5. OS 19. His Elusive Lover (Part 5)

Part 5

“Coffee,” Arnav instructed Aman over the phone, his eyes and focus still on the document lying before him.

“Err...ASR, Khushi is not in office,” Aman said.

Arnav lifted his head, a ferocious frown on his face. “Is she on leave?” he asked, furious that she could stay away from the office for a day.

“No. Err...she was here a few moments back. ASR, err...she has gone out,” Aman said.

The ominous silence made Aman explain, “She is looking for another job and has gone to attend an interview.”

Something burst in ASR’s head, turning his vision red. Never had he felt so angry, so betrayed, so abandoned.

“How dare she!” he bit out.

“ASR?” Poor Aman asked. “You wanted her out, didn’t you?”

ASR could only swallow the bitterness that welled up.

“She needs the money,” Aman explained. “Her father is sick.”

“Ask her to meet me when she gets here,” ASR ordered.

“You have a meeting with the Sinhas at the Taj, ASR,” Aman reminded him. “Do you want her to wait here for you?”

Arnav shut his eyes and drew in a deep breath. No, he didn’t. The meeting would end late and he didn’t want that girl alone in the office.

“I will see her first thing tomorrow morning,” ASR decided. “Aman, send me her employee file.”

“Yes, sir,” Aman said before cutting the call.

A few minutes later, ASR made another call to the PI. “Find out everything there is to find out about Khushi Kumari Gupta. Write down her address in Delhi and Lucknow. I need the details by midnight.”

                                                                ***

Khushi got home, all drenched and cold. It had started pouring a few seconds after she had alighted from the bus and she had forgotten to take her umbrella.

“He Devi Maiyya,” she whispered through clenched teeth as she hugged her cloth bag to her chest with her slim arms.

“Khussi, aa gayi?” Garima asked. “How was the interview?”

“Will you get the job, Nandkisore?” buaji asked anxiously.

Khushi just stood there shivering.

“Khushi, change your wet clothes. I will get tea,” Payal said, making her way to the kitchen.

“I—I’ll be back,” Khushi said through trembling lips as she made her wet way to her room, leaving a trail of water on the floor.

Ten minutes later, she faced the firing squad.

“What did they say?” Garima asked.

“They said I can join next week,” Khushi said quietly, her stomach roiling in tension.

Garima and buaji sighed in relief.

“Nandkisore is kind,” buaji said. “Give your resignation, Khussi.”

“The salary is the one they mentioned in the paper, isn’t it?” Garima confirmed.

“Yes,” Khushi muttered. “But...”

“But?” Garima asked.

“The working hours are long, amma,” Khushi said softly. “I can leave the office only at nine at night. And there is no office transportation. I will have to make my own way home at night.”

Buaji and Garima looked at the slip of a girl seated before them. It was not that they were cruel, but their first priority was Sasi.

“They are paying you more, Khussi. It is only natural that they expect more from you,” Garima said, lowering her eyes in shame.

“I will have to take food from home, amma. The canteen will be very expensive,” Khushi said, her mind full of one akhdoo, khadoos man with molten chocolate eyes.

Buaji and Garima nodded.

Payal demurred. “How can you carry breakfast, lunch and dinner with you, Khushi?” she asked. “The sabzi will go bad. How can you eat that at night?”

Buaji intervened. “Payaliya, Khussi has to take this job. Nahi to your babuji’s condition will worsen, Nandkisore. Go to bed, both of you. And Khussi, inform the office that you are leaving.”

There was nothing more to be said. Khushi and Payal left the living room.

                                                                 ***

ASR stood at the glass door leading from his bedroom to his garden, the phone at his ear. Rain fell unnoticed, a few drops wetting his coat as he stood listening to what the PI had to tell him.

He cut the call and slipped the phone into his coat pocket. He stood staring at the garden with unseeing eyes as he processed the information he had received.

Khushi Kumari Gupta.

20 years.

Orphaned at 10.

Adopted by mother’s sister.

Her adopted father had owned a halwai business in Lucknow and the shop had caught fire. No insurance.

The father had fallen sick and was bedridden now.

The whole family was in Delhi now, living with her father’s sister in Laxmi Nagar.

She was the sole breadwinner of her family comprising her adopted parents, their daughter and her father’s sister.

His eyes fell shut. He felt disoriented for a moment. An intensely private man, peeping into Khushi’s life had given him a strange feeling of being out of control, of being at the mercy of the vagaries of fate, buffeted by strong winds, his walls down....

He shook himself out of that strange mood.

Yes, the house. Khushi’s father had put his ancestral home for sale.

He, ASR, could buy it. It would take just a few minutes. The deal would be done and she would be saved. He wouldn’t even feel the difference. The money would be less than pocket change for him.

But....

But if he bought her house, it would take her out of his sphere of influence. He would no longer have a hold on her.

No. No, that was not acceptable. This was fixed in his mind, even though he refused to admit why that was so.

                                                                       ***

Khushi sat up in bed and looked at the face of her sleeping sister.

How could she go and tell Amanji that she was going to leave?

How could she...how could she walk away from ASR, that angry man?

Her chest ached.

She pulled the pillow close to her chest and buried her face in it. Hot tears leaked from her eyes to wet it.