The Contractual Husband
Saturday, November 15, 2008
We knew this day would come. We looked at each other; not knowing what to say and how to say it, whatever it was that had to be said.
Did we know what the other was thinking? I think not, even after all these years that we have spent together.
Did we know what the other was feeling? I think not; I cannot read his face nor can he mine, even after all these years.
But the day had come. The contract had ended.
I think back to the day when it began. In the year of the Dragon.
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His Fall
Erasmus was a Defender. Our society frowned upon aggression and our vocabulary contained no word for attack. Attack (ə-tăk') was a loanword from the language of the barbarians that crept into our language to describe their acts of hostility, as we entered their lands in search of rice grain. Our reserves were depleted; it was a year of famine and the farms would not yield crop. Our barbaric neighbours would not share our burden and hence our defence forces were formed that year to occupy farmlands outside our borders and defend them against their owners.
Years passed, the heavens opened, and we had bountiful crop. But the Defenders remained at their posts and created more. We continued defending, extending our borders further and defending them until the barbarians would eventually become unwelcome in their own land. Some fled, the others remained and our Defenders mingled, blood mixing, blemishing the purity of our race in these Outlands.
As this unholy practice of mingling with the heathen grew widespread among the ranks, the Creator began choosing the Defenders of her land herself. She could look into the minds of men and their weaknesses would be revealed. She thus chose the strong ones from our first born as her Defenders and send them into the Outlands, leaving the weak and wayward back home to be taken care of by their women.
Erasmus was one of the handpicked ones; he was chosen by the Creator, seeing in him not just strength but also leaderhood, and rewarded him with the position of Captain. He was sent into active duty that year. The year of the Dragon. The year of his Fall.
He fell hard, in the sixth month of his duty. "In his defence", said a comrade to me years later, "His mingling was with a musk woman of the Outlands. A strange people, said to have odour glands in their bodies, their women were much coveted by the Defenders. For the musk women had odour glands close to their reproductive organs, and as you coupled with them, the most heavenly scent would envelop you, an aphrodisiac in itself and an olfactory experience that would grow stronger as you took them to higher planes of pleasured excitement". I could picture the scene in my mind : Young Erasmus, proud and noble, shining white in his virginal purity, marked by the musk women for a long time, finally falling prey to one of them, their most seductive beauty I would like to think, as she approached him tantalizingly, a heavenly scent beginning to envelop her as she grew aroused at the sight of his taut, muscular figure and he, unable to resist such divine temptation; for it is said in legend that the musk people were endowed with their odour producing abilities by the blessing of their god, the Muscotaur; taking her and then as the scent engulfed him, ravaging her until her glands were empty. It would make me envious every time I pictured it; I knew I had no right to do so, nevertheless I coloured green every single time.
The Creator punished him on his return, forbidding him to return to the Outlands.
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My Fall
Orfelia Portson. I did not like my matronymic, bestowed on me by my mother Portia upon birth. She had wanted a male cub, one she could nurture and mould lovingly but the sight of a female emerging from her womb must have saddened her, knowing that the coming years would be filled with conflict as child rose against parent and eventually left the house to find her own man. It was the same story in every house and if my mother prayed that she be spared from it, her prayers were not chanted loud enough. It must have affected her greatly because, though I did not know it at that time, she found herself uninterested in teaching me the ways of our society, as a consequence I grew up to be a woman who was unsure of men.
And hence my marriage to Postlethwaite failed.
He was the son of a countess and I was desperate, after having failed to find a man for myself. I was too straightforward and unromantic, so it was said of me, and it drove the men away. So, I agreed to marry the man my mother chose for me.
The marriage lasted for a day.
Postlethwaite was a fop, the kind I despised. He oozed charm and beauty, and many a woman would be enamoured of him. But I wanted a man with hair on his face. And his chest. And he had it on neither, as I discovered to my disdain, undressing him on the night of our conjugal union. I could not be aroused and Postlethwaite fled, seeking mercy at the feet of the Creator. She took him into her harem, as she did every handsome husband of a failed marriage, and punished me. With a contractual marriage.
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Us
As we women come of age, we go out and find a mate. When we find a suitable man, we start a family and live our lives until the day we die. However, every marriage does not turn out this way, mine included, and we are punished by the Creator. For we have become fallen women and she would unite us with fallen men, men who are guilty of violating our dogma of One Creation by coupling with other unrelated women either by compliance or, horrifyingly, by force.
And thus, for our transgressions, Erasmus and I were united in contractual matrimony for a period of ten years.
