Chapter 18
— NILAY —
For the next forty-eight hours, she did not come to him outside of her routine rounds with Dr. Shravan and his team.
She led his check-ups, read his reports, informed him about his progress and went away.
Nilay thought of leaving her texts or calling her late into the night.
But she had been clear when she had accepted to perform his procedure — it couldn’t be a conflict of interest. He understood what that must be like for her professional standing.
And so, despite every part of him screaming her name in his idle moments, he did not touch his phone.
He did not have many idle moments, though.
Nilay had laughed the first night after the last visitor had left.
And no, they hadn’t been his staff. Gautam and Maya had been outside the Cath Lab all through his angiography and then angioplasty.
They had been there when he had been transferred back to his room.
Rajiv and Meena bhabhi had come then, bearing home-cooked food.
Rajiv had stayed to ‘chill.’ Kedar had come next and brought in work updates.
The news of his episode had been confined to the building.
His CEO was working with his publicist and wanted to meet him.
Nilay, thinking about what Ritu would say about him conducting meetings the evening of his angioplasty, had denied.
He had thought he would be alone. But even without Ritu, these few people had stayed. And stayed for nothing but him.
“Ready?” Gautam strode in on Day 3. Nilay finished buttoning up his shirt. He did not feel any different in the body except the bandage around his wrist. His medicines were slightly altered, but that was it. He could have gone home on his own.
“Maya didn't come today?”
“There was nobody to keep MM.”
“Oh… Is Ritu… coming?”
“She signed your discharge papers. She is downstairs with Dr. Shravan.”
His heartbeat picked up. She was coming home with him.
She was taking him home. His feet bounced as he finished dressing.
As a VIP patient, his discharge formalities were completed in his room, with Ritu having taken care of everything else on the backend.
Nilay waited, waited, waited. She did not come.
“Call her, where is she?”
“She left after finishing your paperwork.”
Nilay wanted to ask why. Did not. Because the nurses walked in to let him go.
————————————————————
He reached home, set his stuff down, entertained Gautam for half an hour. And then, when Gautam left with the promise of returning in the evening, Nilay grabbed his phone and made the call.
It rang and rang.
She did not pick up.
Had she blocked him again?
He switched networks and dialled again.
Same response.
Nilay called Kedar.
“NiP, hi, you said we could not contact you before Monday for work.”
“I can contact you any time I want.”
“Oh, yes, yeah…”
“Bring five new SIM cards to my house.”
“Five?”
“Did I say six?”
“Ok, ok.”
Nilay gritted his teeth and ended the call. What was wrong with her?! He wasn’t cleared for driving. If she did not respond to his call this time, he was catching an Uber, a taxi, a bloody rickshaw to go to her. But where was she?
The lock on his door turned. Rajiv? He glanced up in time to see her open the door and step in.
The tightened muscles in his jaw relaxed, and before he could start firing her she was striding to him.
Her arms went around him and he squeezed her tight to himself, falling back on the sofa.
She did not leave her weight on him, settling beside him instead, tightening her arms around him.
Her face pressed into the crook of his neck and he sighed.
Her face vibrated. Her body vibrated in his hold.
Nilay tightened his arms around her, pulling her closer if that was even possible — “Hey, Doctor, I’m fine.”
Her arms squeezed his neck, something wet melting into his skin.
“Ritu,” he whispered, cupping her head. He stroked her hair. “I’m fine. I’m fine. Everything is fine. You made it fine.”
Her face nodded in his skin. She pulled back. Her mouth was open, her eyes gone soft. Tears hadn’t dried but they weren’t swimming in those browns anymore. Nilay took his thumb to the edge and cleaned her wet lashes. Her eyes fell shut. She inhaled, her mouth wobbling.
Nilay ran the back of his hand across her cheek. “I am fine, Doctor. Never been better.”
She smiled, nodding. When she opened her eyes again, she was back.
“How do you feel?”
“Angry.” He remembered her block attack. “How dare you?” He grabbed her face and kissed her. Hard. She twined her arms around his neck again, kissing him back for only a second before pulling back.
“Ritu, come here,” he reached for her but she swatted his arm away — “You need to take it easy.”
“And kissing you is not taking it easy?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t think so,” he slid closer, making her slide back.
“Nilay,” she warned, a hand on his chest.
“My doctor released me.”
“From the hospital,” she shoved him playfully back. “Not from restrictions.”
“You can’t mean we can’t ki…”
“No.”
