Simply Irresistible (Shlok and Astha FF) (chp 10) (pg23) - Page 8

Something was tickling Astha's face like a bunny rabbit's ears, although it was a bit rough, a bit uncomfortable. As she rubbed open her crusty eyes she was terrified to see beautifully shaped ringlets right in front of her. Was she having a nightmare?

 "My hair! Look at my hair!" Rubi chanted, shaking the ringlets. Astha gasped. Rubi's hair was a mere finger's length distance from her face, which was quite disturbing. Astha had yet another disturbing thought.

"Please tell me you were not rubbing your hair against my face thirty seconds ago," Astha said, rubbing her forehead unhappily.

 "I needed you to see it," Rubi whined. "You're so honest, and I wanted to know your opinion. Dates resume today!"

 Astha groaned. "Move, Rubi," she said, sighing as she heaved herself out of bed. Ten minutes later, she was as usual impeccably dressed, wearing casually elegant purple colored salwar, which unfortunately had a deep V-neck, but Astha was running out of extremely conservative clothes.

If only she could go back in time and warn herself to bring heaps of conservative clothes instead of the "fun and sexy" wear that she'd purchased before she'd came on the show.

If only she could go back and time and warn herself not to come at all.

Stumbling downstairs and trying to block out Rubi's incessant ramblings on the different ways that her hair could curl, Astha focused instead on the delicious looking bagels that were waiting for her. She picked up a bagel and grabbing a box of cream cheese began to lather it on rather thickly, mouth nearly watering from hunger. Just as she was about to bite into her delicious morning treat, she heard a loud voice.

"Astha, no!" yelled Radhika, who had just stepped into the kitchen.

"No what?" Astha asked, confused.

"Put that nasty looking thing down," Radhika said crossly. "Right now."

"But why?" Astha was bewildered. It was just a bagel. It wasn't as if she was, heaven forbid, making a move on Shlok Agnigotri or anything like that.

"Cream cheese! Cream cheese! Astha, that's pure cream cheese! Pure fat! Calories! You. Must. Not. Eat. It."

Astha was, needless to say, a bit freaked out. "Eee" she said, setting the bagel down on the counter top as she tried to come up with a remark that would basically convey her point, she didn't give a damn if the thing was three thousand calories.

But obviously this was the wrong move. Before Astha could say "Shlok's coming!" Radhika had grabbed the delicious looking bagel and thrown it into the dustbin.

"Good girl," she told Astha. "I knew you were just too tired to notice what you were putting in your body. Now go have some fruit."

Astha hated fruit. Irritable and hungry, she scowled and went back upstairs.  

The day progressed slowly until about eleven, when a steaming hot date box arrived. The host had informed them that three lucky girls would get one-on-one dates this time, and the first date box would inform exactly who got it. Astha knew it wouldn't be her and for that reason she was relieved.

The individual date went to Rubi, who nearly squashed Astha with her excitement. "Girls," she gasped. "Where's it to?"

"The Zoo," Astha said, rolling her eyes. Thank god she didn't get the date. Smelly animals, scary animals, and weird animals plus Agnigotri didn't exactly sound like a blast, but Rubi didn't care.

"Wow. I have this pair of dress that is zebra striped. I'm going to wear them," she said, squealing as she raced up the stairs to go get changed.

Astha nearly closed her eyes as Rubi descended the stairs a good hour later. Her dress was overwhelmingly bright, not to mention disgustingly tacky. Agnigotri would have fun. In fact, Astha reasoned, Rubi resembled a hippopotamus dressed up like a zebra. Absolutely stunning zoo attire, really.

Shlok opened the door and was astonished to see a plump zebra staring right back at him. Shaking his head in disbelief, he soon realized it was not, in fact, a zebra, but Rubi, looking very excited for the upcoming date.

Shlok suddenly felt sick.

"Hey, baby," Rubi cooed. Astha came up behind Rubi and held up a finger. "Give us a moment, Shlok. I have a little advice for Rubi here."

Shlok smirked as she pulled Rubi away from the door and whispered something furiously in her ear. Nevertheless, when Rubi came back to the door, she simply gave him a watery smile and motioned towards the waiting car.

Shlok was impressed. That Kiloskar, who did not look half as hideous as Rubi, and wow, was that really cleavage? Who knew Kiloskar had any, did know what she was doing. She made a very good advice consultant.

