Mayur FF - The Love Gamble Epilogue- 16/8/10 - Page 17

i just read the last three parts now srrrrrrry coz i was busy but i loved them all plzzzzzzzzzzzzzz cont soon and thx alot for the pm

Chapter Eleven

When Nupur got to Uday's, a teenage boy at the door said, "You looking for Mayank?" and when she nodded, said, "He's at your table," and jerked his head into the restaurant.

N-"I have a table?" said, but then she saw Mayank sitting by the window at the table they'd had Wednesday night, and she lost her breath for a minute. I keep forgetting how beautiful he is, she thought, and watched as he sat relaxed in his chair, his dark eyes

fixed on the street outside, his profile perfect. He was tapping his fingers on the table, and his hands looked strong, and Nupur remembered how good they'd felt on her and thought, Get out of here. Then he saw her and straightened and smiled, his eyes lighting

as if he were glad to see her, and she smiled back and went to meet him. Charm Boy, she thought, and slowed down again, but he already had her chair pulled out for her.

M-"Thanks for coming," he said, and she slid into the chair thinking, He's up to something, be careful. Then she noticed him looking at the floor and said,

N-"What?" her voice cracking with nerves.

M-"Shoes," he said. "What are you wearing?"

N-"You sound like an obscene phone call," she said, trying to keep her treacherous voice steady, but she stuck her foot out so he could see her blue reptile slides, open-toed to show off the matching blue nail polish. He shook his head.

M-"You can do better. The toes are nice, though."

N-"These are work shoes," she said, annoyance clearing up her nerves. "Also, you have my red shoe so I couldn't wear those. Can I have my shoe back?"

M-"Not until after lunch," he said, sitting down across from her. "It's my only leverage."

N-"Have you had this foot fetish long?" she said, as he passed her the bread basket.

M-"Just since I met you," he said. "Suddenly, there's a whole new world out there."

N-"Glad to know I've made an impact," she said, and was appalled to realize that she really was. It was enough to make her nerves come back. He doesn't matter. She shoved the bread basket back to him, determined to be virtuous in consumption if not in thought.

N-"So who's the charmer at the door? He needs lessons from you."

M-"Uday's nephew." Mayank picked up a piece of bread and broke it. "His tableside manner could use some work. Summer Job."

N-"Doesn't Uday have somebody else to put up front?" picked up her napkin to keep her hands off the bread. "He can't be good for business."

M-"Nitin the socially adept one in the family. His brothers are back in the kitchen where they won't hurt anybody. Fortunately, they can cook. I already ordered. Salad, chicken marsala, no pasta."

N-"Oh, good. because I'm starving. Did you know that forty percent of all pasta sold is spaghetti?" Geek, she thought, and tried to suppress her statistical instinct while she smiled at him. "I think that shows a huge lack of imag—" Nitin slung a salad in front of her and another in front of Mayank.

Ni-"Your chicken's up in about fifteen.You want wine with that?"

M-"Yes, please. I thought you were working on your finesse."

Ni-"Not with you. I know it's chicken, but for you, red wine, right?"

M-"Right. Now ask me what kind of red."

Ni-"Whatever Uday puts in the glass," he said, and left.

N-"Just a little ray of sunshine. But enough about him. Give me the 100 bucks."

M-"100 bucks?" Mayank looked beautifully blank and then shook his head. "There wasn't a bet. Stop harassing me for cash."

N-"You asked me out without a bet?"

M-"No money will change hands. Except for me paying the tab."

N-"We can go dutch,"

M-"No, we can't."

N-"Why not? I can afford it. We're not dating. Why—"

M-"I invited you, I pay," he said, his face beginning to set into that stubborn look that exasperated her.

N-"That means if I invite you, I pay,"

M-"No, I pay then, too. So tell me who Aarti, Wet, and Worse are."

N-"That's why you invited me to lunch?" said, infusing her voice with as much skepticism as possible.

M-"No." put his head in his hands. "Could we just for once meet like regular people? Smile at each other, make small talk, pretend you don't hate me?"

N-"I don't hate you," said, shocked. "I like you. I mean, you have flaws—"

M-"What flaws? Of course I have them, but I've been on my best behavior with you. Except for hitting you in the eye and attacking you on a picnic table. How are you?"

N-"I'm fine," she said, putting as much chipper as she could into her voice. "I'm turning over a new leaf. Taking risks. Like having lunch with a wolf."

