Chapter 15 #2
I liked how far I had come in weaning myself off milk in my coffee.
All I ask for is a strong, steaming cappuccino.
Make that Grande. You’d think that’s easy to find in bean town, but you’d sooner hit a traffic-free road than a café serving cappuccino the way I like it.
Too much milk or froth, and listen to this, luke-bloody-warm.
South Indians like their cappuccinos extra hot and strong.
I can’t make myself a cappuccino at home.
I tried a couple of low-range machines, which I then had to junk before I went with black coffee.
So here’s how I work with coffee now. If I can’t get a cappuccino the way I like it (please don’t tell me cappuccino is a warm coffee and if I want a piping hot mug to get a latte blah, blah, blah, because I don’t care.
I want a cappuccino the way I like it, period), I’ll go with an Americano.
And this one in our lounge tasted good. Bitter, not burnt.
‘What I wanted to tell you,’ Sudha said, pausing before lowering her already faint voice. She looked around the lounge, making sure we didn’t have unwanted company. ‘I think Andrew is planning to quit,’ she said.
‘Whaaaa…’ I pushed the steaming mug into my mouth to keep myself from talking. It burnt my tongue and so shut me up. Andrew had barely been here for six months. So what Soor was babbling about was right. He was in trouble.
‘Careful!’ Sudha cautioned, reaching for my cup.
My expression was salty. I could tell by her reaction.
‘Have you burnt yourself?’
I shook my head.
Sudha laughed. ‘Such a klutz!’
I joined in the laughter.
‘Please don’t step on your sari now.’
‘I’ve ticked that box already.’
Sudha had heard from ‘a reliable source’ that Andrew wasn’t happy in Morning Herald.
Whoever it is she was hearing stuff from was generally in the know; I could vouch for that.
Andrew was apparently not enjoying managing pages and the administrative responsibilities that came with being an editor.
His first few months in Morning Herald hadn’t afforded him the time to pursue what he wanted.
‘What exactly was it… ah, “suffocated” is the word he had used,’ Sudha said.
‘I told you, about the time he joined us. He had absolutely no experience in print. He’s a political pundit, but I’m not sure his résumé is cut to take over the newsroom.’
‘I remembered that,’ Sudha said. ‘That’s why I wanted to tell you the moment I heard.’
Sudha could well be right because, in the last couple of weeks, I noticed that the editor was on tenterhooks, tailing Andrew, trying to ensure he was comfortable.
‘But you’d think he was smarter than that, that he’d have done his homework, known what the job entails, decide if that’s what he wanted for himself. Who’d move halfway across the world, even if he was coming home, without being sure if it would work for him?’
I shrugged.
‘Also, it’s not just about Andrew,’ Sudha said. ‘Morning Herald paid shitloads of money to get him. They need to justify the hiring to employees. Not verbally, but the economics, especially at a time when our industry is struggling. He’s got to be worth the deal, right?’
I nodded. ‘Already, people like Soor are walking around asking what he’s done.’
‘There’s a rumour doing the rounds that he’s under pressure to prove himself. I’m sure that’s what Soor was telling you,’ Sudha said. ‘I don’t think that’s true. I think the people around him want him to stay. I think he doesn’t want to.’
I nodded. ‘And if I know Brown at all, he won’t do anything he doesn’t want to.’ What a stupid comment, Myra. You might as well have confessed that you are lovers. WERE lovers. I cohabit in another tense.
‘Brown, eh?’
Sudha was on too much coffee. ‘An old joke!’ I sneered. At least that was the intention. Apologies if it sounded like a squeak. I had rolled myself under the bus. India has talent.
‘I keep wondering if there’s any other reason he’d have made this move for.’
I shrugged.
‘He’s single?’ she asked.
Was this an enquiry for Pooja?
‘Yes, as far as I know,’ I volunteered. ‘But maybe there’s a girlfriend or partner I don’t know of.’
‘I haven’t noticed a ring. How is he still single though?’
I smiled. ‘Maybe he’s not single. We just don’t know who his partner is.’
‘It’s easier to move the way he has, just up and leave, shifting jobs and homes if you’re single,’ she said, nodding. ‘Still, I can’t wrap my head around why he did this.’
I shrugged. Why had Andrew moved back to Bengaluru? Why Morning Herald?
‘I introduced Pooja to him thinking he was single.’
I nodded.
‘She’s my best friend’s daughter, and she’s coming off a nasty break-up,’ Sudha said. ‘Her parents live in the same apartment building as Andrew.’
I was listening.
‘She came gushing to me a little after he had moved here. She wanted him to model for her.’
‘Maybe he’s coming off a bad break-up too. Who knows?’ Why was I talking? Why couldn’t I shut up?
‘Maybe.’
‘They make a handsome pair,’ I said. Sometimes I knew what to say and how to say it.
‘They may look good together, but I don’t think there’s a pair there or there’s any chance of that.’
I exhaled. Living in the moment. Heard of that?
‘He’s an old 30, she’s a very young 21 or 22. Too much Gen Z.’
‘Too bad!’ When did this go from a slightly uncomfortable conversation to an enjoyable one?
‘Were you guys friends?’
I told her we knew each other. How quickly the weather changes in Bengaluru!
‘He’s a super-smart man, Myra.’
If she was hawking him like home-grown produce in a market square, he had impressed her, which wasn’t easy to achieve either. Sudha wasn’t given to superlatives, in life and in her stories. She was the very definition of a reporter.
She obviously thought I didn’t have a boyfriend.
Ravi Rao’s and mine was a noiseless affair.
We didn’t stroll the streets hand in hand or otherwise, and as a couple, we didn’t have a social media presence.
It’s the way both of us wanted it, but it was more me.
I didn’t want people to know, particularly because I was in the media.
Once we were official, engaged, maybe it would be okay to make it public, but before that, it was best to fly under the radar.
I smiled. I needed a rocket out of this personal space we were in.
‘What’ll he quit and do? I’m not sure if people are waiting to take him back from where he came?’
‘He’ll write columns, books, cover elections,’ Sudha said. ‘This level of expertise is always in demand. There are too few of them in the ecosystem.’
I nodded. ‘They’ll have to afford him.’
‘He could freelance. There are organizations that don’t cost cut on intellect.’
I was beginning to wonder if Sudha’s source was Andrew Brown himself.
‘You probably know him longest,’ she said.
I nodded. She was waiting for me to add to it, but I forced my backside off the settee to get more hot coffee to burn my mouth.
‘If Andrew stays, he’ll make it worthwhile for Morning Herald, but I don’t think he wants to stay,’ she said after I took a sip of the boiling hot black liquid.
Then he won’t, my lips were too scalded to say.