Although he reminded himself, he was still cold and hard and downright mad at her for the awful stunt she had pulled the other day. Instinctively he ran a hand through his hair, making sure it was all black.

Rubi's smile considerably broadened when she saw this. "I love your hair, bab, I mean, Shlok!" she said, giving his hand a bit of a tight squeeze. He shuddered.

"Thanks, Rubi," he replied cautiously.

Rubi came home around six and everyone clamored around her for details, with the exception of Astha, of course. However, before Rubi said a word about her date, she requested that Astha hear it too.

Everyone had suddenly decided, after seeing Astha's prank on Shlok and her attitude towards him, that Astha Kiloskar was the best interpreter of Shlok's feelings, based on his actions and words.

How they had come across this unearthly conclusion Astha didn't know, but it was less hassling to just go along with their claims versus trying to convince them that it wasn't true. She'd tried, actually, but their argument had been too simple to refute.

"You're a bloody smart," Parvati had said. "Of course you can interpret his actions."

Astha had not exactly wanted to launch into an explanation about how all smart people had different fields of study and hers was most definitely and most emphatically not divination, so she accepted the theory and went along with it.

Now, as she was reading an interesting romance novel, which was actually a first for her, she was absolutely bombarded with girls and their questions. "Astha, shut that silly thing, oh, my, are you actually reading a romance novel. It's an excellent, book, isn't it?" Parvati said in one breath.

"Well, it's quite interesting, really," Astha replied, amazed that she was having a conversation with a piece of fluff about a piece of fluff and actually enjoying it. Well, it had turned out to be a learning experience after all.

 "Anyhow, Rubi's back from her date and she wants you to hear all about it."

"Astha! Tell me what my date means as a potential for Shlok and me," Rubi gushed.

"Go ahead," Astha sighed wearily. She might as well do it.

 "Okay, so Shlok and I went to the zoo, and we saw loads of really interesting creatures, and it was so fun. He was really polite to me."

Astha stared, trying to let the information sink in. Of course she could interpret it just fine, Agnigotri was far from interested in Rubi and was probably feeling awkward because he knew that the "relationship" wouldn't work but the thing was, how was she supposed to tell Rubi without hurting her feelings? Astha was a very caring girl, deep down inside, and although she seemed cold and uninterested in these kinds of girls, she was nice to everyone.

 "Well," she began, "It  means that he is a very deep person. Yes. He can notice other people's feelings and act accordingly," Astha finished up lamely. None of the girls seemed to notice.

 "Oh, brilliant," breathed Lavanya. "Absolutely brilliant."

Astha shrugged. "What can I say? It's the science."

The next day, an individual date for dinner and dancing arrived for Radhika, who positively glowed when she heard the news.

"Dancing!" she gasped. "Oh no! I didn't bring clubbing clothes!"

A massive frenzy of clothes-searching ensued, ending when Radhika decided she'd just wear something she'd brought, after all.

"One of the girls might be conspiring against me," she confided to Astha. "I can't trust any of them. They're out to get Shlok for themselves, and I can so feel a connection between us. It's like fire," she said, obviously pleased with her comparison.

Radhika departed wearing sparkly hot pink dress and a pair of strappy baby pink stilettos. "Pink's the newest black," she declared.

The next morning, considerable shrieking alerted Astha of yet another date box.

"This is the three person date box," someone told Astha as she entered the room, wearing another "fun and sexy" outfit. Curse the stupid clerk at that stupid store that had made her buy these stupid outfits. Today it was a pretty pastel pink pair of salwar that were tight, but far from skin tight, Astha would never be caught dead in anything that resembled Rubi's laced thing a few weeks ago. That had been giving her nightmares.

 "The date's for Rose, Astha, and Parvati, okay? You guys are going to a Garden."

 The three of them were picked up by Shlok around eleven that morning. Parvati smiled coyly and didn't talk while Rose took the other option and began conversing outrageously with him. He seemed a bit taken aback at her brazenness but nevertheless, went along with it. "So Shlok Agnigotri," Rose teased, "who'd you fall asleep dreaming of?"

Shlok smirked. "My mother."

Only Astha caught his joke and she snorted, which caused both Rose and Parvati to send her withering looks.

"Astha," Parvati whispered heatedly. "How many times have we told you not to laugh like a bloody animal?"

Agnigotri apparently heard her comment. "Yes, Astha," he stressed, "why must you snort? It's so wrong. And inconceivable, in this society. You must be very careful, dah-ling," he said.

