Now That You're Rich: Let's fall in Love!

by Datta, Durjoy

  ‘I didn’t tell you her name? She is Riya.’ He saw Garima’s expression change. ‘What? You know her?’

  ‘Riya? From Shri Ram College of Commerce?’ she asked and he nodded. ‘I have heard about her from Abhijeet.’

  ‘When? What? And why don’t I know about this?’

  ‘Don’t tell Abhijeet that I told you, but they were good friends. Abhijeet had a crush on her, they used to go out a lot, and then they fought and vowed they would never see each other again. They don’t talk now.’

  ‘Why didn’t he tell me about it?’

  ‘He doesn’t like to talk about it. And Saurav, just be a little careful with her. We know what you want from girls, right? So, don’t end up doing something that you regret later. I am just saying that they were good friends once. I hope you are getting it.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I mean … C’mon!’

  ‘I am not that shallow, Garima. Thanks anyway. I will take care not to do anything stupid.’

  He walked off, taken aback and slightly miffed at how Garima typecasted him even when he had had just one physical relationship, and that, too, not only of his doing.

  ‘What the fuck?’ Shruti said to herself. There was a surplus in the Energy department and she would have to be shifted to another department. The mail said she would be shifted to Infrastructure from the coming week, and the worst part was that she would have to report to Dinesh, the most unpopular boss amongst female employees, the man in whose car they found Thapar and the two girls.

  She re-read the mail for the fifth time. There was no mistake. It was clearly addressed to her. She looked for Abhijeet’s name in the mail and it was not there. Only she was being shifted. Was Sumita talking about this shift of department during that meeting? What were Sumita and Thapar planning? Her brain became a battlefield of ideas and it hurt.

  ‘This is so unfair.’

  ‘I know,’ Abhijeet said. He felt sorry for her because Shruti had just started showing signs of getting better after that outburst in the canteen. She was working hard, and the other three were maintaining their distance from her in the office.

  Sumita’s words rang in their heads.

  You can still make amends. The list still needs to be signed by Thapar. Talk to me some time. We will see what we can do. Thapar and I.

  The four of them sat in the cafeteria, trying to make sense of it all. They knew they were all thinking about what Saurav and Garima saw in the parking lot that day, but nobody went near it. Nobody knew what Sumita, or Thapar, or Dinesh, had in mind, and they feared the worst.

  Garima said everything would be fine, but Shruti felt all her hopes dying inside her. She had already imagined herself and Thapar and Dinesh in the car, naked and writhing, and she felt sick and pukish. She felt as if Thapar and Dinesh had already asked her to meet them in the parking lot. It was as if she had already agreed to it and had steeled herself up for it. Refusing them was not an option for her. It’s not an option, it’s not an option, she kept saying these words inside her head.

  ‘Don’t worry, Shruti. Whatever happens, just remember, we are all there for you. I hope you know what I mean. I will talk to my dad and we will get you out of here. You don’t have to do anything stupid, okay. We will take care of everything,’ Saurav said.

  ‘Shruti, nothing will happen. Just relax. I am sure we are overthinking things,’ Garima added.

  Refusing them isn’t an option, Shruti said in her head.

  It had been a week since Shruti was working under her new manager, Dinesh, and every day was long-drawn torture. Dinesh was especially harsh on her, and she could feel his eyes on her body every time he talked to her.

  ‘Sir,’ she said. The four of them had just met in the cafeteria when Dinesh called out Shruti’s name.

  ‘Shruti, can I see you at my seat?’ he said and walked away, and Shruti followed him timidly.

  ‘So, I hope you are having no problems in joining our department. The workload is a little on the higher side here, so you might have trouble coping up. Sumita told me that there was a surplus in certain departments and forwarded a few CVs for me to pick from. I picked out yours, so please don’t disappoint me.’

  ‘No, sir, not at all.’

  ‘There are these six deals that you need to spread,’ he said, his voice a lot softer, his eyes piercing through her white shirt. ‘I guess you will be able to do that by tonight.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘If there is any problem, you can talk to your friends. Okay?’

