Chapter 8
Ishani took
a day off to study the new project without hindrance. The time passing swiftly
made her more and more nervous, and sometimes her confidence gave her away. At
times she would talk to her mother on phone for long, long while and yell how nervous
she is whilst her mother will smile and say how stupid she was to underestimate
herself.
Feeling
extreme nervousness she again called her mother and told everything she was
feeling.
"You are not
in school, sweetie. Haven't you already done enough of work to be confident by
now?" her mother said.
"I know. I have
done more than I remember," she
replied nervously, "but there are already big names associated with it. There
is nothing but to feel nervous about it."
"Close your
eyes," her mother said.
"What? Why?"
"Ishani, I
know you are a champion in questioning but not every question is meant to have
an immediate answer."
She closed
her eyes. "Okay, done."
"Now, think
of your father who gave this all to you, who made you worthy of standing where
you are, who taught you how to walk, who was with you through every thick and
thin, who never let the stigma of illegitimacy ever trouble you. He was your father. Now, since you have
taken the responsibility of his work on your shoulders you can't come back. Make
sure you make him feel proud," her mother said.
Ishani
opened her eyes and smiled. She knew what was to be done. She was afraid, yes,
but a new energy was running through her that seemed to chase away all the
hopelessness, confusion, and fear of failure at once.
"I
understand this, Maa. Thank you."
"'Thank you'
for what, Ishani?"
"For being
by my side, always. For taking care of me after Papa left us. For doing
everything you did for me, for us. And for accepting my decision of not getting
married at present," Ishani said.
"You are crazy,
Ishani. Absolutely crazy," Falguni laughed. "I understand how you were feeling
here and it was not right from my side to force you for the things you did not
want to do. You are free to take your time."
"Thank you, Maa,
once again!"
This time Ishani
did not appear to be sad as usual and smiled quite a lot during the
conversation, she was only nervous about the future work and its requirements
followed by unsure consequences. Falguni noticed this change.
"Ishani, I sense
you are happy. I'm glad to see you like this. In months for the first time I
heard you laugh," Falguni said. "Anything special?"
"Someone told me to be to be happy for those
who love me. My sadness must have made Papa sad too; and only looking after his
business was not enough to keep his memories alive, was it? So now I've decided
to be happy for him, and it doesn't hurt either," Ishani replied.
"That's
good. Looks like you found a good friend over there," Falguni said.
"Something
like that, yeah," Ishani ended. "Maa, it's time to go. Will talk to you later."
"Alright!"
And Ishani
disconnected the call. She wondered if she should tell her mother about Ranveer
returning back to her life or not, for she very well knew her mother would
never want him to be by her side even in her dreams. Her father often used to
talk about Ranveer once he had left the Parekh Mansion,
but Falguni was never in favor of him being talked about in her house. Her
father always hoped things could get back to normal, just like she did but her
mother remained as stern as ever saying they have gotten rid of a traitor and it's good to stay away from
such people. Imagining what her mother might think of him even now Ishani kept
the truth of Ranveer being her business partner a secret.
Ishani
still was not sure of her feelings that felt excruciating to the core. All the
events were taking a toll on her. More than often she spent her nights in
thinking what went wrong, why Ranveer did what he did two years ago. But her calculations
would stop at the moment he had sworn on her saying he was innocent, that he
had not even thought of Disha that way. But then, was he not wrong in trying to
break Ishani's engagement with Chirag?
She
wished she could ask him everything, and why he did this to her but even
thinking of asking anything like this filled her heart with a weird shame. His
behavior in recent days was abnormal. She was not sure what he himself was upto
cause a moment of concern in his eyes showed her that he was the same old Ranveer who she had known for years, but
his ignorance stung her heart and she realized he had changed. The Ranveer she
knew could never ignore even a stranger the way he was ignoring her, he would
have that concern for an unknown person but now his indifference towards
herself deep down annoyed her. But why? She had no answer of this at present.
"I
should not spend my time in brooding over these trivial things or everything will go wasted," she said to herself,
as she immersed herself into her work, for it seemed to hold lots of expectations
for tomorrow.
****
It
was evening time when Ishani finished her work and came to the terrace. The
wind blowing was dry and cold; and the view of the entire land in front of her
was gradually being covered with white fog. After five minutes the fog had completely
taken over the city and only its whiteness was visible now. Soon after a while
the wind turned into a chilling one that could numb the flesh from cold. Ishani
shivering came back to the room and put on her brown fur jacket that after few
minutes seemed to block the freezing caused by the sudden change of weather.
She closed the window, drew the curtains and lit fire in the fireplace to warm
herself.
"It's
so cold," she whispered.
Evening
was growing dark when Ishani heard a knock on the door. Putting aside each of
the files in her hands she ran towards it and saw her associate, Mr. Khanna,
was standing there.