Astha snorted again at his comment and suddenly feeling a disgusting and irrepressible urge to giggle. Mentally berating herself, she swallowed mid-giggle. She wasn't a giggler; why the hell were the things infesting her now?

It was awfully nice to see the beautiful gardens and she was pleasantly surprised to find out that Shlok did know quite a bit about botany, and throughout the whole date she was thoroughly entertained in this whole meal of knowledge. It had been absolutely fascinating.

Unfortunately, Rose and Parvati kept breaking the spell with a, "Wow, Shlok, you know so much!" and a "You're such a bloody genius, sexy!".

It got quite irritating about the third time around and Astha desperately wanted shut the two of them for at least a good three hours. The date ended quite nicely, Astha thought. It could have been a lot worse, but she had discovered so much lovely information about plants that it had been more than tolerable. Bordering on fun, even.

Rose and Parvati were put-out that all they had done was "discuss stupid plants" as Rose had said dismally and Parvati had agreed vigorously.

"Most definitely," she had said, "the only chemistry going on there was between the plants and Shlok. Oh, and Astha too. She actually liked learning about the blasted things."

Astha shrugged. "Oh, it wasn't that bad, really," she said. "Wasn't learning about new plants completely mesmerizing?"

Rose rolled her eyes. "Um, yeah, if you're attracted to plants maybe!" Parvati nodded.

Astha sighed, muttered something about wasting her breath, and returned to her romance novel, which was, unfortunately, quite gripping.

The last individual date had gone to Lavanya, and it was a trip to a water park.

Then it was time for the rose ceremony. It was morbid, this show. Blasted thing. The tension was disgustingly thick as Shlok tenderly picked up the first rose and began the same explanation. I've grown increasingly fond of everyone so far and I feel like I have a connection with everyone here, and all of that silly rot that was for plain idiots to trust.

Unfortunately most of the girls here were looking at him with rapturous eyes and believing every single word.

"He cares," Astha heard one of them gush. Astha sighed. Shlok was getting ready to call his first name. Finally he said, "Radhika."

Radhika swallowed what was sure to be a squeal, Astha knew, and went up and gave him a fierce hug. "Thanks," she whispered.  

The next girl to be called was Parvati, who had a very similar reaction to Radhika. If possible, the nerve-wracking situation had just gotten worse, as there were only two spots left. Astha was pretty sure that Shlok was going to need her now more than ever, and she was about eighty-five percent sure she'd get a spot, unless Shlok had already found four girls he was deeply interested in. Then again, Shlok seemed rather immature; his idea of connection was probably limited to the bedroom.

 "Rose," he finally said, and Rose did not hesitate to conceal her joy as she leapt upward and enveloped Shlok in a hug. There was one rose left, and Astha felt a fleeting feeling of pity for Rubi. Astha was quite positive that Rubi would not be receiving a rose, and the poor girl really did lust after Shlok in a most disturbing way.

 "Astha," Shlok finally said, exhaling loudly. The cameras picked it up so that the tension would look even worse on television, and Astha got up and accepted the rose.

Their fingers brushed and Astha was a bit surprised to find out that she hadn't grown green warts or been repulsed at his touch. Poor Rubi had already begun to sniffle, and each sniffle was growing louder and louder.

Feeling terrible, Astha walked up to the poor girl and gently patted her back. "Rubi," she said comfortingly, "Don't be so downcast. Shlok's not worth all of that."

**

Astha threw her stuff messily into the brown suitcase, unhappy that she had to change roommates now that Rubi was gone.

"Hey, Astha," Radhika said, looking up from perfectly painted pink and polished nails.

"Hello, Radhika," Astha gasped, dragging the heavy suitcase into the room.

"You know, Astha," Radhika said seriously. "There are four of us left. This is where it gets real."

Astha nodded absentmindedly. "Yeah," she grunted, finally heaving the suitcase and dropping it with a sickening plop onto her new bed.

"It's hometown dates for the next four days." Astha's listening magically came back to her as Radhika said the words.

"Hometown dates?"

 "Yeah," Radhika said condescendingly. "God, Astha, don't you know what hometown dates are?"

Pouting because indeed this was yet another thing she didn't know, Astha shook her head and snapped, "No. What are they?"

"Well," Radhika said, hopping off her bed and making her way over to her make-up table, even though she already had a not-so-subtle amount on, "Shlok gets to visit each of our hometowns, you know."

