Will you be my quarantine ?

We wonder how the pandemic may end up altering relationships and reshaping love

If Gabriel Garcia Márquez were to be alive today, he would probably be rapidly filling up journals with his observations. Who knows, the world would perhaps have been gifted with a sort of sequel to his iconic 'Love in the time of Cholera'. Since he isn't around, for now, we are having to make do with Hrithik Roshan's too-earnest-to-digest Instagram commendation to his ex-wife Sussanne who moved in with him to co-parent their sons during the lockdown.

Staid his writing may be, but Hrithik certainly made a valid point about how separated parents were finding it tough to handle the lockdown. He wrote: "While the world talks about humanity coming together, I think it represents more than just an idea, especially for parents sharing custody of their kids. How to keep their kids close to them without infringing on the right of the other who also has an equal right to be with his/her children... Our children will tell the story we create for them (sic)."

They certainly will. Even as we are living through it, the lockdown is sometimes silently, sometimes loudly, altering the dynamics of many relationships. While it has widened the cracks in some unions, it has made others grateful for what they have. In some best-case scenarios, it has even rekindled romance in couples who had forgotten what it was to be in love. Happily, in a survey carried out by the publication The Knot, nearly 60 per cent of the respondents said they feel their relationship has strengthened because of being in quarantine together. And even better, 68 per cent of those surveyed said their priority is to deepen the emotional connection with their partner and discover new ways to be together in post-pandemic times. There, that's your silver lining.

Here are a few stories we heard — of the many hues of love behind quarantined walls:

'This has taught me to be grateful for our love.'

"This is clearly not the kind of anniversary we had planned for. It is 15 years since we married and we had planned to throw a big party that involved lots of hugging!" rues Suchitra Belur, a Kannadiga settled in Cupertino now. But, not ones to lose heart, Suchitra and husband Deepak decided to take the nostalgia route to celebrate their anniversary. They dusted out their wedding album and sat down with their two kids and told them stories of "that day". Much to the kids' amusement, they even ended up enacting some "hilarious scenes" from their wedding day. "Being in this isolation, in this "choti si duniya" of ours, has reminded me all over again why I chose to marry this particular person," says Suchitra, adding that being in quarantine has taught her to be ever grateful for the "abundance of love" she has in her life.

'I would have lost it without WhatsApp and Zoom.'

As India geared up to listen to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech on April 14, anticipating an extension of a 21-day lockdown, 19-year-old Mansi Bhanushali sat with her fingers crossed. "Not again…not again…not again," she muttered. And, within moments of the PM’s announcement, as her family got up to return to their routine, all set to repeat their lockdown activities in confinement, Mansi rushed to the bathroom for that moment of privacy to break down in isolation. It was not easy to stay away from her beau Sanjay who she has been seeing for over five years now.

Ironically, Sanjay lives three blocks away from her ground floor apartment at Navrangpura in Ahmedabad West and in pre-Corona days, would, inevitably, 'pass by' her place to reach the main road. But not now, not since the lockdown began and not for long, as it would continue most likely beyond the stipulated date. If it were not for the WhatsApp messages, phone calls and Zoom calls through the day, while all the time, dodging her strict parents, brother and a pesky cousin at home, Mansi would have 'lost it' by her own admission. "And now, with the lockdown being extended and with the whole Coronavirus thing just not ending, I am scared she may do something drastic or dangerous," says Sanjay, himself in a lockdown, "yet always accessible" to Mansi, as a rule. The two had made plans to visit Goa over the first long weekend of May 2020. "I was disheartened but Mansi was heartbroken. She was really looking forward to spending time away from her orthodox parents for the first time. This extension has really hit her hard."

'It is clear they cannot live together.'

And while Mansi and Sanjay have been pining for the lockdown to end and meet as usual, Nagpur’s Namrata Gosai too has been waiting with anticipation for things to mend. "It was a love marriage and everyone knew how Vinod, her husband, was too possessive for comfort. As Namrata resumed work after marriage, Vinod’s family forced her to quit her job," narrates Namrata’s sister Vaidehi, also married and living in Mumbai. “Why, her in-laws had issues with her talking to me regularly. It’s only after the lockdown began that I put my foot down and started to call her daily," says Vaidehi. "And thank God for that. Namrata reveals to me how she wishes it (the lockdown) ends soon. She has made peace with the fact that she can’t do a job any longer, but has another demon to deal with during the lockdown." Forced to stay at home too, her suspicious-as-ever husband fights endlessly with her over small, inconsequential things. Frustrated than ever, during the lockdown, Vinod has even started to physically assault her over the smallest of things. “Now, following the lockdown, it’s clear that they cannot live together and we’re looking for a legal solution to work out a separation between the two. However, owing to the situation now, there’s little we can do but wait it out for things to normalise,” says Vaidehi, worried sick for her sister.