"Mr. Khanna,
you here! This time?" Ishani asked, surprised. "Is everything alright?"
"Everything's
alright, Ms. Ishani," he replied with a smile.
Ishani
gestured him to take a seat whist she went to the kitchen to prepare coffee.
"Take
this. You must be feeling cold," said Ishani handing him over a cup of coffee.
"Thank
you," he replied politely.
"So,
what brought you here this time? I was coming to the office tomorrow anyway,"
Ishani said.
"Ma'am,
today Mr. Puneet had visited our office to see you,
but you were not present there. He had come to inform us that our project will
be operated from Mr.
RV's place because the group we
are working with have already their almost every field occupied with other
businesses. Therefore Mr. RV
offered to give his own office to work for which everyone agreed," Mr. Khanna
spoke in a breath. "And here are a few files that he wanted you to have a look
on before starting it all afresh."
Ishani
took the files and studied them attentively. They held the information about locations,
objectives, workers, land, and future requirements of this new venture.
"Thank
you, Mr. Khanna. I will see them and see you at work
tomorrow," Ishani said as Mr.
Khanna left.
Ishani
gave out a sigh. From tomorrow her life's biggest event was going to start and
she was having all kinds of mixed feelings about the upcoming day. They were
blended with excitement, fear, happiness and enthusiasm.
****
"Sir,
it's done," Puneet said.
Ranveer
nodded in appreciative comprehension. "Good. And have you prepared the papers
that you need to give Ms. Parekh?"
"I
have given them to her. By now she would have studied them well and from tomorrow
there's this project," Puneet smiled.
"That's
good," Ranveer said.
Puneet
had many questions running in his mind regarding strange the things happening
to his boss. What he does and why Puneet never could understand the reason.
"Sir,
I have a question. If you don't mind may I ask that?" he said after thinking a
bit.
"Go
on."
Puneet
first had to gather his courage to question RV's decision for he always
remained sure of them.
"Sir,
I remember Ralph, the man who you had saved from being punished for theft few
weeks back. I just want to know why you fired him." Puneet asked, and felt
relaxed when he saw his boss' expressions were still the same-- possessing a
nothingness that could be interpreted into anything but Puneet knew what it
meant. His boss was ready to answer him, but what?
"Puneet,
few things in life are not to be taken too seriously. You seem to be empathizing
with him far too much while he is not worthy of this concern of yours and nor
your attention. As long as his work pleased me I kept him here but now he had
started acting weird which I personally noticed and that resulted in him losing
his job," Ranveer responded.
"But,
sir, everyone believed he was working fine, and he was enjoying his work too,
then what--"
Ranveer
glared at Puneet that made him his mouth shut.
"Sorry,
sir," he said slowly. "Sir, there are people who are again back with their
random gossip about you because they were surprised to see you helping someone (as if this thought was
alien to them) but when you've fired Ralph they're kind of sneering you at your
back saying the same old talk."
"Does
that even matter? They'll keep working for me as long as they are paid properly;
and when do you think, Puneet, it has mattered to me what others think of me?
If someone wants to work with me they will work even though I fire hundreds of
worthless workers," Ranveer ended, but this time with an unknown gesture in his
tone that was beyond Puneet's sanity for the moment.
Despite
Ranveer's supposed explanation Puneet
was not convinced. Although he knew his boss never cared about others' opinions
about him but he had something missing this time. Puneet had been Ranveer's
most trustworthy employee ever since he had joined the company, and all the
times either Ranveer would not answer him questions or whenever he did he would
make them clear. Puneet sighed. Though he wanted to know what was in RV's mind
he had to keep his mouth shut.
"Have
you prepared the files of the Diamonds?" Ranveer asked while Puneet was still
in his thoughts and did not notice what was said.
"Puneet,"
Ranveer repeated, and it was then Puneet came out to reality.
"Ye--
yes, sir," he fumbled.
"Did
you hear what I just said?"
"I'm
sorry, sir. I couldn't."
"I
asked have you prepared the files of the diamonds that we are to deliver
tonight?' Is everything done in that?"
"Yes,
sir. It's all done. Let me get them right now," Puneet was still fumbling
through words.
He
went out as Ranveer waited for him. 5 minutes later Puneet returned with a
bunch of files holding in his right hand and some in his left. Ranveer checked
them and after approving he ordered Puneet to keep them safe.
"Puneet,"
Puneet heard Ranveer's voice calling him, "don't mind asking questions, and I
hope I have not frightened you with the way I just behaved. You will know
everything soon," he saw Ranveer finish the last sentence with a mysterious
smile.
Puneet
was stunned. Ranveer had read his fears and unasked questions.
"Thank
you, sir," he left with a smile.
comment:
p_commentcount