  ‘Okay, sir.’ She got up and walked to her seat, her head hung low, and sat down, only a glass wall separating her seat from Dinesh’s. She could feel streams of disgust pouring out from her body as she adjusted her computer so as to hide from the direct gaze of her new boss. For the rest of the day she worked with her eyes strictly stationed on the computer screen, to avoid any type of eye contact with Dinesh.

  She worked hard and fast, just to keep the thoughts of Dinesh and her in the parking lot out of her mind. Unlike Saurav and Garima, who were still halfway through their day’s work, Shruti mailed the work that was assigned to her by eight.

  ‘Done for the day?’ Dinesh asked her.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Going back home?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I can drop you if you want.’

  ‘Sir, I will take the cab.’

  ‘Arey, not a big deal. Just let me finish this off and we will go. Okay?’

  ‘Sir. But …’

  ‘Why? Is there anything bothering you?’ Dinesh asked scornfully. I had picked you, his words rung in her head.

  ‘No, sir. Actually I was thinking I will go back home with them,’ she said and pointed to Saurav and Garima.

  ‘But they are a long way from over, I suppose. They would take at least a few hours to finish.’

  ‘Sir, I don’t mind,’ she said coldly.

  ‘Okay, then. Now that you are still in the office, I will assign you some more work. Go to your seat. I will mail you a few more profiles to work on,’ he said. All the affection in his voice had dried out. ‘I like the fact that you’re a workaholic. There is always a choice to make and I hope you always make the right one.’

  She resisted the urge to hit him across his face, tell him that he was a jerk, and that she wished he would crash his car and die. She felt disgusted. She felt as if she was already touched by him. Shruti checked her mail and saw that Dinesh had sent her twenty profiles to complete. Was this the right choice? She often wondered what wrong she had done to deserve this. She sobbed softly.

  Saurav and Garima came to her seat as soon as Dinesh left. They’d overheard the conversation. They looked at her, as she gazed back at them, teary-eyed, and though no words were exchanged, they let her know that they were with her no matter what. That moment defined what they meant for each other and their relationship. They were a family.

  They went back to their seats, thanked their stars for the friends they had, recounted the times they had spent together and daydreamed about the times to come.

  The days kept getting tougher for Shruti, after the snub she gave Dinesh. She worked nights, right through her toe-curling painful periods. She missed Garima’s birthday, so none of them celebrated it.

  She clocked eighty-nine hours in the next week, and went home just twice in seven days. What was even worse was that she knew all this would count for naught if she did not give in to what Dinesh and Thapar really wanted from her. What was even more painful was that Dinesh would leave office very early and would not forget to ask how her work was progressing. Dinesh’s attitude towards her was getting maniacal by the day, as he kept crushing her under piles of work.

  Meanwhile, the subprime losses were starting to hit all major banks and economies.

  The whole hoopla about subprime losses is simple. You lend money to a gun-toting, tattoo-pierced man to buy a big house, hoping that he will pay you back well in time. Obviously, the man ends up in jail after
few months. So there is no way the banks can get the money back.

  Take millions of these cases and scores of banks and you will get the picture. The banks weren’t getting their money back. The banks lose money; the investors in those banks lose money. The lesser money in the market—that is, in your pocket—the lesser you spend. The car you meant to buy a few months back will still be standing in the showroom now. So what do the car manufacturers do? Stop producing. What do the workers of the company do? They get laid off!

  So, at the end of the day, everybody goes broke and becomes jobless!

  16

  ‘Oh yes, Riya. Abhijeet talks a lot about you,’ Saurav said. He was toying with the idea of approaching her for the last few days, but he held back, thinking that Abhijeet might agree to introduce him to Riya, but when he didn’t, Saurav finally made his move.

  ‘Does he?’ Riya asked.

  ‘Oh yes, he surely does.’

  ‘That is nice to hear, sir,’ Riya said.

  ‘So, is there a training that you guys are undergoing?’ he asked.

