Page 14 of Red Flags and Rishtas
She laughed, lightening the tension in the room. ‘Well, it’s a little half-baked, but I think it has potential. I’m going to tell the team it’s a work in progress.’
A smile escaped my lips and I exhaled in relief.
‘Good work, kid,’ she said, her choice of words a subtle reminder of her seniority.
Sometimes, when I daydreamed about the future of my career, I wondered if I would be the head of a department by the time I was her age. It felt like an awful amount of time to wait for a glass cabin. I just hoped it would be worth it.
‘Oh, by the way, no need to prepare that list of sponsors for next week’s car launch,’ Pooja said as I was turning to leave.
‘Oh, okay … how come?’ I asked.
‘The editor had a few contacts that came through. We have a restaurant venue and the bar sponsor already,’ she said, packing up her laptop in its sleeve.
‘That’s fantastic,’ I said, not quite believing that most of my work for the week to come had magically evaporated.
‘I’ll rope you in on the email threads. Just take care of the paperwork for me, yeah?’ she asked as we walked out of her cabin together.
Back in my cubicle, I was thrilled to finally be able to enjoy my Monday. I ate my lunch at my desk, after telling Hina from the editorial team that I couldn’t join her in the cafeteria on account of some unfinished work.
‘That visit from International is keeping everyone on their toes, huh?’ she asked before leaving me alone.
I’d realised long ago that it was better for my professional health if I didn’t have close friends in the office. In a place like this, you almost always had to step on people’s toes to get something done. Inter-department clashes were common, and they got way too ugly when you were friends with the other person. So I stuck to the two-minute small talk rule. I always initiated conversations whenever I bumped into somebody in the washroom, elevator or pantry. But I never hung out with anyone during or after work hours. It might seem like I was taking great pains to be asocial, but the success of my strategy was apparent if you considered my total lack of involvement in office politics. Besides, if I added up the affection everyone in the office had towards me, it might’ve equated to that of a real friend’s. So I wasn’t missing out.
I closed the YouTube tab as I finished eating the burger and fries I had ordered for lunch. The timestamp on my home screen indicated that it was almost 3:00 p.m. Two hours without any work or the surveillance of my boss? What a wonderful day it was turning out to be. I unlocked my phone and opened Tinder. It was time to swipe.
Sometimes I worried that I was on the brink of exhausting all the single men in Delhi. I stressed about what I would do if one day I ran out of men to go on dates with, judge and, well, ultimately reject. And yet, I couldn’t seem to change my dating habits. It’s not that I wasn’t looking for love, because I was.
I’d just found a way to do it without hurting myself. I didn’t have any more heartbreaks left in me after the way my ex had shattered my heart. The entire time we’d been together, all two years of college, he’d been sleeping with other people. Everyone knew. All my friends, who I later discovered were really only his friends, had known all along. And nobody had ever bothered to tell me. The humiliation was as strong as the pain, and I couldn’t bear it. I left college to come back home, taking my exams onlineafter faking a medical emergency. I never went back, blocked every single one of those people out of my life and tried my best to forget that any of it had ever happened.
Once I was back in Delhi, I spent a lot of time healing (read: moping) before I discovered Tinder. Not only was it a great distraction, but it also allowed me to step back into the dating world on my own terms. By following the rules I’d made for my love life, I was able to steer myself away from being tempted by any of the bad apples. Like this guy Suraj, whose profile I was looking at right now. On the surface, he seemed like an attractive, charming guy. He had an athletic build and good posture. His bio was short and to the point. But if you zoomed in on his mirror selfie, you could see his dense, dark eyebrows and the glint in his eyes. The confidence that oozed out of him bordered on narcissism. He was too good to be true.
I was about to swipe left when I got a text from Pooja.
I closed the dating app, clutching my phone to my chest. I couldn’t believe this had worked. I realised that it might end up being exactly what I needed with the appraisal coming up. As I gloated, Pooja flooded my inbox with a bunch of long email threads from the sponsors for the car launch event.
Scheduled for the coming Friday, it was going to be the first of five branded events we would do with this automotive brand. It was a pretty straightforward event, so there wasn’t too much to plan. Plus, we already had the sponsors, so most of my job was already done. Once I’d formally gotten them on board, all I had to do was send out a bunch of influencer invitations and getthem to come to the event for free, which is easier than it sounds. Those guys love parties.
The first two emails were from the restaurant’s owners. They were confident the space would be big enough and were ready to arrange a recce this week. I wrote to them, asking if I could come by for a visit tomorrow afternoon. The recce wouldn’t take longer than an hour, but I was sure Pooja wouldn’t expect me to come back after it. I sighed happily, already making mental plans for my half-day. Maybe I could schedule a date?
The third email was a pretty standard introductory one from the bar sponsors, but something about it wasn’t sitting well with me. It was a reputed brand, Stellar Spirits, one that had never partnered with us before. After a few moments, I realised what was bothering me – this was the company Aadar had said he worked for. I read the email thrice over, looking for God knows what. Eventually, I began to relax. It was a big company. Working with them didn’t mean I’d have to work withhim.
And that’s when I saw it. On top of the email message, in the CC field, was the name I’d been dreading I might find.
5
A Meal with the Devil
Well, this is awkward
A
15/5/23 4:02 p.m.
to Ananya
Hi,
I didn’t expect to bump into you here. But I’m hoping we can keep things professional. Think you can do that?
