Chapter 9
I’m normally sensible in these matters. On days that required getting around, which is most workdays, I wore sneakers. Only on occasion did I indulge myself. Looks over comfort.
I hadn’t factored in the one-kilometre hike from office to the resto-bar today. Too close to taxi and too far to totter. Blame it on Meena Iyer.
I was meeting my oldest friend – we’d been together since kindergarten – for the first time in nearly a decade. Her family had shifted back to Bengaluru a couple of months ago. Meena had invited Chhaya and me for drinks.
I was excited to see Meena, but equally, a sense of dread had been building inside me after I’d heard from her last week. My heart felt impossibly heavy.
Words were swirling around my head.
The pin that burst the bubble.
A brouhaha I didn’t want to acknowledge.
I pushed that draught of grotty air into my recesses and impelled a smile.
There was much to look forward to this evening – the reunion of friends.
That’s when the heel of my shoe found the edge of a crevice on the pavement. I was tilting, dragged down by the bulk of my tote, when a firm grip on my elbow steadied me.
As I straightened to my full height, my eyes met rapidly darkening almond-brown pools. The lost notes of halcyon.
The late-evening westerly was playing mind games with me.
‘Are you hurt?’ Andrew asked, his palm warm around my elbow. I felt his strength.
I inhaled his perfume. I needed air to dilute the effect.
Andrew’s eyes caressed the length of my legs. ‘Are you hurt?’ he asked again.
I hadn’t seen him in office today. I had thrown more than a few furtive glances in the direction of his cabin. I didn’t want to run into him in the middle of the editorial again.
I wanted to say something, anything… but those words that came cold through the telephone line some eight years ago rang in my ears. Like a cross-connection.
I was torn, shredded into a hundred pieces.
Andrew was now looking at me like I were a book, the pages of which he couldn’t turn.
Other women…
Over you…
There was more.
The words settled on my tongue, refusing to leave it like a stubborn stain. I was sweating.
Andrew was saying something. I think he was asking me if I was heading out on work.
The question rang like a timer.
I stepped aside, forcing him to drop his hand, which was cupping my elbow. I swallowed the bitter aftertaste and made my way past him.
I felt his eyes on my back.
I gave myself a once-over in the full-length decorative mirror at the entrance of the resto-bar that had recently featured in Asia’s top-10 nightspots.
I was in my go-to black dress, an angular hem that finished well above my knees. I was looking sharp. Andrew’s eyes had told me that. I checked my watch. I was on time.
Chhaya had informed us that she would be late. Maybe she’d be in time for the bill!
‘Oh my god! Oh my god! You look stunning!’ Meena was standing with her palms pressed against her cheeks.
I paused mid-stride and looked around me before covering the few steps between us and enveloping Meena in a hug.
My ankle felt fine, but there was an anxious strain inside me that was threatening to break.
We stayed that way for a whole minute; it was comforting. Meena set me aside and wiped off a stray teardrop.
‘Look at you!’ she said.
Compliments made me cross-eyed.
‘You, too, gorgeous.’ I attempted a comeback.
Meena was wearing a linen dress. She looked like she had walked off the pages of one of those glossies she deified.
‘I love your shoes. You’ve changed fully, Myra. You’re a whole new woman.’
A whole new woman?
‘Tell, tell, tell. When did all this happen?’ Sometimes, she had an accent; at other times she sounded just like she had in school.
Meena’s decibel level was rising. That’s when I noticed the glasses on the table; there were three. Even assuming one was water served in the wrong glass, that was bottoms-upped, too. She was already on her third drink.
There was a bowl of untouched peanuts in the middle of the scattered crockery and cutlery. I reached for it as I seated myself. I was starving. ‘Let’s order some food,’ I said, trying to shift the topic from me and my clothes.
No sooner had we placed our order for food and drinks than she wanted to know when the makeover had happened. ‘From ugly duckling to swan. What triggered it?’
Ugly? Was the emphasis on ‘ugly’ or was it my imagination? Or the slant of her smile.
‘It must be your success as a professional. You’re working, and you have some money. That always helps. It ups your confidence,’ she said, smiling.
‘Or I just grew up.’
‘And got rid of your clown wardrobe.’ She was laughing, flashing pearly-white teeth.
Where was Chhaya when I needed her?
This was a first for the three of us. We hadn’t dined together before. When Meena was in Bengaluru for her summer or winter breaks, the two of us would have sleepovers, chatting into the wee hours.
She caught up with Chhaya and the rest of her fashion clique over lunch or dinner.