  ‘No. They have assigned us mentors and we do some of their work. Basically, getting acquainted with how things work.’

  ‘Nice.’

  ‘Sir, how is the work here? I mean the culture and all. I have heard they have their own stylist here? I asked someone and she didn’t know! She, of course didn’t even know the s of style, looking at her extra-large handbag and green mascara with red nailpaint. Who does that these days?’

  Saurav kept looking at her glossy lips form those words, but not listening to them.

  ‘Sir? Sir?’ She waved her hand in his face and broke his stare.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Oh, stylist. Yes, fourth floor to the right. You don’t need her, you look fine, in fact you look great!’

  ‘Thank you! That is so sweet of you. No, I just want to meet her once and ask her if she is blind. I mean there are so many girls who wear ballerina shoes with …’ She went on again. Saurav lost his mind again. ‘Saurav? Sir, I really need to go. My boss, Kritika, she is a real bitch! You know her? It is better that you stay away from her. Okay! Bye.’

  ‘Huh? Yeah, bye.’ They shook hands and she walked away from him. Saurav had never seen anybody walk so perfectly well on five-inch pumps. Pink pumps. They were a different shade from what he had seen her wearing the day before, and he could think of no one else who could carry them off as well as she did.

  Abhijeet was neck-deep in work that day. Sameer was disappointed with his team’s performance and had decided to make amends. He had buried everybody under him with loads of work, though he had not yet stooped to Dinesh’s levels. He was profusely apologetic about the workload and was always the last one to leave the office.

  Abhijeet was scrolling through his mailbox when Saurav tapped on his shoulder.

  ‘Look whom have I got?’ he said and pointed towards Riya, who was standing right beside him.

  ‘Hi!’ she said.

  ‘Ummm … Hi,’ he said.

  ‘How are you? It’s been so long! How are you?’ Riya asked.

  ‘I am fine.’

  ‘Thank me, I made the two of you meet. I will get a chair for myself. Will you have anything?’ Saurav asked.

  ‘Saurav, I need to go. I have work,’ Abhijeet said, his eyes staring coldly at the two of them.

  ‘Arey, sit for a while!’

  ‘Saurav, I need to go. NOW,’ Abhijeet said and got up.

  ‘You can at least …’

  ‘I can’t,’ he said and left, without looking at Riya even once. Riya looked at Saurav and he looked back at her, confused and sorry. ‘He does not talk about me, does he?’ Riya asked, with little beads of tears in her eyes.

  Saurav hung his head and said, ‘No, he does not.’

  A couple of weeks passed before Garima got to know about the incident and she felt bad about it.

  ‘Why did you walk away?’ Garima asked Abhijeet who was cooking for Garima that night.

  ‘Did Saurav talk to you about it?’

  ‘Yes, he did,’ Garima answered.

  ‘He talks to you? I didn’t know he had time for us now that he is such good friends with Riya.’

  For the last two weeks—precisely from the time Riya stepped into the office—Saurav had been ignoring the other three. He was keeping out of sight of Abhijeet and was often spotted at the cafeteria with Riya.

  ‘Don’t say that.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t I? It’s been more than a week and I don’t think he has been with us.’

  ‘Abhijeet? What is the problem?’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it. By the way, where is Shruti, man? She leaves for home early and doesn’t pick up her phone. Dinesh finally decided to let the steam off her?’

  ‘Yes, he has been a little easy on her these days. And don’t change the topic.’

  ‘I am not changing the topic. I told you, I am not talking about it,’ Abhijeet grumbled.

  ‘You are irritating me.’

  ‘Why the hell are you getting irritated?’

  ‘You feel bad about your friend talking to a friend who talks to an ex-crush of yours. What am I to make of it? Are you jealous? All I am asking is whether you still have a problem about some other guy talking to her?’

  ‘Saurav is not some other guy.’ Abhijeet got up and looked the other way.

  ‘But you have a problem, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Fine.’ She threw the cushion she was holding on the ground and went to her room, slamming the door behind her.

