What was that word again?

I have two friends who are 'seeing' each other. They are seeing what it means to be together, to sit and talk for hours, to walk together and be silent, to introduce each other to friends, to go on picnics by themselves, or to crash at each other's homes. They are checking out how much they can tolerate each other - with affection or indifference; or whether they can tolerate each other at all.

I'll call my girl pal X and guy pal, Y. (after the chromosomes - cliched but clever..and also alliterative.)

Y calls up to fix a dinner date. X ignores the calls because she doesn't feel like talking to him. He calls thrice, messages 5 times, mails twice, and then gives up. Goes for movie with roomie and has beer.

X asks Y if he is free the week-end. Y says he is busy with his stunning female friend who has just come into town for a seminar. It's been a while since they met after college so they'd like to be by themselves. Y is sure X 'will understand.' Y spends the weekend watching cricket with his roomies. There is no stunning friend. There never was any stunning friend.

X and Y go shopping. Y happens to mention that the last girl he dated wore a size 26, not a size 30. X is hurt and storms out of there. Y continues to shop and goes for a movie at the mall. X waits at the car park expecting her guy to come out and say sorry.

X looks over Y's sweat pants and says that her ex-boyfriend only wore designer labels - the kind that wasn't sold in Bangkok. (manufactured there, sure - but sold, no.)

One evening they are sweet to each other. He says he's been having second thoughts about her..and they're better than the first ones. She coos that he has eyes like a poet.

Then something happens. He wants to check out whether she is serious about him, so he asks her to 'find a girl' for himself - - to see if she gets jealous.

She says that she'll ask Nikhil to find one for him. Who's Nikhil? Her office colleague who she went out with - the nite X was with his 'stunning college friend.'

I talk to each of them separately. We all work in BPOs and there's no way we can all meet together. Individually I ask them, 'Why do you treat him/her that way?' Individually, they stay silent.

'You like him/her, don't you?', I ask. 'He/She deserves better than this.'

Individually, they explain, 'Yeah...but it's not like ...we are committed or anything.'

'Really? But he's said he loves you...and you said you loved him.'

'Yeah..but it's not like he/she's agreed to a lifetime commitment or anything. Nobody talked about marriage.'

At this point, I get exasperated and go back to office.

Here's the strange thing...once you say that you love someone, you ARE committed. You are committed to not disregard the other person's feelings. You don't play mind games, you don't act selfish, you don't ignore calls, you don't calculate to hurt, you don't string the other person along, and you most certainly don't make the other person feel like an after-thought. You simply treat people with a basic decency.

When you say 'I love you', you don't marry; but you do commit.

Great people make these sort of ‘commitments’ for the sake of a conscience or a character. Some others do it for courtesy. Still others do it for love.

So many reasons and see, nobody did talk about marriage.