‘This is the first time we are meeting of whatever was left of the group as adults, Meens.’
I don’t know why I said it; maybe because I was thinking of it this morning.
‘Remember the stuff you wore in school. It was like you had emerged from a dive into a paintbox. We always wondered if you got your clothes from a stall in Shivajinagar.’ More laughter.
It was as if Meena couldn’t stop herself. The more she drank, the louder she laughed and the deeper she cut.
I love colours, I have to admit. Sometimes, all of them equally and at the same time. But garish? Even though we all have mirrors in our homes, some of us need help, especially at an age when you tend to gloss over the image before you.
I often bump into people from my past in Bengaluru – classmates, school and college, teachers, friends of my parents. Almost every time, I’m told how much I have changed. ‘How lovely you look now…’ Compliments. Unfinished sentences.
Meena’s index finger was tapping her right cheek. I could tell she was thinking, weighing. ‘So, naturally, you have a boyfriend now,’ she deduced, as if she were tracking the Homo sapiens evolution.
‘Is that what you wanted to tell me? Your big secret.’ She was laughing again.
I started to tell her about Dr Ravi Rao, the man I was dating. He had been the unflinching light on my darkest day.
‘Hmmm… Doctor means money bags,’ she calculated.
I smiled. He was not just moneyed; he came from seriously influential stock. I had wanted to tell Meena that, but seeing how the evening was unfolding, I changed my mind.
‘How long have you both been dating?’
‘A few years now.’
‘You should push for marriage. You’re not getting younger, and it’s not like a ton of men are waiting for you.’
Incidentally, Ravi, too, was pushing for marriage. And it was moi who was dragging her feet.
It was desi night at 19th Floor, and the foot-stomping Kannada song ‘Alladsu Alladsu’ was playing.
‘Jeevna tonic bootli, kudiyo munche alladsu.’ Life is a bottle of tonic; shake it before drinking.
Everyone around us was on their feet. It was a loud and busy space.
I wouldn’t have picked a bar for this meeting. It was Meena’s choice. Suddenly, I was grateful for everything I had objected to – the volume and the strobes. The buzz about meeting my oldest friend had dissipated.
‘How are you doing, Meens?’ I asked forcefully, picking up a honey-coated cauliflower floret, urging her to eat. She hadn’t so much as touched any of the plates we had ordered.
As perfectly as her make-up was done, I noticed a puffiness below her eyes. ‘How is married life?’
For the next half hour, Meena told me about her divorce.
She was married to a software engineer in Chicago, who was so obsessed with her that he became suspicious of her every move.
The way she wore her hair, the timing of her supermarket visits…
he even monitored her phone calls. He was so far gone that he disguised himself to spy on her.
She fled to her parents’ place six months ago and filed for divorce. The marriage hadn’t lasted a year.
‘Hellooooo,’ Chhaya cooed.
She swooped down to pull us together in a tight embrace.
Meena was quickly on her feet, returning the hug with air kisses. I didn’t move; I was drained.
Chhaya had chosen drab for the day. She had been on the field, having scheduled visits to a couple of troubled highway outlets.
One had been burgled and the other had complaints of food poisoning.
She was not just a hands-on captain, but where quality was concerned, she gave it personal attention.
She had driven 400 kilometres, and she had neither the time nor the energy to change into something more suitable for an evening out.
‘Are you getting ready for marriage, too?’ Meena asked after she filled Chhaya in on her divorce.
‘I wish I was,’ she said, grabbing at a plate and waving to a waiter all at once. ‘Why, who else is?’ she asked as soon as she settled into her seat.
‘Our lady here got herself a makeover and money-bag boyfriend followed.’
Chhaya turned to look at me but was distracted by my phone, which was lighting up. The network was unreliable in this part of the building. After a spell of quiet, WhatsApp messages were pouring in.
Meena’s eyes were on my phone, and before I could react, she picked it up. ‘You have a message from an Andreeww,’ she said, handing me my phone. Her eyes were glazed.
After Andrew was added to the various MH groups, one night, when I wasn’t at my best, I opened an independent contact page and saved his number.
Good interview, Myra. Andrew was congratulating me on my piece on a female lawyer who had taken on the bar in fighting for a rape victim. I had chased Harini Parekh relentlessly. She hadn’t spoken to any media outlet until she decided to speak to me.
‘Andrew Brown?’ she asked.
‘Yup, the very same,’ I said.
Chhaya added, ‘He joined Morning Herald recently. You remember the fellow from school, right?’
‘You didn’t tell me.’ Meena was pouting now.