  Abhijeet kept standing there, confused as to how to react to that. Garima had just had a conversation with herself, got pissed, and locked herself in. It was late at night when Abhijeet went to her room and sat where she was sleeping. Her pillow was a little wet with her tears.

  He bent over and whispered in her ears, ‘I love you. I am sorry.’

  ‘Love you, too.’ She opened her eyes. She had been waiting for him to come to her for the last hour. ‘But couldn’t you have come and said that earlier?’

  ‘I don’t care about her. Just that, I don’t want her around …’ he paused. ‘They can’t be together. I mean you know what Saurav wants, and she is silly, she doesn’t know where to draw the line.’

  ‘Come here.’ She pulled him close and planted a kiss on his lips.

  They hugged each other and went off to sleep. Or did not.

  I had been looking for a job for the last two weeks, but I was not getting anywhere with it.

  After days of nothingness, I finally landed myself an interview with an analytics firm where Sameer’s wife had worked. I dressed in a sharp, fitted suit for the interview. The slight beard was gotten rid of because Avantika threatened me with consequences if I didn’t.

  ‘Why not call everyone home for a party some day?’ I said, as I admired myself in the mirror. I wasn’t the most super-looking guy, but when you have a girl like Avantika by your side, you tend to think otherwise.

  ‘I don’t see them spending much time together. Saurav and Abhijeet have something going on between them. I was thinking of talking to Garima about it, but it always slips my mind.’ She came near and smelled me. ‘Nice. You will do well.’ She pecked me.

  ‘And Shruti? Dinesh still on her case?’

  ‘I am a little worried about her.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Dinesh is a bastard and he has let her off the hook all of a sudden. It’s a little weird.’

  ‘Guilt pangs?’

  ‘You know that he is not that kind of a guy.’

  ‘Very strange,’ I said, as I grabbed Avantika.

  ‘Hmm … very,’ she said as we kissed. ‘Not now …’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘You get through.’

  ‘That is what I am meaning to do,’ I said, as I pushed her to the wall.

  ‘Get through the interview and we will make tonight special.’

  ‘Promise?’

&nb
sp; ‘Promise.’

  I left for the interview, pumped up and ready to knock down some walls. Sameer’s wife was very popular in the firm, it seemed. The interview looked and felt like a mere formality. I was through in a matter of twenty minutes. I was promptly given the offer letter, and it seemed like they had it ready before the interview. I wasn’t the smartest or the brainiest guy around. But I knew the right people, and was probably a lucky bastard. The drop in salary was huge, but the perks were aplenty.

  Good people. Sleep. Sanity.

  17

  A few more days passed by and Saurav couldn’t stop thinking about Riya, and he knew it was real this time. He knew he was ignoring the other three but he thought he would make up for the lost time when Riya went back to Delhi.

  For now, he devoted all his time to leave a lasting impression on Riya. Every day there was some surprise or the other waiting for Riya on her table. Sometimes, it was a new keyring with a cute teddy hanging from it, while on the others, it was a coffee mug with ‘Riya’ written on it. Soon, her table drawers were full of baubles, trinkets, cards and the like. Riya had started liking Saurav, too, but she was more than a little wary of falling for him. That night, it was their umpteenth dinner date together.

  ‘I really like you. I mean, I have made it a little too obvious, haven’t I?’

  ‘Not really. I just have fifty-three gifts and counting? I would have to say, NO!’ she giggled.

  ‘Okay, I get it. But you are still to say what you feel about all this? I mean me, us, the whole thing that is going around.’

  ‘I think you’re a really nice guy, Saurav. It is just that I don’t feel it is right. You know what happened with Abhijeet. And we are still not over it. I mean he is still very angry with me.’

  ‘But that was a long time ago, man! He is happy now and moreover, he is dating now, isn’t he? And do you think it is fair? I mean, why should I be the one to carry the burden of his or your past? And, I am sure you will sort it out some day.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘You will.’

  ‘Okay, I think it is getting late. I must go,’ Riya said.

  ‘You are not going today.’