"Kalpi, tune apne saare sapne pure kar liye. Tu Memsaab ban gai. Tune ek Dance Academy khol li. Aur tune apne aap ko establish bhi kar liya," Kamla said this while massaging Kalpi's head lightly.
Kalpi nodded absent-mindedly, as she went on to humming her favorite song.
"Arre Kalpi, tu sun rahi hai na? Yaha tak Pakhi ki bhi shaadi teh hogayi Samar se. Kalpi beta, tujhe kiska intezaar hai?" Kamla nudged her daughter as she said this.
Kalpi smiled slightly and nodded dismissively at her mother.
"Beta agar koi hoga nahi tumhari kamyaabi share karne ke liye to phir kya faeda aisi taraqqi ka?"
"Aai tu kis liye hai. Tu hai mera parivaar. Tu share karegi mere saath meri khushi," Kalpi pecked Kamla's hand as she said that.
Kamla just smiled sweetly at the gesture and swatted Kalpi's hand away gently.
"Chal hat. Main humesha to tere saath nahiin rehne wali."
Kalpi just laughed lightly as she went back to humming the song. Kamla sighed seeing her daughter's indifference to this topic. She shook her head in dismay.
"Achcha ab uth bhi ja. Raghav babu thodi der main aate hi honge!"
Kalpi rolled her eyes at the mention of his name. It was true that he had become somewhat a friend to their family. He did not revert back to the childhood days. However, he was definitely warming up to the family, at least to Kamla Ma.
His equation with her had changed as well but in a different direction. He definitely thought her capable at least. Or he wouldn't have partnered up with her to expand his business - not that his business needed expansion. They had ventured together in a lot of business deals. Alas, that relationship did not travel to their personal lives. For some strange reason, there was a certain awkwardness and hesitancy from both of their sides. They could be called friends, and could be seen as relying on each other. However, there was some self-awareness that friends usually don't feel in their relationship. She had guessed it was because he was socially inept and needed some time to warm up to people. However, it had been five years since they started working together.
A lot had changed. He started to trust her more, but his strange behavior towards her hadn't changed. He still was far more critical of her than any other colleagues or staff members. He still was far cruder with her, than Pakhi or any other female colleagues sometimes. After some time, Kalpi just accepted his awkwardness as being who he was. Now that they were at the same level, she could talk back to him with full authority. This had led to several heated debates between them whenever they were working on a project proposal. This is what made them work so perfectly with each other. They were so critical of the other person's ideas that they always found counter-arguments or alternatives to it. This made their proposal unmatched by any other business.
Kalpi shook her head, as if to forget about him for the moment, and went to tidy the house up a bit. They still lived in that very chawl because Kamla Ma hadn't wanted them to move. Kalpi didn't mind very much, because it was very homely, despite it being rather small.
She heard a knock on the door as she finished tidying everything. She showed no signs of getting the door because she knew that her Kamla Ma wouldn't let anyone else open the door to her Raghav Babu.
She shook her head and smiled as she heard the door clicked. She sat down on her bed, and started reading a book while the tea that she put started coming to boil in the kitchen.
After about 15 minutes, she heard her mother call her name in exasperation. She knew that was her cue to ready the tea and some snacks. She sighed and closed her book. She would finish her read some other time. Now she has to serve her mom's Raghav babu.'
As she made her way to the kitchen, she put her earphones in order to tune out their conversations. She knew what her mother would be talking about to Raghav anyways and she really didn't want him to give her advice about the topic of marriage. That would be really awkward!
She was readying the snack, without making any eye contact with anyone in the living room even though she could feel his eyes on her occasionally. She wanted to drown in embarrassment as she knew what was coming. She felt someone take one of her ear phones out and she looked up to see her mother looking at her with raised eyebrows.
"Kay huwa Aai? Ready hai sab kuch. Bas la hi rahi thi."
Kamla nodded and helped her in bringing snacks to the table.
"Raghav babu samjhaiye Kalpi ko. Ab usko shaadi karke settle hojana chahiye. Main humesha ke liye to nahi rahoongi na?"
Raghav looked between them and then started talking to Kamla Ma, "Aap pareshaan mat hoiye. Jab hona hoga to hojaega. Waise bhi, Kalpi abhi young hai."
Kalpi was surprised to hear that, and her eyes shot up to look at him. However, she could tell that he was avoiding her eye contact. This is what she had noticed. There was certain level of awkwardness and boundary in their relationship that both of them found hard to cross over. They talked about personal things, but never too personal because Raghav always seemed to hold back. This prompted her to do the same, because she didn't find it necessary to divulge details about her personal live while she was working.
