PART 2 #6
The memory of Vicky, my high school and college ex, still evokes a sense of bitterness.
Time heals, but also leaves its invisible marks on your soul.
He was the first boy I learnt to love, felt close to and shared dreams with.
I learnt to love him more than I loved myself, and then I learnt to hate him with an intensity that scared me.
Once I mustered the courage to walk away, he refused to let me go.
My imprisonment began the day he stood at the front door, brandishing my bikini photos and declaring his love for me despite my perceived lack of virtue.
The bikini photos I had shared from the Andamans because he had gifted me one.
The photos I had shared because I wanted to better his mood after he bungled his board exams. That day, my parents, horrified by their ‘slutty’ seventeen-year-old daughter who was sending boys risqué pictures, insisted I stay with him.
‘The wearing wasn’t the problem. I just shouldn’t have sent pictures to Vicky.’
‘You were seventeen. Being stupid was first nature to us back then,’ she says. ‘But see how times change? Your mother will be the first one to like your picture on Instagram.’
I nod, having felt this first-hand. ‘Morals shift, things change. Did you imagine when we were young that we would be on a trip like this? Two middle-class girls? A different country? Things just keep changing. It will keep happening. I’m living a life a younger me didn’t even dream of.
My younger cousins are even a step further . . .’
‘Are they allowed to send pictures to boys?’ jokes Vanita.
‘Somehow it’s still not funny.’
‘I know, I know,’ she says and touches my arm. ‘Oh, just remembered, Daksh was on that trip, wasn’t he?’
I nod. ‘I told you this, right? He was the one who checked my board exam results.’
‘Nineteenth April. I will never forget that day. The most nervous day of my entire life!’ says Vanita. ‘Life and death.’
‘I swear I was shaking that day, like crazy. He found me in the business centre of that resort. I still remember his face, so calm, like a monk. He checked the website on the computer and on his phone too. I called him my lucky charm.’ And then I remember about Gaurav and him.
‘Gaurav stole his Nintendo on the trip, by the way.’
‘And look at Gaurav now,’ says Vanita. ‘How many followers does he have? Two million?’
‘Two point three million,’ I correct her.
‘Seems like Daksh was a bigger lucky charm for your brother. Where’s Gaurav, by the way?’
‘He’s gone to the UAE, some gaming convention. With Tejal, she’s managing him now. I mean, they are undergoing a transition. So, at the moment, both Daksh and Tejal are managing him.’
‘I fell out of touch with Tejal,’ says Vanita and then rubs my back. ‘By the way, you did a good job at hiding your feelings with Daksh. You were like, so normal. I’m proud of you.’
‘There was nothing to hide—’
My words are cut off by a voice behind me.
‘Hey!’
The voice startles me. I recognize it immediately, but it’s weird. I swivel so quickly I give myself a sprain.
‘No way!’ I say. ‘So cool you came!’
I jump from my stool to hug Saket. I don’t know why but somehow I had a feeling he would follow me to Phuket.
I couldn’t believe the guy who stayed up consecutive nights to talk to me for months, would say ‘investor meetings’ and cancel.
I just knew it. I want to act surprised, but I’m not really that surprised.
‘Excuse me?’ says Vanita.
A big smile creeps up on my face. ‘So this is Saket,’ I point at Saket. And then I tell Saket, ‘And you, of course, you know Vanita. The coolest girl I have ever known.’
‘I like none of this,’ grumbles Vanita. ‘How is that he knows about me, and I know nothing about him? What exactly is happening here?’
Saket smiles with his movie-star looks and puts an arm around me. A sense of warmth permeates through my body. ‘She’s annoying like that, isn’t she? I’m Saket. I think I’m with her? Kind of? I’m not sure as of now. We’re trying to figure it out.’
Vanita’s looking at us, mouth agape, betrayed. ‘You guys are dating?’
Saket throws a look at me. ‘We are not strictly calling it dating, but thereabouts.’
Vanita’s eyes ice over as she looks at me and says, ‘And when were you going to tell me that? Aanchal, I’m pregnant. You can’t be giving me such shocks.’
‘You look amazing by the way,’ says Saket. ‘And congratulations.’
Vanita ignores Saket and says, ‘Why didn’t you tell me? And didn’t you tell me that you had gotten on some matrimonial sites? Then who’s he?’
‘I’m telling you now.’
‘You call him here? That’s how you tell me?’ she says and turns to look at Saket. ‘No offence.’
‘None taken. I’m on your side. But in her defence, she asked me and I refused to come and then I came to surprise her. So it’s not really Aanchal’s fault.’