 "Hometowns?" Astha asked weakly.

 "Yes, Astha. Where you grew up."

 "Er," Astha said intelligently as she tried to process the hefty amount of information. "Me and Shlok are from the same place, you said he comes and visits our homes?"

 "Oh, yes. And you can have dinner with your parents and see if they'll like him."

Astha visibly shuddered. Shlok was beginning to grow on her but what would her mum say to him? How many days had she vented about his absolutely childish and rude behavior to her mother? Oh dear. She could picture them sitting around the table right now.

Radhika gave Astha an off sort of smile. "Are you all there, Astha? You're eyes are all glazed over."

"Oh. Just thinking about good old hometown. Pleasant weather, isn't it?" Astha babbled.

 Radhika shot her another look but nevertheless changed the conversation to head in a more selfish direction.

"I can't wait to show Shlok my favorite places. It's just north of here. Hope you have fun in your hometown, but not too much fun. I'm going to get him, after all," she said easily, sliding out of the room to converse with the other two girls.

Astha stared after her and frowned. The girls did view her as serious competition. Interesting. Very interesting. Shaking her head she followed Radhika out.

Parvati was looking rather dismal now that Lavanya was gone. "I was hoping," she said sourly, "that Lavanya would get to stay. We had so much fun discussing every aspect of Shlok."

"Every aspect?" piped up sex-crazed Rose.

"Oooh, tell me!" Parvati swatted at Rose.

"Oh, shut up. You can probably describe that aspect better than we can. None of us has seen him, have we?"

Astha left the conversation. It was really getting silly and she was getting rather tired of it. She decided to take a walk in the garden. The show was quite a debacle of course, but she had been enjoying it. However, she craved a much-needed break from health-crazed, sex-crazed, and overall crazy girls. The garden was every bit as spectacular as she'd hoped the first day she'd come around. Marble statues spewed water out in a trickling fashion creating a very peaceful environment. She breathed in lilac scented air as she walked around, for the first time in true peace, wearing plain old salwar and boring brown flat shoes, her hair a messy thing of frizz piled unceremoniously on top of her head. Now this was life. She didn't care about looking great; comfort was absolutely key.

"Astha," someone drawled behind her.

She spun around, the frizzed hair whipping her in the face as she did so. "Ouch," she muttered as she took in the sight in front of her. Of course the 6 foot something statue that blocked her view was none other than Shlok.

"Hello, you," she said off-handedly, in what she hoped was a friendly-but-not-kind voice. If such a thing existed of course. She wouldn't want Shlok to go and get the wrong idea, would she?

"What are you doing down here?" he asked conversationally, strolling past her with his arms behind his back, looking like a right little professor.

 A professor, now, an intellectual man was one who was truly handsome. But of course, that didn't apply to Shlok.

 "Could say the same to you," she replied casually, although suddenly butterflies seemed to swarm the air. Or were they just in her pitter-pattering heart? Pitter-pattering? What was she, an old woman who heaved a gigantic bosom every now and then? Oh, dear.

"I love botany," he said as he inspected a plant with ease. "Especially these plants. They're enchanting, aren't they?"

 "Hilarious," she replied, smiling at his small joke. "I was just taking a walk, getting some air, having a bagel or two," she said, pulling one out from the pocket in the salwar.

 "A bagel?" he asked, evidently confused.

 "I'm not allowed to eat bagels in there," she replied distractedly as she tore off the wrapping viciously.

He looked at her, those pointy black brows raised in consideration. Astha could almost see his mind working; wondering if she was joking or if she was actually serious. She decided to help him out just a tad little bit.

"Well, er, girls these days are rather health conscious and bagels aren't healthy enough for them. Bagels with cream cheese, that is."

The corner of Shlok's mouth began to twitch and it looked like he was refining an odd little smile. Bit of a difference from the ever-present smirk that could be seen on those pink lips.

"Interesting," he managed. "Quite interesting."

"I thought so," Astha replied awkwardly with a small smile. She dove into the bagel, cream cheese and all, remembering a little too late that she was behaving far from lady-like in the least, with white cream cheese splattered across her mouth and bagel crumbs down the front of her salwar. She looked guiltily over at Shlok who was alternating between looking at the different flowers and at Astha's newfound accessories. Hurriedly she wiped her mouth, sticky residue from the cream cheese staining her hands.

