Chapter Two
Broken
"Shall I plate your dinner?" Soham asks his employer.
'No. I had it outside. You can go to sleep. Viaan replies without looking up from his phone.
"Bro, your speech made it happen. Especially the last Urdu couplet you recited there." Ehsan, his friend has texted him. Viaan smiles while typing back, "I think it was your optimism they liked more." Ehsan, besides being his closest friend, is also his business partner.
"Any plans for tonight?" Ehsan writes back.
"Going to hit the sack but not before deciding the head architect for the Dubai project."
"I have a name in mind but don't want to influence you. You come up with your own, and then we will sit together and finalize it."
"Sure thing," Viaan types before exiting the messenger application. It was an exhausting but fruitful day. His company has managed to land "the" Dubai deal, something that has stirred the market, and Viaan can feel the adrenaline rush in his veins. Now he wants the best team on board to complete this project, he thinks as he peruses the portfolios of a few architects that his secretary has emailed him.
"Viaan Sahab, the house needs renovation." "It's falling apart at places," his steward says. "Do you have any plans?"
"I have no plans, Soham Ji." Viaan had thought that the man had left.
'Saheb, I had informed you about it the last time you were here. Did you not get time to think about it? It is a very pressing matter, Saheb. This house was co-designed by your parents. Every brick here is reminiscent of their love and their domestic bliss. Of your childhood'
'Love?? Domestic bliss?!!' Viaan scoffs. Sohamji, is age catching up with you? Can't keep it together?'
Visible red dots appear on Soham Chowdhary's loose, hanging, pale skin. 'It was love while it lasted.'
Viaan cannot bear to discuss it, so he dismisses the case with, 'Nothing can be done to salvage it.'
'But, Saheb--'
'Good night. You can leave." Viaan states rudely. He busies himself with work. There's one employee's work portfolio that he's impressed with. Katha Singh. He doesn't remember interacting with her one-on-one, but looking at her resume picture for the second time, a distant memory knocks at the back of his mind but disappears before he can open the door. He has seen her in the office—in fact, in the meetings—a few times before. He wonders if it would be wise to choose a woman to heap such a huge responsibility on. In the long struggle between his prejudice and sense of righteousness, the latter wins.
He is trying to sleep but cannot. Earlier in the day, while they had gone to meet the Dubai clients, he had met Anup Thackerey. Anup was his wingman back in the day. Viaan had been elated to meet Anup after so long but had been shocked to receive the news that Anup was divorced now. His wife had left him for another man. Viaan had been disappointed, to say the least. Anup and Rekha had been college sweethearts; he himself had witnessed their story blossom.
"You were right, Raghuvanshi," Anup had told him before they parted ways earlier in the day, "that I need to be wary. That I shouldn't relax my guard. That she can betray me and break my heart. I stand before you with a broken heart and a broken will."Viaan had been left speechless. In that moment, Viaan realised that even though publicly he had ridiculed Anup and Rekha back in the college days, he had rolled his eyes at their displays of affection, but he had secretly hoped that it would work out.
Why are women like this? He wanted to believe. He wanted to believe in women, marriages, and happy endings. But the moment he would start believing in things, something would happen to crumble his already fragile belief. To the world, he was a 34-year-old intelligent, good-looking, and talented businessman with a world full of opportunities waiting for him. In reality, he was messed up in his head. He was unable to see a woman as a woman. When he saw a woman, he felt the instinctive need to strip her down to her bones and reach her core of beliefs to know if she was loyal or not. It was the same reason he could never approach a woman.
It gave him sleepless nights. What was that dialogue in Inception? An idea is like a parasite—no, a virus. Resilient and highly contagious. Viaan was scared for himself and for the people around him as well. He was scared that one fateful day, his sense of righteousness would not be able to save him from himself.
He stared at the crack in the ceiling. The house was falling apart, wasn't it? It had come apart so long ago.
What was that poem by Jaun Elia?
Kaun iss ghar ki dekhbhal kare?
Roz Ik chiz tut jati hai.
Perhaps the burden of this house had been too much for his father as well.
Edited by Meerkat - 1 years ago
comment:
p_commentcount