Before I Met the Man Who Would Become My Husband

Sometimes the loves that do not stay still prepare the heart for the love that will.

When I left home at eighteen, I believed I was escaping a life that no longer felt possible. I did not yet understand that I was also travelling toward the experiences that would shape my understanding of love, independence, and my own resilience.

Bombay represented freedom — a city vast enough to disappear into, a place where the past could not easily follow. I imagined a possibility waiting there, though I did not yet know in what form it would arrive.

It was the monsoon season in July 1961 when the train finally pulled into the great Victoria Terminus. The city seemed alive with contradiction — ancient and modern, fabulously rich and achingly poor, elegant and chaotic in equal measure.

After nineteen long hours on the train, I stepped down onto the crowded platform carrying a brown leather suitcase and a heart still unsettled by everything I had left behind. Before I Met My Husband — The Girl I Was Becoming

Inside that suitcase were the carefully chosen clothes of a well-brought-up girl — pressed skirts, modest blouses, sensible undergarments selected with my mother’s approval.

Tucked carefully among them was one small rebellion: a pair of red patent leather stilettos I had bought for myself. They felt like a quiet declaration of independence, something chosen not for me but by me — a small symbol of the life I hoped to create.

During the long journey, my thoughts had returned again and again to one unexpected memory — a birthday party, a silly game, and a boy named Chris.

There had been something about him I could not easily explain. It was not only his rugged good looks or the natural strength of his presence, but the way he listened, as though conversation mattered to him more deeply.

In a single evening, he had seemed to understand something about me without my having to explain very much at all. It had felt strangely familiar, as though we had known each other far longer than a few hours.

For a fleeting moment on that train, I wondered whether he might try to find me. Then I gently put the thought aside. Boys forget. Life moves forward quickly, especially when one is young.

What I did not know then was that Chris would not forget me at all, and that life was quietly continuing its patient work, weaving our paths that would one day cross again.

For now, however, Bombay demanded all my attention.

I found board and lodging with a woman named Ethel, who was kind but practical in the way of women who had learned early to depend on themselves.

For what little I could afford, she offered me a small attic room that was bare but clean, shared with another young woman named Diana, who carried herself with the confidence of someone accustomed to admiration. The girls at the lodge nicknamed her Princess.

After paying my first month’s rent, there was very little money left for anything beyond necessity — every small expense needed to be considered carefully. Food was simple, transport calculated, and small comforts postponed for another day.

And yet, almost miraculously, I found work quickly.

I secured a position at Haussler’s, an aircraft manufacturing company, as executive secretary to the CEO — a man I had not yet met.

On my first morning, I stood before my modest wardrobe longer than necessary, wondering what one wears when stepping into a completely new life. Clothing suddenly felt symbolic, as though the choices I made might influence the person I was becoming.

I chose a cream-and-black suit that felt quietly elegant, simple pumps, and small gold earrings. Princess insisted I borrow a little of her Chanel №5, explaining with great seriousness that a woman should always leave a subtle memory behind her.

The 7:15 train was crowded, filled with commuters already absorbed in the rhythm of the day.

Pressed between strangers and surrounded by unfamiliar voices, I felt the enormity of the city closing gently around me. Bombay did not pause or wait for anyone to feel ready. It moved forward constantly, inviting you either to keep pace or be left behind.

At the office, a cheerful young man greeted me with an easy friendliness that immediately eased my nervousness.

“First day?” he asked with a smile.

“Yes,” I replied.

“Sam Batur — bus boy extraordinaire,” he announced, offering an exaggerated salute that made me laugh despite my nerves.

“Girl Friday to the CEO,” I replied lightly.

His expression shifted slightly.

“You’ll meet him in about ten seconds.”

And then I did.

A tall man, well dressed, crossed the courtyard toward us with an air of natural confidence. He was composed, self-assured, and striking without seeming aware of it. He opened the door for me with a small, knowing smile.

“You must be my new PA. I’m Atik Rahman. Everyone calls me Tiks.”

In that moment, something subtle shifted within me.

The work itself was not difficult. I had trained well and quickly demonstrated that I was efficient, organised, and capable.

Yet I found myself distracted in ways I had not anticipated.

Something about him was compelling — perhaps those mesmerising green eyes that seemed to observe more than they revealed, or the quiet patience with which he encouraged rather than corrected.

Slowly, almost without noticing when it began, I found myself drawn into his world.

We began leaving the office at similar times, often finding ourselves on the same train, continuing conversations that seemed to pick up naturally where they had left off the previous day. Sometimes we would stop for tea, prolonging the ordinary moments of the day simply because we enjoyed each other’s company.