He laughed. "You're really a klutz," he teased. "Now what would Radhika say if she saw you in such a predicament?"

Astha grinned sheepishly. "She'd pound my head into the pavement."

He was intrigued. "Is she vicious?" he asked hopefully.

It was Astha's turn to burst out laughing, in her usual half-snort half-giggle half-uproarious laughter sort of noise. It was unique, her friends told her. She was not in the least embarrassed by it, but right now, she did not want to giggle. Yet, once again, she felt this awful, awful urge to just let free and let those damn giggles come. Who bloody giggled? Fighting the urge, Astha managed to say with a straight face,

"You're a moron."

"Ah, Astha. Never too old for those types of things," he acknowledged. "Don't worry, shortie, I'm the same way."

"Oh, shut up," she said, mock-haughtily.

Shlok turned to observe some violets, and Astha ambled around the garden, sneaking looks at him every now and then and appreciating his wonderful sense of learning. Now, she really did like a man who knew his plants.

Heavens! Hit with sudden realization, Astha stumbled towards him and muttered a sudden, "I'll see you later but I must get dressed," or something just as inane as that. She couldn't believe, oh, bloody hell, no, when in the world had she started seeing "Shlok" instead of "Agnigotri, the man she hated"? When had that happened? Why hadn't anyone told her? Stupid brain, she cursed. Now she was getting a little too close for comfort. Much too close, actually. She hurriedly left the garden behind her.

 Inside, Parvati was packing for the hometown date.

"It's overnight," she informed Astha gleefully.

Astha could not take news like that at a time like this. Overnight! Overnight, did she say! Barely even mumbling a "hell!" to Parvati, Astha stomped into her room, where Radhika was looking at a India Vogue, making comments such as, "ooh, those models do know their fabrics," and "my, my, Rose, it's satiny! Perfect for lingerie, no?" Astha, instantly bored, wandered back out to Parvati, taking deep breaths to calm her frayed nerves.

"So, what are you packing?" she asked, out of lack of anything better to do.

"I'm meeting him there, we're not going to be able to go up together, unfortunately, and of course, my make-up kit, a toothbrush, hairbrush, hair pins, my new lemon v-shaped dress, and most definitely my sexiest black lingerie. It's lacy, too."

Astha nodded, trying in her mind to figure out what in the world she was going to pack. Flannel pajamas came to mind instead of lingerie, after all, she didn't keep sexy, black, lacy, or see-through in her wardrobe. Just wasn't going to happen.

 "Well, you have fun," she said warmly

 Astha was dead tired and more than ready to call it a day. Of course, there was still that tiny chore of packing for a hometown date, maybe planning ahead on what to do. God. Maybe she should just tell Shlok that she should just bloody leave the show already. He didn't need her help, and right now she was getting a little too involved for her own tastes.

Hermione stared up at Parvati glumly. Parvati was putting on an absolute magnificent shade of eye shadow, a shimmer, glimmer, glamorous mix between lavender and a breezy peach. Parvati stepped away from the mirror and grumbling inwardly, Hermione admitted that the girl did look nothing short of fabulous, fantastic, ferociously beautiful. It was really rather depressing.

Parvati smiled at Hermione and said, "Don't I look wonderful Ashta Hermione, darling? Won't Shlok just adore me in this oh-so-wonderful-beautiful-amazing-gorgeous thing that I have on? I am a goddess!"

Aatha agreed. Parvati was a goddess. She looked smashing. Shlok suddenly came into the room and gave Parvati a huge smile. "You look fabulous, fantastic, ferociously beautiful," he said reaching over to kiss her in that nice, mushy kind of kiss that Astha would never admit to wanting. The kind of kiss you just sighed and melted into. Who would want a stupid, romantic thing like that? But this Astha was jealous as hell.

Astha woke up feeling hot and sweaty. She groaned and looked over at her alarm clock, which had conspired against her during the night and conveniently hadn't gone off. Damn thing. It was already 10:00 a.m.! Making a face, Astha dragged herself out of the bed, plodding quite ungracefully towards the bathroom. Only then did her dream hit her. Yech, had she really just dreamt about being insecure, jealous, and ugly? Stupid subconscious was wrong! She was not jealous in the least, especially not of Parvati! Parvati who could mix peach and lavender eye shadow and come out with a shade straight from heaven? Jealous? Never!

To be cont... (next chapter, Shlok visits Astha's house)