M-"I'm a wolf?"

N-"Oh, please. You picked me up on Friday with 'Hello, little girl.' Who did you think you were channeling, the prince?"

Uday appeared with wine before Mayank could say anything, and Nupur beamed at him, grateful for the rescue.

N- "Uday, my darling. I forgot to mention cake boxes. Three hundred cake boxes."

U-"Already on it. Nani said you'd need them."

N-"I'm getting the boxes," said, nodding. "Sure. Great. Fine. Your grandmother is an angel and you are my hero. And of course, a genius with food."

U-"And you are my favorite customer." Uday kissed her cheek and disappeared back into the kitchen.

N-"I love him,"

M-"I noticed. Been seeing him behind my back, have you?"

N-"Yes. We've been having conversations about cake."

M-"Whoa. For you, that's talking dirty."

N-"Funny." stabbed her salad again and bit into the crisp greens. Uday's dressing was tangy and light, a miracle all by itself. "God, I love Uday. This salad is fabulous. Which is not a word I usually use with 'salad.'"

M-"Tell me about the cake," he said, starting on his own salad.

N-"My sister Aarti is getting married in three weeks," she said, glad to be on a topic that wasn't dangerous. "Her fiance said he knew this great baker and that he would order the cake as a surprise. And then the surprise turned out to be that he hadn't ordered the cake."

M-"And the wedding's still on?"

N-"Yes. My sister says it's her fault for not reminding him."

M-"Your sister does not sound like you,"

N-"My sister is my exact opposite. She's a darling." He frowned, some what annoyed at her statement.

M-"Which makes you what?"

N-"Me?" she stopped eating, surprised. "I'm okay."

He shook his head as Uday appeared with a steaming platter of chicken marsala. When he and Nupur had assured each other of their undying devotion, he left, and Mayank served chicken and mushrooms.

M-"So how do Wet and Worse figure in this cake story?"

N-"They don't. Except that they're my sister's best friends. But do not tell anybody I called them that." She ate her first bite of chicken, savoring it, and then teased an errant drop of sauce from her lower lip. "Do you think—"

M-"Don't do that," he said, his voice flat.

N-"What?" she blinked at him. "Ask questions?"

M-"Lick your lip. What were you going to ask me?"

N-"Why? Bad manners?" she said, dangerously.

Nupur met his eyes, and he stared back, unblinking. Oh, she thought and tried to remember what they'd been talking about, but it was hard because all she could think about was how he'd been there once, and how good he'd felt, and how hot his eyes were on her now, and how much she—

Ni-"You guys okay?"

M-"What?" said, jerking his head up.

Ni-"Is there something wrong with the chicken?" He frowned at them both. "You guys looked strange."

N-"No," she said, picking up her fork again. "The chicken is wonderful."

Ni-"Okay. You need anything else?"

M-"A waiter with some class?"

Ni-"Yeah, right, like I'd waste that on you," said, and wandered off.

N-"So anyway," she said, scrambling for a safer topic, "when Aarti told me about the cake, I turned to Uday in my hour of need, and he called his grandmother. So he's my hero."

M-"Wait'll you taste the cake. She only makes it for weddings and it's like nothing else in this world."

N-"When did you eat wedding cake?"

M-"When Uday got married. When my brother got married. When everybody I've ever known got married. Sam, Benji, and I are the last hold-outs, so there have been a lot of weddings. And now Sam's going down for the count."

N-"Well, at least you and Benji will have each other," said brightly. "So you have a brother. Younger or older?"

M-"Older. Nikhil." Nupur stopped eating.

N-"Nikhil? Nikhil Sharma?"

M-"Yes. Husband to Chiki, father to Sahil."

N-"Isn't there a fancy law firm called Nikhil and Manik Sharmas?"

M-"Yes. My father, his partner Manik Sharma, and my brother." He didn't sound too thrilled about any of them.

N-"Cozy. So how is Sahil?"

M-"Permanently scarred from watching us on a picnic table." She winced.

N-"Really?"

M-"Hard to say. I haven't seen him since. Chiki probably has him in therapy by now. So what's your take on Sam and Gunji?"

N-"They'll be engaged before August," she said, and they began to discuss Sam and Gunjan and other safe topics for the rest of the meal. When they were finished and Mayank had signed the charge slip, he said,

M-"So lunch with me is risky. Does that mean you need an apology for our last lunch?"

