Madhubala is dead. He once offered to take my virginity
Madhubala is dead. He has been for six years now. When he was alive, he offered to take my virginity.
He very literally messaged me this in December 2013: "Sanjana, can I deflower you? I have extended my services to many others. I promise. I'll be gentle".
Madhubala didn't take my flower but he did have the pleasure of giving me the first kiss I actually liked. The original first kiss was shit. The boy's braces poked through my supple lips. I bled.
Madhubala instead took me out to lunch at Dario's, an Italian restaurant that shut down years ago. We packed some chocolate cake to take back home. Two streets from my house, he parked his small blue Maruti car and said, "I'd like a bite of the chocolate cake".
He opened the box, took a spoon and ate it. He said, "Come close. I think you should taste some of this". So I did. From his mouth.
He called me back to his place but I was concerned about going to the house of this man, 12 years my senior. Madhubala understood. He said, "No problem. Next time my parents aren’t over, you’ll be the first girl I call," he said, acting as though he had a roaster.
He did call me again when they were out of town. This time, I went.
Madhubala was strange. He was always high. He was always writing film scripts. He was always online. He said that he had created a character based on me. He said that to every girl.
When he first talked to me before we became friends, I wondered why. I was but a mere lowlife who tanked at every quiz she went to. He was a god in his circles, the winner of every major quiz. "I think I like you. But also, I really like sex. I think it's a problem. A vice," he'd say.
After I began dating a mutual friend, Madhubala and I communicated less frequently. Except that he'd send me an occasional "💐" emoji and type "Flowers for you, ma'am". I'd smile and dismiss him. Silly guy. My ex boyfriend hated this.
When things were okay, I’d bump into him at a pub quiz or two, walking around with bloodshot eyes and a glass of black rum. "I fail to understand what you see in him. He is ugly, obsessed and conceited. What gives him the right to date you," he’d ask me, pulling me aside. I’d beg him to keep his voice down.
When things were not okay, I'd receive the rare "I think I'll be better if I were dead" message. He'd deflect quickly if I asked if he was well.
When Madhubala actually died, I hadn't spoken to him for eight months. He had cancer. He never told us. "His mother is really not alright. She'd like to publish a book he wrote and talk to his friends. She'll call you soon," a friend wrote.
What was I supposed to tell Madhubala's mother? Your son sometimes sent me unsolicited shirtless pictures and asked for mine in return but he was also rarely loveable and kind? I've seen your house. He has seen mine. The bed needs to be sturdier.
"I have his phone and I’m calling all his friends. I just want to know what you last spoke about," she said to me on call. "Just regular things, aunty. Work and life. He was talking about his latest film. I didn’t know about the cancer. I’m so sorry for your loss," I said, promising to buy his book.
Six years after Madhubala’s death, I lay on the floor at an immersive painting exhibit today, watching Edvard Munch’s portrait flash by me. When Autorretrato Fumando Cigarro came on with a subtle chorus of violins I saw Madhubala come alive. Wasn’t this him? A melancholic with hollowed eyes, perky ears and a cigarette in his hand from 1885. Why did he seem so real? Is this what they mean by ghosts that haunt? I know that he’d be happy about the comparison. He enjoyed violin symphonies and tortured art.
Six years after his death, I opened his book and couldn’t read beyond the acknowledgements.
Did I miss him? No.
I was only pained by his memory. It is exactly what he would have liked.