“Fine. If this doesn’t go my way then something else has to.”
“What?”
“Promise you will agree.”
“Not without knowing it.”
“Promise me, Doctor.”
“Don’t even try to intimidate me.”
He smirked.
“What?”
Nilay reached out and pushed her bangs behind her ears.
She was so beautiful. In the winter sun of Mumbai, having shown him the strength of her will, now here again, softened into the girl he had just recently uncovered, he couldn’t stop staring.
And thanking his lucky stars that his heart attack had landed him in Dr. Shravan’s clinic just as the poor doctor’s own emergency had brought her there.
Big nicks in both their plans, but indispensable in bringing them here.
“What, Nilay?!”
“Stay.”
“I am here till night.”
“Stay the night too.”
She clicked her tongue.
“I am in recovery. I need a doctor. Look.” He turned and lay down with his head in her lap. She laughed. Her palm landed on his eyes and he closed them, breathing steadily. Sleep began to pull him in.
“Unblock me, Doctor.”
“You have been unblocked a long time ago.”
————————————————————
Recovery With Ritu could be a whole reality show of its own.
And if it was, he would be the defaulter who always landed in the dungeon or the jail or whatever it was that meant imposition.
Nilay had been a man too careful with his own health ever since his first attack.
But with her becoming his Big Boss, he couldn’t help himself.
He made phone calls to his office just to annoy her (usually to Kedar to do nothing but ask how he was doing).
Kedar was going crazy at this point. He would whistle at her as she tried to cook (‘tried’ being the operative word), the latest was the song she had introduced him to during one of their rain-song-scouting jukebox junkie sessions.
He would whistle it nonstop — Koi ladki hai, jab woh hasti hai, baarish hoti hai.
He would finish his water, then fill it up again when she wasn’t looking, just to hear her rant about dehydration.
He would try to grab her and kiss her, only to be smacked.
Hands, arms, shoulders — nothing had been spared.
Last time she had gone for his mouth. It was still tingling.
“Hey, Doctor, come here,” he tugged her arm as she passed him. She smacked his puckered lips and made him laugh again, falling back to the sofa.
“Take my BP at least, what kind of a nurse are you?” He managed between his wheezes. She didn’t take the bait, going to the island outside the kitchen and segregating the fruits she had ordered.
“Ritu!”
“What?”
“It’s been five days and you are not even touching me.”
“How did I take your pulse this morning?” She set the bananas in a basket and filled a bag with the rest of the fruits.
“You know what I mean.”
“Eat this apple,” she turned and threw it at him. He caught it in time — “You’ll give me a new heart attack!”
“No I won’t.”
“And I don’t want to eat this.”
“Why?”
“It keeps doctors away.”
She stared at him, probably as appalled at his dead humour as he was.
“It was a sad joke.”
She kept staring.
“You are sucking all the fun out of this!”
Her face remained blank.
“Say something!”
“Your jokes are becoming flatter. Obnoxious was better.”
“That’s because you are living here like a well-behaved roommate with a medical degree and sucking all the fun out of my plans.”
“What plans?”
“Doctor-patient plans. What’s even the use of getting this angioplasty if I can’t play patient and yell doctor-doctor help me every time you pass?”
“I think we need to stent your brain too.”
“You have to come closer for that.”
She grabbed another apple and he ducked, only for her to bite into it with a crunch.
“Fuck, you are good.”
She smirked, taking another bite and walking to him.
Her lips were perfect, bow-shaped, turned up, her eyes alight.
Now they were talking! He sat up, opening the stance between his legs, hoping to tug her in.
This patient game hadn’t proven useful for him, and, it was taking away his right to kiss her. No more.
Ritu stepped between his legs and his heart thumped. Nilay stared up at her, moistening his lips, taking his hands up to grab her hips. She leaned down, and he trailed his palms up to her waist, squeezing it just as he heard the snap of a velcro.
“Sleeve up.” She commanded, grinning, holding the cuff of the BP machine up. He scowled.
“Give me a kiss first.”
“You wanted me to take your BP, come,” she set her apple in his right hand and raised his left one to push the cuff. He pulled it away, hiding it behind his back. “Only after I get a kiss.”
She shrugged. “Suit yourself. I have my morning reading. Now at night.”
“See if I let you take it at night.”
“See if I don’t take it at night.”
Nilay smirked, snaking his hand up her thigh and to her hip. He pulled her close and she gasped.