did the two things. Shock. Then the lean-in.

“Hell. Really?”

“Tons,” I said, which was a lie about worth and not about the house.

I walked her back.

“Your date.”

“Fucking her mom, huh?” she said to him.

I cackled. “Gotta piss.”

Wing woman out. His test eaten.

I did not go to her side of the house. Umaiyal’s rooms were rules and Appa’s shadow. His were the ones I had been taking by inches: couch, his food, now the bed. I knew he would be at Janani’s until the light changed. I took the sheets. Shorts. Tee. No bra. Light on. I did not care.

The mind would not shut up. I gave it jokes so it would not give me the window.

Janani with something ridiculous and purple, him yelping, Take it, shy boy. Then the other picture, kinder and worse: her bored with him soft, asking what it was for besides pissing. Then the husband at the door and Visu in a cupboard with his trousers. Then the dull version, which was probably the true one: missionary, her already half asleep, him having picked the sharpest woman in the room and landed on a weekday.

I laughed into the pillow and called it even.

A little after four, the door creaked.

Visu shuffled in, reeking of booze and Janani’s polish.

Anger flared. He’s back?

I grinned, half-awake, owning it. He froze when he saw me. First time I had taken his bed, not just camped on his couch. Shame prickled. He’d rather Mom here?

I tossed it off, the playful edge cutting through.

“Switch off the light,” I mumbled.

A pause.

“Please.”

He did not fight. He switched it off and dropped onto the couch, wrecked.

The anger softened. Fuck. I had kicked him out of his own bed.

I fell asleep again.

By the time I woke properly, the room had filled with morning. He was still curled on the couch, sweaty, muttering through whatever dreams the night had given him. I left him there and went to shower.

Sometime after eight-thirty, beneath the running water, I heard him hit the floor.

Then the gagging.

I shut off the tap, wrapped the towel around myself and ran out, water still moving down my back.

He was on his knees beside the couch, vomiting hot and rank across the floor.

“Gross.”

He heaved again. I caught his head before he could drop into it and held him there, one hand gripping the towel closed, the other against his forehead. When it stopped, I found water, made him rinse his mouth and pressed the glass into his hand.

“Drink, dumbass.”

He crawled back towards the couch, dazed, his eyes moving around the room as if he had misplaced something.

I knew what.

He wanted Mom, not me.

“Janani’s still at her place,” I said.

A grin, because care was unbearable unless I damaged it before he could see.

He looked at me and said nothing.

Days later I hauled my things upstairs. Shorts, tees, a suitcase of bras and panties I wore when I remembered them. I connected my MP3 player to his television and made the speakers announce the occupation.

Umaiyal did not object. Visu did not throw me out. Between her guilt and his exhaustion, silence became permission. He took the couch more often. I took everything else by inches.

“My room now, asshole. Whether you like it or not.”