Care & "Consult"
Amma and Sam made plans to meet at Nalli in South Ex, on Saturday after lunch
Sam insisted Amma come by to Shanti Niketan for lunch
Amma squirmed
Appa was never keen on socializing with Bhallas "for no reason"
"Let me check with Mr Iyer?" Amma offered
"I will ask Tan to call him Aunty"
"No no... no" Amma interupted hurreidly
"Aunty?"
"Umm.. Samyukta, he actually heard he might not receive an extension, he completes 61 next month, and our tryst with Central Govt will end then" Amma chuckled
"Oh! really?" Sam was disappointed
"yes yes... we will have to move, we will have 90 days, I am hoping by 2017 July we have a house and move in, before KV begins" Amma explained
"Aunty, my Panchsheel cousin does property dealing usko kahoon?" softly
"No no.. u must not bother them" Amma hesitated
"Aunty its no bother, its his job, he does this for a living" Sam explained
"But Samyukta, we are not talking about homes in Jor Bagh or Golf Links" Amma said abruptly, and then continued in a softer tone "Umm... maybe a two or a three bedroom flat somewhere?"
"Aunty not everyone I know lives in Golf Links" very hurt
"Yes I am sorry mera matlab... u know, Uncle and I cannot pay Rs.10 or Rs 20 lakhs in commission etc" Amma said sheepishly
"Aunty" Sam was troubled
"We will start looking after Ishita has her baby" Amma smiled happily
"Aunty main bhi chaloon?" Sam asked sadly
"Yes yes, the reason why I didnt seek your help is because you have a baby, and are married to a busy man" Amma said politely
"I dont get to do anything for family, meri nanad US rehti hain dono, Dad has his own place, brother lives in Paris, Manya ka pata hai aapko" Sam said sadly
"Then yes, please come with us, I will ask Uncle and let you know if your cousin can help us"
"Aunty please dont worry, I will ask him and get you a list of 10 apartments you can see this weekend, he can get it all off his database" she said joyously
"We must pay him" Amma said fearfully
"Aunty please?" Sam stressed
Amma nodded
"You people are very helpful, Uncle keeps saying, our families in Tanjore and Madurai are not even close to what u do" Amma lied glibly
"He is SOOO SWEET" Sam laughed with gratitude
"He says, our people dont care" Amma mumbled and quickly corrected herself "He means Iyers"
"Arey Aunty, she is part of the family, aap log bhi"
"Vandita was asking about you this morning, you must go have idlis and coffee at her place" Amma reminded
"Aunty ek ke baad ek, Tan ke naye call centers, Nandu ka field trip, Lasya ka flu, my FIL came to India for a month because his Uncle passed away" Sam explained
"You must stay in touch" Amma spoke wishfully
"aunty Vandu is like a sibling to me"
Amma noticed Sam was eager and affectionate and kind and generous
Like she was making up for everything that ailed the family
Everything that was absent, Ma's absence and the grave tension between her brother and father
Just before leaving Chachu and R&B had had a row over additional bays for the Gurgaon workshop renovation
Chachu had insisted Ranjan go with his "associates"
R&B had shot down the idea, he had done some quick math on the new technicians that were
going to be hired,the cost of material, the sq ft cost of expansion, the revenue per repaired vehicle
Now the metal finishing, painting, electrical systems, mechanical systems were all its own silos functioning like a well oiled machine
Chachu's architect was coming up with a plan that was destroying the vehicle queueing area with the customer parking, not to mention,
forcing some triage (vehicles waiting their turn for repair) vehicles to be confused with ones already parked in mechanical systems repair bays
The three along with the Guragon workshop GM, and one of Chachu's worthless hiers, and Emad had racked their brains over it over a 17 hour meeting at Spectrum
R&B had returned home and not said a word to II for days
Not speaking at all
Ranjan had told her what had transpired, and the fact that R&B had stood up and basically flipped Chachu off, so to speak in his tone
Chachu had walked away angrily, Trehaan and Samar had buttered Ranjan up, since he was their ATM... bringing some sort of "peace"
R&B had quit calling or texting to Ranjan since he went to Paris after Ma's death anniversary on Jan 15th
That relationship was somehow doomed, each time it turned a corner, an explosion rattled the very foundation of it
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II returned from work to a quiet house
Chachu had completely stopped coming over, Chachi & Co didnt bother anyway
Ranjan and her ate together at the kitchen dining table, watching a Hindi soap and laughing about it
The food was astoundingly good? Or II's nausea was gone and she was able to stuff more in
It didnt show much anywhere, except her belly was huge
She still had skinny arms and legs, but she carried a 20 lb water melon
A massage lady came by every other evening, she got head, foot massages, and mineral soaks
She practised singing talked with Shravu or Nandu and went to bed early
Her phone beeped
"Did u see some papers from BNP Wealth Mgmt?" he asked
"No" she texted
"Did u have a good day?" he asked next
"U changed the order?" she complained
"If I begin with the enquiry I wud have been told how awful the day was and how uncared u were"
"I did and I am" she said cynically
"U shud go to Sam's for a sleepover"
"Aur Dad ka kya karoon?" she asked angrily
He didnt say anything
"Watch it... ur over flowing love for Dad is soaking my text page" she took a shot at him for him becoz he cudnt say anything nice abt his Dad
"Is that what's soaking it? I thought it was becoz of him drooling over Chachu!!!" he responded
"Not all of us can be confident and self sufficient and brave to do everything solo. The rest of the world needs HELP" she ranted
"FYI, I offered my services for FREE" he texted (to Ranjan)
"So the loss of consulting fee is actually whats pissing you off then?" she mocked him
she threw the phone on one of the many overstuffed silk upholstered Louis chairs on the lounge and went in to fix herself a milk shake
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