Erasmus was different from the other men I knew. The years in the Outlands had changed him, his mother said as she placed his hand in mine, in matrimony. He looked at me as she said that and I could see something within him. While other men seemed to have the purity of white lilies inside them, in Erasmus I saw something else.
But what I saw within would not come out easily, I realised as the priestess read out the contract and drew our signatures in blood. In the contractual marriage, Erasmus would have to carry out faithfully the duties of a husband, laid out by our scriptures, failing which he would be put to death. A contractual marriage was a chance of redemption for a fallen man and most men in it followed its terms till its end date. Would proud Erasmus follow suit? Though I did not know what he was like at that time, his face pleased me and I certainly would not have wished him dead. So, I prayed that he would not break the rules. However, there was still a small part of me, the part that listens to no reason, the part that liked what it had seen within him, that wished that he would break these rules.
And break the rules he did, on the very first night of our marriage. I do not speak from experience but from the memories of stealthily witnessing the coupling of my parents as I say this : the act allowed to us by our religion is monotonous and boringly bland. It did not arouse me in any way and I dare say I did not look forward to the nights with Erasmus. As he entered my room the first night, I looked up, expecting him to ask me to lay over him and begin the process of Creation. He did not, however, choosing instead to come close to me, with a wild look in his eyes, and caress my body. I grew aroused rapidly, but a small voice in me, fearing punishment, vocalised itself and asked, "But what of the terms of the contract, Erasmus?"
"I am beyond redemption, Orfelia. If I must be put to death tomorrow, I shall walk to the guillotine satisfied with the taste of you."
His words were crude but they burned something within me. "I am beyond redemption too, Erasmus", I replied and hurtled down the vortex to fiery hell with him, our bodies coiled together. If the good men and women of this land coupled for Creation in the way my parents had, I wept for them as they were deprived the real joys of union.
A good man and a good woman coupling were two blocks of flint stone, inanimate and inorganic, rubbing against each other to create a spark.
Erasmus and I, on the other hand, were living, breathing creatures. He was a snake coiling around the lemon tree. I played the flute in rhythmic patterns. He was the autumn leaf floating on the spring pond. I became the tigress swimming the easterly wave. He transformed into the pangolin in the hunt. I plucked grapes from the vines. He became a boar..
As the sun rose, yellowy rays entering the room, lighting it up, we found ourselves back in our human forms. I looked at Erasmus. Whatever was there within him, which emerged in the night, had gone back to the depths from whence it came. But I knew it would return as darkness fell again and I smiled in anticipation.
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Musk
Ten years had passed. We were beyond our prime, but that did not slow us down. Even on the last day, Erasmus ravaged me, a discernible sadness in his eyes. I closed my eyes, lifted my oars and let my canoe rush down his raging river. I knew I would lose everything this day.
As we lay next to each other, we looked at each other, not knowing what to say. Erasmus had broken the contract the first day of serving it, taking me in his arms and performing unholy acts. Would he break the contract again to stay with me?
I looked into his eyes expectantly. He looked back. The sadness grew. There was a distant look, a distant and almost forgotten memory returning to haunt him.
"I have served you well, Orfelia", he said, "And I must take your leave now and return."
"Where will you go, Erasmus? Why won't you stay with me?"
"I will return to my beloved. She waits for me, in the Outlands."
"Don't you love me, Erasmus?"
"I was your husband by contract, Orfelia. With her, I am free and an equal."
His eyes had that wild look again. And he was gone.
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Creation (Optional epilogue)
As Erasmus fled to the Outlands, he was captured and presented before the Creator. A look at him and she had not the heart to put him to death, instead it stirred her loins and she decided that it was time for another birth.
The Creator was a lady of great beauty and she chose a worthy mate every four or five years to produce an offspring who would eventually leave these lands to set up her own society elsewhere. And she had chosen Erasmus now, and they would couple before her people who would cheer them in a gala of the grandest pomp and splendour. She disrobed herself before the applauding audience and beckoned Erasmus to the ceremonial bed. She would coil herself around him, she planned, clutching his hair in intimate embrace and after the final moment draw out her dagger and- but, Erasmus had not followed her commanding gesture. He came close to her instead, with a wild look in his eyes.
The End.
posted by foogarky @ 11:45 AM,
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foogarky
foogarky is the pseudonym of the fictional construct who battles for supremacy with other constructed personas in the mind of a crazed individual. He describes himself as a man living in a non descript house in Rio De Janiero, Brazil with two dogs and a parakeet.
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