Old Flame


                                                                  

The other day a friend of mine asked me for advice. That’s something I don’t give even when asked. But for a special friend like him I had to make an exception. He said his old flame was in town whom he had not seen for 20 years, so what should he do? I told him that he should give her at least 20 minutes. My wife overheard me giving this advice. Immediately, she asked me, ‘would you have done the same?’

I was stumped by her question.

She said, ‘why don’t you answer me? Isn’t my question straightforward?’

I replied that her question, indeed, was straightforward, but unfortunately the answer to it cannot be straightforward.       

She raised her eyebrows and said, ‘I don’t understand.’

I said, ‘I also don’t understand.’

She said, ‘don’t be funny.’

I replied, ‘Honey, I am not being funny.’

She looked at me and said, ‘OK, I’ll rephrase the question for you. If I was your old flame and you were married to someone else, then what would you've done?’

This was a more perplexing question than the first. I didn’t know how to field it. 
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I am sure this one you can answer.’

She was looking at me with lot of expectation and hope and love and passion. Bowled over by her mesmerising eyes, I said. ‘Yes, I would have met you if you were my old flame.’

In a flash, her expression changed. Like how a summer day gets spoilt by a sudden thunderstorm. Her eyes became fiery. I thought lava would soon erupt from them. Gathering courage, I asked, ‘darling, what happened?’

She said, ‘Your answer means that you would have met your old flame, even if I was your wife.’

‘No,’ I said.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘If you can meet me if I was your old flame, despite you being married to someone else, then what would have stopped you from meeting someone else if you were married to me?’

I said, ‘you.’

‘What does that mean?’ she asked, her eyes still flaming.      

‘It means my dear, my darling,’ I said, ‘that I want you. Either as wife or old flame. If I was married to someone else and you were my old flame, I would have met you at every opportunity, but if you were my wife and my old flame was someone else then I wouldn’t have met her, never ever.’

The hug that I got made my evening and completed my day.

I thanked God for helping me to think of the right answer.

-          NZ

17.7.2019      

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