The new boy bores her, like most boys do. His idea of conversation is to ask vague, broad questions (1. what is the oddest thing about you? 2. do you feel deep? 3. chows your day going?) she never really knows how to answer. Until they started talking, Satya thought she was the pinnacle of self-awareness. Now, her armpits sweat furiously at the thought of more pointless introspection.

 Because he’s British, the new boy ends all of his text messages with X’s. She asks him if he ever had a YouTube phase (come on – Dan and Phil, Zoella, SprinkleOfGlitter?) because there is nothing more British she can think of (maybe colonisation and BBC Sherlock?) – but he says he was outdoors too much to care about the Internet. That tells her everything she needs to know: Satya is what Twitter calls chronically online (fanfiction, Harry Potter edits, Tumblr blog – she’s done it all), and the thought of someone who grew up in the UK and didn’t even care about her favourite British YouTubers is an abomination, a personal affront.

She still texts him, though. First thing when she wakes up that morning. Her hands are clammy under the grey comforter as she types out a reply to his last text (one super sexy hot male gaze fantasy, coming right up!):

Still in bed, unfortunately x

In response, he asks for a photo, and Satya rolls her eyes (“men are so predictable,” she imagines telling her friends that evening, as they gulp down wine coolers by the street, hiding behind parked cars). Right now, though, Satya is no better than any man: she wastes no time pulling her nightdress a little lower, folding herself strategically so the crease between her tits is visible. It takes her one attempt to take the perfect photo; she watches it go from Sent just now to Seen just now, and lies back, waiting.

Feeling desired is addictive: there is that familiar rush of endorphins, and a tinge of uneasiness she is all too used to ignoring. The unease is a wired response: it comes from last year’s drinking problem and this year’s sex addiction issues — from being hit by a truck full of regrets on countless mornings after. She’s not that person anymore, but the guilt still lingers.

British boy responds with a photo, a fuck, this made my day so much better X.

come to Mumbai sooner, then, she writes back.

The first time Satya went a month without alcohol, she channelled all her pent-up energy into sex. Sex was healthy; the Bombay Times published articles about its benefits nearly every day. Good for heart, good for skin, great for self-esteem — it was basically the opposite of alcohol!

It got out of hand quickly.

On Diwali, she was sexting three men at once, nursing a UTI from another. Arranged on the basis of priority on her phone was a list of men she wanted to fuck. In between texting friends, there was always someone new to sext.

“I have sex with men I don’t even know, when I don’t even particularly want to. It’s become, like, this compulsion,” Satya confessed to her psychiatrist, “Could it be because of the medication?”

In the same week, she got her hands tied behind her back by an older man in his parents’ house. He told her his office was close to where she lived, and that he would see her again before the week was over. When she got home, he had texted her on Instagram, saying he had a good time. She unfollowed him. He still watches her stories every day, and she revels in the idea of being that one younger girl he fucked: the one shining in a film of sweat on his bed, who travelled for four hours, made him pay the cab fare, and didn’t stay a moment longer than she needed to.

Aryan asked her how she initiates the sex talk. “Something like ‘what are you wearing?’, I guess,” she answered, sheepish. It quickly became a private joke — now, months later, every awkward pause in their conversation still is met with an impish “What are you wearing, then?”

She has promised the new boy she will wear her sheer black dress for him when he comes to Mumbai next month. What she doesn’t tell him is that it’s neither a dress (it’s a long top!), nor her own (she only borrowed it once, from Parnika). 

You’ll have to convince me it’s worth it X

Satya isn’t even sure if she’ll turn up to meet British boy. Sex is fucking tedious now: it doesn’t quite fit into this uncharacteristically peaceful life she’s living, the only life she’s wanted for two tumultuous years. She wakes up late in the morning without residual guilt from last night. She cooks rice for her family. She spends hours in Parnika’s paper lamp hall, forming full sentences that are uninterrupted by the churning of Old Monk in her stomach. Sometimes, she spends hours watching TV.

There is such novelty in being bored. Satya hopes it lasts.

“What do you think you’re looking for, when you’re having all of this sex?” her psychiatrist had asked her, all those months ago. Apparently, the medication wasn’t at fault.

Satya sighed, “Validation? Pleasure? Making up for lost time? Those are all the correct answers, right?”

The last time Satya had sex was three months ago, with A. It was all she had fantasised about for the eight months (and fourteen days) they had gone without talking, but when it finally happened, she found herself distracted, inattentive.

“I’m looking for how it used to feel with him,” she had told her psychiatrist, before, “I’ve never felt that way again, and I used to think it was the sex, but now I think it was just A.”

He came home late the last time they had sex. When they fucked, Satya felt like she couldn’t hold her brain together; it was spilling in a hundred different directions. The bed was too feeble, the remnants of Sula wine too bitter in her mouth. The first rays of sunlight edging in through the window irritated her. Their arms were sticky from sweat.

Waiting for this moment had felt precious, like an end in itself; now, the reality of their bodies (“flesh prison,” her friends would say!) — their pungent breath, their aching thighs, the sharp sand clinging to their skins — was tainting that fantasy. She remembered how most of love was mythologising.

I can do that x

Sexting was also mythologizing, building up stories of want and touch. So many times, she had twisted in bed, fucking horny, absolutely desperate to be with the man behind the screen. Naked with the same person, she would feel every second crawl by, painfully sluggish. There was no desperation when you had what you wanted. So much of sexting was yearning.

“You have to listen to me,” she told A later, when it was still dark enough for her face to be in grayscale, “I think I’m in love with the suffering.”

To yearn for something, to demand it from the universe, means speaking directly to God. Satya is so used to these conversations that having her wishes fulfilled feels like treachery, like being thrown aside to make room for others’ prayers.

“For eight months and fourteen days, you were an idea,” she told A, three months ago, “Now, what do I do with this?”

Half asleep, A pulled her closer. His skin was speckled with spots, lips chapped and peeling. The faint odour of sweat pierced through her nose. His legs were hairier than she remembered.

…

At 22, Saachi Gupta is the founder of Moonflower COVID Relief and Push up Daisies. Her writing has been featured in Malala Fund, Dismantle Magazine, and The Juggernaut. She was also a staff writer for Gaysi Family and The Luna Collective.