Vanita continues, ‘This boy is continuously speaking, and you’re saying there’s nothing to tell me? Where did you find him?’
‘On the matrimonial site, obviously. Where else? That’s why I was on those sites.’
‘Ohhh-kay?’ she mumbles. ‘So? Oh. Oh. Oh. You’re dating him with the intention of marrying him?’
‘That’s my line,’ says Saket.
Vanita trains her eyes on Saket. ‘What do you do for a living?’
‘He just quit his job to work on his own start-up,’ I butt in.
‘Can we just keep this a little casual?’
‘Saket?’ grumbles Vanita. ‘Till the time you answer my questions, please take your hand away from her neck.’
Saket throws another of his trademark smiles. ‘Can I pull up a chair if this is an interview?’
‘Yes, you may,’ she orders. ‘And you can’t put your hand around her waist either.’
7.
Daksh Dey
The Ritz-Carlton, Phuket reminds me of the definition and diagrams of the biosphere from my old science books; the perfect convergence of sea, land and sky, making it most fertile for life forms. In this case, the life forms of the resort are us, squirming and throbbing.
People splashing about boisterously in pools, honeymooners sipping cocktails at the beach bars and influencers waltzing in front of tripods.
‘All the tiredness is just gone,’ remarks Amruta as she slathers herself with sunscreen. ‘I feel like saying what everyone who comes to Phuket says.’
‘That we could consider moving here?’
‘The rent is low, food’s cheap, the weather’s also not bad. The trifecta of good reasons. What’s stopping us?’ she muses.
‘We can work from home, set up a nice little studio,’ I add.
She reaches out for my hand. I thread my fingers around hers.
‘Let’s walk till the end of the beach,’ she says.
I flash her a quick smile and say, ‘What else is there to do?’
We have just left our resort room when two kids—not older than six—run past us in their tubes. Both of us stare at them go.
‘We are not going to miss them,’ I tell Amruta. ‘They are not missing us.’
She nods.
Just then, my phone beeps. It’s a mail from the office. I put it back in my pocket.
‘I thought we had decided to keep the phones in our room,’ remarks Amruta.
‘The handover is a little tricky,’ I reason. ‘Tejal’s doing a good job, by the way, but just getting used to some stuff. The junior gamers like her too.’
She studies my face, looking for any hints, and tentatively says, ‘Will you miss managing Gaurav?’
I weigh my words. ‘I will miss it. But he’s at his peak and he needs Tejal, not me. Tejal’s younger, more clued in. It will be selfish of me to keep going.’
‘He’s also dating her. That’s going to make the transition easier,’ says Amruta.
My face breaks into a smile as I look back on my time with Gaurav. ‘Can’t believe it’s coming to an end though. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened had Gaurav not stumbled into my life.’
‘And what would have happened to him had you not walked into his life?’ reminds Amruta. ‘Had you not managed him, he would still be in the lower rung of gamers. Worse, actually. Had you not given him the Nintendo back in the Andamans, maybe he would never have become a gamer.’
‘His talent is once-in-a-decade. He would have done something big anyway.’
‘But you honed it. You marketed him. Don’t short-sell yourself, Daksh. Just like he would have done it anyway, you would have done it, too. Look at our podcast.’
‘You’re hard to argue with. Thanks for that,’ I say with a sigh. ‘I just hope Tejal stops him from doing stupid shit.’
My blood boils thinking about the little ways he’s harming his career. That’s why it’s even more important for Tejal to step up, stop him, rein him in.
I continue, ‘He has cut down on the partying a little bit. And he just has to stop spending like he does.’
She scans my face. ‘What did he do now?’
‘He bought an apartment in Malad. At 30 per cent over market rate. Says it holds emotional value.’
‘Does it?’
‘It’s the same one I found him shacking up in. Remember I told you?’
An eye roll precedes her response, a silent testament to how often she’s heard this story. ‘How can I not know it? It’s all he talks about in his interviews. How you discovered him, fought for him, made him.’
It’s the story of the stolen Nintendo, as Gamers India had first reported it.
About how I met Gaurav for the first time when he was an irritating, gangly fourteen-year-old with scruffy facial hair and a tinny voice, and introduced him to games on my Nintendo.
They make me sound good. But the truth is that I wanted to talk to his sister, Aanchal, and though Aanchal had a boyfriend, Vicky, I didn’t care.
I had lured Gaurav with my Nintendo so I could talk to her.
Gaurav promised to give the Nintendo back but ran away with it to Delhi, while I flew back to Dubai.
That’s where his addiction to games began, which Gamers India got right. Of course, I didn’t stay in touch with either of them.