She was taken out of her reverie as she heard her mother's voice again.
"--theek hai, mana maine. Magar kuch ladko se to mil sakti hai? Main shaadi ki baat nahiin kar rahi abhi. Bas kaam main lagi rehti hai. Ya phir aik hi gana sunti rehti hai. Wo bhi itna sad wala. Kaunsa hai wo..?"
Kamla looked at Kalpi while she spoke of the song, as if prompting Kalpi to finish her statement.
Kalpi lowered her gaze as she felt that awkwardness creeping in again. She looked up to meet his eyes and whispered. She felt him raise his eyebrows to indicate that he hadn't heard the name.
"Say something, I am giving up on you..."
For a second, time had stopped for her as she looked into his surprised expression. For one moment, she felt his expression open up. She felt his eyes cloud over with emotions and her heart slowly started skipping a beat.
Before anything else happened, she heard her mother's resumed chatter again. She lowered her gaze from his piercing ones and took in a shaky breath. Her face started to heat up for reason that she didn't comprehend.
She heard him speak up and she looked up at both of them.
"Agar Kamla Ma itna keh rahi hai to sun lo unki baat. Milne me harj hi kya hai?"
Something crumpled inside her as she looked at him. It was there again. He wasn't looking at her as he said those words. She felt...disappointed. Something happened at that moment and she felt unreasonably angry. She gulped and took another breath to calm herself down.
"Mr. Singhaniya, agar koi harj nahi hai to aap kyun nahi mil lete?"
Her mother exclaimed in delight. "Yeh baat bhi sahi hai. Raghav babu aap to Kalpi ko jaante hi hai. Hum jo bhi ladke dikhae, aap unse mil lijiyega, theek hai? Aise hume bhi sukoon ho jaega!"
Before Raghav could say anything, Kalpi replied annoyed, "Aai please! Mera matlab mere liye nahiin tha! Mera matlab tha ke Mr. Singhaniya khud kyun shaadi nahiin kar lete? Yeh to mujhse umr main bade hai. Inko bhi to shaadi kar leni chahiye. Kyun Mr. Singhaniya?"
Raghav's eyes shot up at her. He looked shocked. For a moment, there was complete silence, and Kalpi thought that she had gone too far. However, she was too angry to admit defeat.
"Kalpi beta,tu.."
"Aai mujhe iske bare main koi baat nahi karni. Please.."
Kamla stopped saying whatever she wanted to say and nodded. Kalpi then looked away from her and rushed towards her room. After closing the door behind her, she slumped down on the floor. She had tried so hard to remain indifferent but she couldn't. How could you remain so indifferent to this topic, when the very person who you love is telling you to marry someone else?
She had hoped it wasn't true at first. However, the signs were too obvious for her to ignore. It started with her noticing little changes in her at first. Little by little, she realized that she followed his moods. She discovered that she kept up the facade of being the devil's advocate for him just so she could remain someone in his life. She didn't care if no one noticed, or if he didn't return her feelings. She just wanted to be there. She knew that sooner or later she would need to find someone. However, she still had time. And she so desperately wanted to hold onto that.
Kalpi dragged herself to her bed and slumped on it. After a little while, she heard the door click again indicating that Raghav had left. She closed her eyes and sighed again - the next day was going to be long.
Kalpi gulped down another cup of coffee as she worked on the new project proposal. Raghav was in a meeting with one of his former clients from before the expansion. She was too tired to be entertaining guests so she had told Raghav to handle that. She yawned again, and cursed herself for not getting enough sleep the night before due to the events that had occurred at her house.
She felt someone knock, and gestured the person to come in without looking up. She felt someone putting down a bottle of water in front of her. She looked up only to find Raghav looking worriedly at her.
"Drink some water. You will get dehydrated with all of that coffee."
She raised her eyebrow at him. She knew that he would never bring water himself in her cabin unless he needed something from her.
"Did you need something?"
He nodded, without any hesitancy.
"Pakiya sent me the name and place where we need to go to meet the guy. Make sure to be ready by 2 p.m. We will go after you're done with all of your engagements for today. I already told the secretary to clear up your schedule after 2 p.m. so we should be fine." He swiftly got up, and got ready to leave, without giving her a chance to say anything.
She shot up from her chair and grabbed his left hand in a hurry so he wouldn't be able to escape. She slowly shut her door so her raised voice would not reach outside.
"Excuse me? What guy? I am not going to meet any guy. I think I made myself pretty clear yesterday." Saying this, she let go of his hand and turned around to get back to her work. It was her turn to be jerked around.
Kalpi jumped in surprise as she felt him gripping her petite arm firmly and looked at her, exasperated.
"Why? Why are you making this harder?"