With him, I spoke more freely than I ever had before. I told him about my childhood, about the loneliness of boarding school, about the curious feeling of never quite belonging anywhere completely.

He listened with an attentiveness that made me feel understood rather than judged.

For the first time in my life, I felt truly seen.

What began quietly deepened naturally. Days became evenings, evenings became long conversations filled with laughter, shared confidences, and the small discoveries that gradually bring two people closer together.

Through him, Bombay revealed itself in all its colour and movement — the lights, the music, the restless energy of a city that seemed determined never to sleep.

We wandered along the beaches, the warm air carrying the scent of salt and possibility. We ate from street vendors, sampling foods I had never tasted before, laughing like children discovering the world for the first time.

And somewhere in the midst of all that life, I fell in love.

It happened during Holi, the festival of colour, when the city seemed transformed into a celebration of exuberance and freedom.

People filled the streets, throwing coloured powder, laughing and dancing without inhibition.

He was waiting for me, already covered in bright colour, and as I approached, he playfully threw blue powder across my face.

I answered with green and gold, and soon we were running through the streets like children, losing ourselves in the joyful chaos of celebration.

That night, he took me back to his apartment near the sea. The air was warm, and the sound of the waves provided a steady rhythm that seemed to quiet the world beyond the open windows.

I was young, in love, and trusting. What followed was not frightening or confusing, but deeply tender. It felt like stepping into a new understanding of closeness, of intimacy, and of myself.

Later, lying beside him and listening to the ocean, I sensed that something within me had shifted irrevocably.

I was no longer the girl who had stepped onto the train alone.

I was becoming someone new, someone discovering not only the world but also her own capacity for love.

For two years, we lived inside that world of movement, music, and possibility. Bombay dazzled me in ways I had never imagined — the film studios, the glamour, the illusion of perfection that often blurs the boundary between fantasy and reality.

We spoke often of the future, imagining lives that felt both exciting and believable. He told me he wanted more — more than Bombay, more than the life immediately in front of him.

The idea of acting had begun to take hold of his imagination, drawing him toward distant places where new lives might be lived on screen.

His dreams stretched beyond the horizon, and I believed in him completely.

Love has a way of making the future feel both certain and beautifully open.

Holi carried a spirit of freedom that made everything seem possible. And yet, beyond the colour and laughter, there was a reality we both understood, even when we did not speak of it. Tiks came from a traditional Kashmiri Brahmin family, where customs surrounding marriage were deeply respected. In those years, family understandings were sometimes formed very early in life, shaping paths long before we imagined ourselves ready to choose them.

We did not dwell on it, yet the unspoken presence of expectation was always there, quietly accompanying the ease of our companionship.

Then one evening, he said quietly,
“I’m going to Hollywood.”

The words did not sound dramatic, yet they changed everything.

He told me he loved me, but he could not marry me — not across caste, not against his family’s expectations, not against his mother’s wishes.

The decision, it seemed, had been made long before we met.

And just like that, he was gone.

There was no long goodbye, no gradual drifting apart, only a sudden absence that left me struggling to understand how something that had felt so real could disappear so completely.

I had loved him fully, without holding back, and now I was alone again with the familiar ache of loss.

The quiet question that had followed me since childhood returned once more: why does love sometimes leave when we most wish it would stay?

For a time, the world seemed muted. I cried often and found little appetite for ordinary things. Princess tried gently to comfort me, insisting he was not worth such sorrow.

But I knew the truth.

He had been.

And that was what made it hurt.

First love rarely leaves quietly. It changes something deep within us. It reveals the depth of our capacity to feel, and the vulnerability that accompanies genuine connection.

Although I did not yet realise it at the time, this heartbreak was shaping the woman Chris would one day meet again — a little more aware, a little more resilient, and perhaps more ready to recognise the difference between intensity and constancy.

Bombay had opened my world, but it had also taught me that passion alone does not always promise permanence.

Some relationships arrive like a monsoon storm — sudden, overwhelming, unforgettable — and then they pass, leaving the air somehow clearer than before.

I did not yet know it, but life was quietly leading me back toward someone whose presence would not disappear with changing circumstances or expectations — someone who would remain.

Sometimes the love that does not stay… still prepares the heart for the love that will.

And sometimes, only with time, do we understand that even the loves that end were gently guiding us home.

Years later, life would quietly bring Chris back into my story.

The Bridge Between Friendship and Forever (coming next)

Part of The Long Road of Love — Memoir Series

A story of love, resilience, and a marriage shaped across continents and decades.

New chapters are added regularly.

Thank you for reading, dear friends ღ.

© Stephanie Roberts