N-"No." she smiled and tried to look unfazed. "I've been working on the theory that if we don't talk about it, it didn't happen. Although a lot of people seem to know about it. Rahul, for example. He ratted us out, and now my mother wants you to come to dinner." Mayank looked taken aback for a minute, and she said, "I told her you were a complete stranger so dinner was unlikely." Then out of the blue, she blurted, "So what was that on Saturday?"

M-"Well." he took a deep breath. "That was chemistry. And it was phenomenal. I'd be more than interested in doing that again, but—" Nupur's pulse picked up, but she slapped herself in the forehead to forestall him and her own treacherous imagination. "What?" he said.

N-"I'm remembering why you never ask guys to tell you the truth," she said. "Because sometimes they do."

M-"My point is. That Dia was right, I had no business kissing you like that because I don't want anything that serious. I just got out of a relationship that was a lot more intense than I'd realized and—" Nupur frowned.

N-"How could it have been more intense than you'd realized?"

M-"I thought we were just having a good time. She thought we were getting married. It ended okay, there are no hard feelings —" Nupur looked at him in amazement.

N-"She wanted to get married, you didn't, but there are no hard feelings."

M-"She said if I wasn't ready to commit, she'd have to move on. It was pretty cut and dried."

N-"And you're the guy who's supposed to be a wizard at understanding women. It was not cut and dried. She either hates you, or she thinks you're coming back." Mayank shook his head.

M- "Sheena's very practical. She knows it's over. And so are we because, even though it was great, this is not something either one of us wants to pursue."

N-"Right," she said, understanding completely if not happily. "It would be different if we were at all compatible. I'm not averse to commitment especially if it'd be that much fun, but the last thing I need is to fall for somebody I already know is no good for me just because he kisses like a god. Also, I'm waiting for the reincarnation of Elvis and you are not him. But—" She stopped because Mayank had a strange look on his face.

N-"What? I was kidding about Elvis."

M-"I'm no good for you. but I kiss like a god?" Nupur considered it.

N-"Pretty much. Why? Did you have a different take on it?" Mayank opened his mouth and then stopped and shrugged.

M-"I guess not. I don't think you'd be bad for me, I just can't take the hassle. You're not a restful woman."

N-"This is true. But you ask for it. You're such a wolf."

M-"I'm retired. All I want now is some peace and quiet. I just need a break."

N-"That's my plan. I'm taking a break from dating."

M-"Until Elvis shows up,"

N-"Right. As far as I can see, there's no downside to this at all."

M-"Yeah, you're good at denying yourself things."

N-"Hey," she said, insulted. "We were doing just fine there and then you had to take a shot at me."

M-"Sorry," They got up to go, Nupur kissed Uday good-bye, and they went out into the street.

N-"Okay, it's broad daylight and my office is only fifteen mins away, You don't have to walk me."

M-"Fair enough." he held out his hand. "We'll probably meet again at Sam and Gunjan's wedding. In case we don't, have a nice life." She shook his hand and dropped it.

N-"Likewise. Best of luck in the future." She turned to go and he said,

M-"Wait a minute," and made her heart lurch. But when she turned around, he was holding her shoe, the red ribbons fluttering in the light breeze.

N-"Right," she said, taking it. "Thank you very much." He held on to it for a moment, looking into her eyes, and then he shook his head and said,

M-"You're welcome" and let go, and she set off down the street without looking back, full of excellent food but not nearly as happy as she should have been. Charm Boy, she thought, and put him out of her mind. On Tuesday, Nupur looked at the salad on her desk at lunch and thought, There has to be more to life than this. It was Mayank's fault;

she'd had real food in the middle of the day and it had tainted her. Until Mayank, she'd never thought about food except as something she couldn't have. Even before she'd started dieting for the wedding there'd been no butter in her life. There should be butter, she thought, and then realized the folly of that. But there could be chicken marsala.