Kalpi was taken aback. "Harder?"
It was as if Raghav was jolted in reality, "For Kamla Ma. Don't make it harder for her. She has already struggled enough. If she wants you to meet someone, then meeting should be no problem right? What is the harm in there?"
"Mr. Singhaniya, I will definitely answer your question if you answer mine. What about you? You haven't gotten married either. I don't see why being 26 years old means that I should get married."
"My reason doesn't matter. I just simply don't want to. It's just a waste of time for me."
"It's funny how you want me to tell you the reason but you're not even giving me a straight answer. Well, I simply don't want to get married. Not to him anyways..." the last bit of her statement slipped before she even realized. She avoided looking at him after that, for the fear that he would see what she feels for him.
"...then who?" he whispered, as she felt his grip become tighter. She didn't look at him. After few moments, she felt him loosening his grip on her.
"Is there someone else?" This time his voice was more controlled. She looked at him.
"If there is, then I am sure Kamla Ma won't mind if you just tell her."
Kalpi smirked sarcastically. "Don't worry, I will let aai know after I go home so please cancel the meeting with the guy today."
Before there could be anything further said, Pakhi came in to discuss the Goa deal with both of them.
It was about time Kalpi told her mom about her budding feelings. She knew that her mother would not be happy about it. However, she had to tell her mother because her mom deserved to know. She wrapped everything up at the office, and decided to leave since she didn't have any further appointments. She was about to exit her floor when she heard laughter coming from the Raghav's office.
She sneaked a peek only to find a girl sitting comfortably beside Raghav, with one of her hand around his shoulder. That was not what got her though. It was the fact that Raghav was laughing. Laughing - Something he never did when he was with her. She had never made Raghav laugh like that, so openly. It's true that he had often laughed and smiled with her, but not like that. Seeing his musical laughter for the first time, her heart broke. She felt something hot rising up again. She looked away and decided to leave because she felt like she was intruding in a truly intimate moment.
Needless to say that after she came home, she hadn't felt very chatty and had forgoten to divulge the fact that she was utterly and hopelessly in love with Mr. Akhdoo Singhaniya to her dear mother.
Kalpi noticed the presence of the girl, named Deepika, more and more. It wasn't that she was doing it intentionally. It was more so that the girl was always around when they were not doing confidential work. She wasn't particularly keen on asking who the girl was either but she had found out a lot of details anyways: The girl was a cousin of Samar, and was said to have a huge crush on Raghav. If this didn't make Kalpi jittery, it was the fact that Raghav didn't seem to mind her presence around him. He let her do whatever she wanted. This irked Kalpi sometimes, but she tried to remain neutral. It was one of those days when things got heated up.
"Raghav, I think you should go for the Amritsar deal. I have heard that there's a lot of profit there," reasoned Deepika.
Raghav simply nodded without looking up from the file.
"Though it's true that it's profitable. However, if we take off resources from our Goa deal and divide the two of them up at this crucial moment, then it won't be a good idea. We need to keep our priorities intact. While it's true that Amritsar may be profitable, it's also true that we have already committed to Goa. To divide resources right now can shake our client's confidence in our loyalty." Kalpi reasoned calmly as she sipped her coffee.
"Yeah but Amritsar will give you more connections and bigger projects. This deal can open up a lot of pathways for you."
"...which would be meaningless if the clientele won't be able to trust our loyalty, no?"
"But..." Deepika wanted to continue further. However Kalpi didn't let her.
"Deepika, I know that you mean well but could you please leave these decisions up to us? This is administrative decision and I like to think that Raghav and I are doing a very good job making it." Saying this, Kalpi picked up her coffee and exited the room quietly.
Alas, as she fumed out of the office room, she missed the fact that Raghav was smiling into his cup of tea as he heard her reply to their banter.
Kalpi sat down on her bed and she let her tears fall. It was getting really hard to contain herself. She almost lost her cool in her office when she argued with Deepika today. Every day she had looked at them together, chatting away. They looked so comfortable and at peace. She didn't even have the guts to interrupt. Every time she would walk in on them, her heart would break a little more. There was no point to all of this, she realized it then.
She hiccupped more as she felt her mother wrapping her arms around her.
"Kalpi, kay hua beta? Kyun ro rahi hai?"
Kalpi didn't say anything except burying her head in the embrace.
"Aai, I am ready. Main shaadi ke liye ready hoon. Tum ladka dekhna shuru kar do."
Kamla only grew more worried, but decided not to press any further. She tightened her embrace.
"Beta, soch lo. Abhi tum jazbaat main ho."
"Nahii Aai, main ready hoon. Main bilkul ready hoon."
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