Mirror Magazine

Mirror Magazine

Is he the one?
By Aditha Dissanayake
April 13, 2004. The sun had begun a new solar journey - another new year. Marshi took stock of her life. Twenty-nine, pushing thirty. Twenty-seven teeth left in mouth. Puny body. Unsteady income. No boyfriend. She turned to the back of her diary and wrote under “Notes”, “Resolutions: Find Mr. Right, fall in love, get married.”

Three days later, Avinthe turned up on the doorstep of her sister’s house. (Marshi was living with her sister because her parents were in Melbourne). Marshi’s brother-in-law’s car had broken down and Avinthe, his colleague had come to pick him up. “Show him in and ask him to wait for five minutes,” shouted Gihan from the bathroom. Marshi led Avinthe to the sitting room, handed him the paper and ran back to her room. This was the time she logged onto the net to check her e-mail. She had to do it before ‘peak-hours’ came into effect and the telephone charges increased.

The next day too, Avinthe came to pick Gihan. He was ten minutes early, and so there was no paper to give him. “The paper boy hasn’t come yet. Would you like to read yesterday’s paper again?” Marshi asked him, wanting to get back to her computer. Avinthe twirled the car keys in his hands and shrugged his shoulders. Marshi took this to mean “yes,” handed him the paper and rushed back to her room. The following morning Avinthe arrived twenty-minutes earlier. When Marshi handed him the outdated paper he pushed it back towards her and said, “I don’t want to read it. Why don’t you stay and talk? Why are you always in a hurry?” Marshi sighed. She hated explaining things to people. “I work as a freelance writer and it’s important that I check my e-mail in the morning before the telephone charges increase.” Just then her sister walked into the room, and began to ask Avinthe about his parents. Marshi retreated to her room, but could not help hearing her sister teasing him. “Your mother was telling me that she was searching for a partner for you. Has she found one yet?” Marshi did not hear Avinthe’s reply.

Avinthe stopped coming when Gihan got his car back from the garage. But on Thursday, at ten in the morning the phone rang. Marshi was the only one at home. “Marshi?” She recognised the voice.“Yes?” She said, wondering why he was calling her.

After a slight pause she heard him take a deep breath and say, “Would you like to go out with me on Saturday?” Marshi couldn’t think of anything to say. Then she blurted out the first excuse she could think of, “I don’t think Akka will let me go.”

“I’ve already asked her. She said O.K., as long as I brought you home before ten in the night.” Marshi frowned. She didn’t really know Avinthe, but if her sister had already given permission Marshi decided she would accept.
“I’ll take you to the pub,” said Avinthe when he came to pick her up on Saturday.

“The pub? Great! I have never been to a pub,” Marshi said with glee as she unbuckled her seat belt and jumped off his jeep. “Do you like the colour?” he asked, looking at the four-wheel-drive in front of them with adoring eyes. Marshi saw nothing special in the vehicle and wished his eyes were on her instead, but managed an “It’s marvelous”. From the look on his face she was relieved that she had said the right words.

Even though it was Saturday night, the green doors of the pub looked daunting. Both of them looked at the door apprehensively, and decided to stroll towards the shopping mall instead. The shops were closing and the shop assistants gave them hostile glances when they began to show an interest in the goods on display. They decided to have dinner at a food court. Marshi insisted on paying for the desert, ice cream.
“Are you one of them?” Avinthe asked her.

“One of whom?”
“Are you a feminist?”
“Only when it suits me,” she said, with a grin. He let her buy a Caribbean Dream for him and a Romantica for herself.
When the ice creams arrived they managed to find an empty table in the open air. The sky was their roof, the air was filled with carbon-monoxide, people walked around chatting into mobile phones, the thin breeze played with a used paper serviette and they dipped their spoons into the plastic cups filled with ice cream.

“Do you want my cherry?” All of a sudden Avinthe asked Marshi. “Do you want my cherry?” he asked again. “This,” he said pointing to the red cherry on his ice cream. Marshi smiled. “No, I don’t want your cherry.” She decided and shook her head in reply.

When Marshi got home she rushed to her room and to her diary. She had already decided what to write. “As first dates go, mine proved to be half a success...” But before she could take up the pen she remembered the small cardboard box Avinthe had pushed into her hand. She had stuffed it into her bag. Marshi tore the wrapping and opened the battered box. Inside, she found a chain and a pendant in the shape of the first letter of her name.

Their evening out had not been romantic. There had been no moon. No candles. He had not stared deep into her eyes. He had not said any of the things guys in novels tell their girls, when they take them out for the first time... but...

Marshi turned to the last page of her diary, ‘Resolutions’. Was Avinthe her Mr. Right? She listened to the wind as it rustled the leaves of the tree outside her window. She stared at the sky. She wanted someone to tell her the answer. But in her heart of hearts she knew that whether she married Avinthe or not, she would never know.

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