She shoved her salad to one side, logged onto the net, and googled for "chicken marsala" because googling "Mayank Bhushan" would not have been helpful to her damn plan. "Very popular dish," she said when she got 48,300 matches. Even allowing for the weird randomness that more than 48,000 of them would demonstrate if she ever got that far, that was still a lot of recipes. She printed off two that sounded right and went to log off the net, but instead, on a random impulse, Googled for "dyslexia" instead. An hour later, she logged off with a new respect for what Mayank Sharma had accomplished. When she got off work, she stopped by the grocery. There was something about having a plan for dinner, a recipe in hand, that made her feel much less hostile about food. Of course, she was going to have to adapt the recipe. It called for the chicken to be breaded in flour, which was just extra calories, and carb calories no less. Skip the breading. Salt and pepper she already had, and parsley had no calories, so she picked up a jar of that. Skinless, boneless

chicken breasts she was familiar with, no problem there, but butter and olive oil? "It is to laugh," she said and got spray olive oil in a can. Mushrooms were mostly water, so she could have those, and then there was the marsala. She found it in the cooking wine section. Resolutely passing by the bread section, she checked out feeling triumphant, went home and changed into her sweats, cranked up the CD player, and sang her head off to her Elvis 30 album as she cooked. An hour later, Elvis was starting all over again and she was staring at the mess in her only frying pan trying to figure out what had gone

wrong. She'd browned the chicken in the non-stick skillet and then followed all the other directions but it looked funny and tasted like hell. She tapped her spatula on the edge of the stove for a few moments and thought, Okay, I'm not a cook. I still deserve great

food, and dropped the spatula to pick up the phone.

The Thakore seminar was turning into the worst mess SSM had ever seen, mostly because the idiot who was in charge of training kept changing the seminar information. "I'm faxing some information over," she'd say when she called. "Just slot it in somewhere."

B-"That b***h must die," said when she called at ten till five on Tuesday. "I've got a date with Dia tonight."

S-"I'll stay for the fax. Gunji will understand."

M-"You go, I'll stay. I'm dateless and too tired to move anyway." The guys left, both heading for warm women, and Mayank read the fax and tightened the seminar packet one more time, trying to feel grateful that there wasn't any place he had to be, no woman demanding his time and attention. At seven, he turned off the computer with relief and realized he was starving. Uday's seemed like an excellent idea.

U-"Don't tell me," said when Mayank came through the swinging doors into the kitchen. "Chicken marsala."

M-"I've had enough chicken marsala for a while," said as the phone rang. Uday turned to get it and Mayank added, "Something simple. Tomato and basil on spaghetti—" No. He remembered what Nupur said. Forty percent of all pasta sold was spaghetti. No imagination. "Make that fettuccine—" He stopped when Uday held up his hand and said,

U- "Uday's," into the phone. Uday listened and then looked back over his shoulder at Mayank and said, "We usually don't, but for such a special customer, we'll make an exception. Chicken marsala, right? No, no, no trouble at all. You can overtip the delivery boy." He hung up and smiled at Mayank.

U-"That was Nupur. She wants chicken marsala. You can deliver it to her."

M-"What?" said, dumbfounded.

U-"You know the way. It's probably on your way home."

M-"It's not on my way home, it's not on anybody's way home except God's, the damn place is vertical. What gave you the idea I'd do this?" He shrugged.

U-"I don't know. She called, you were here, you two are great together, it seemed like a good idea. Did you have a fight?"

M-"No, we didn't have a fight. We're not seeing each other because I'm all wrong for her and she's waiting for Elvis. Call her back and tell her your delivery boy died."

U-"Then she won't have anything for dinner. And you know Nupur. She's one of those women who eats." Mayank thought about the look on her face when she ate chicken marsala. It was almost as good as the look on her face when she ate doughnuts. Which wasn't anywhere near as good as the look on her face when he'd kissed her, that had been—

U-"Fine. Nitin can take it to her." Uday shrugged.

M-"No. I'll take it to her. Hurry up, will you? I'm hungry."

res!

*edited*

Ah! that was ahmazing!

i am always left asking for more and more with your updates!

they are fun read always!

can wait to see whether the delivery boy will die seeing her, or will she actually kill him! LOL!

Ah! I loveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee your writing! I loveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee this story!

Cont. asap!

Akansha!!!

P.s. @ Miffy! 31-30! 🤣

*Edited*

I m logging in thru cell, wait...


This was amazing
Its just mindblowing
I loved it.

But I am more restless for MayUr dinner..... Wat will happen?????

So pretty pleaseeeeeeee update suprfast pleasee na...

Hey Aastu,

amazing part loved it plz cont soon and thx alot for the pm

Awesome update.....

sorry just caught up with the last 2 parts
ur updates always leave me wanting for more,
update soon

Aastu ...u are amazin yr ...truely !