Not single, but not really double either...

From The Great Indian Novel

"Are you married?" Arjun asked gauchely
"No" Krishna replied, flashing those white teeth of his, "but my wife is."

Wah wah! (a very poor translation would be "Wow")

Fine usage of words to convey a meaning that colours many relationships.

Krishna has a wife, but isn't married to her. Or lets say he is married to her, but isn't married to her. The first usage indicates the ritual of marriage, while I use the italicised word "married" to mean a close and intimate relationship in which two people have pledged themselves to each other in the manner of a husband and wife, with a certain commitment, affection, romance, love etc. thrown in in varying amounts. He, being who he is, can't be tied to one person exclusively.

But being who he is, that is, a part of this world, he went through the rituals of marriage- after all, no one knew he was the almighty, and it would be considered a serious anomaly for an adult man to be unmarried now wouldn't it?

There are several like him, not avatars of dios, but plain and simple boys and girls next door, who go through the prescribed stages of life in a robotic mechanical fashion. Doing this and that because they have to be done, not because they want to do them. Unfortunately for them, they don't have the excuse of being the omnipresent one, who is free to be many things at many places at many times and everything at every place at every time. They are their wives' husbands, and their husbands' wives.

Instead of grin or a laugh, the same statement, if made by them would probably be accompanied by a sigh.

Oh, and then there are always relationships in which one feels bound to the other by a love that is not limited by or dependent on the relationship, while for the other, it is the relationship that binds him (or her) to the other and love is either absent or elsewhere.