Page 62 of 12 Years
‘Do I get my Payal back now?’ I said after a while.
‘Yes,’ she said, smiling.
‘What wasthat?’
‘Tell me, how was it?’ she said.
‘Hot. Insanely, mind-numbingly hot.’
‘It was amazing for me as well.’
‘Now that we’re back to our senses, well, sort of, what are you doing here at this time? Didn’t you have dinner at your parents’ place tonight?’
‘I had dinner with them, and I was supposed to stay over. But I insisted on returning because I have to go to office early. The driver dropped me to Parel. After he left, I took a cab to Bandra.’
‘Wow, you took an Uber this late?’
‘What to do? Shabnam had to service a client.’ She kissed me on the cheek.
‘How was the dinner?’
‘I’ll tell you about it at breakfast. For now, I want to savour this moment, not talk about Jain dinners.’
‘Okay. Anything I need to worry about?’
‘Yeah, a lot.’
‘What?’ I said, concerned.
‘That I’m not going anywhere. So, you better be worried about that,’ she said, ruffling my hair and snuggling closer to me.
‘No more Nutella, okay?’ Payal said, spreading the chocolate–hazelnut spread on her toast. ‘Just stop buying it. I can’t resist it if it’s in the house.’
We sat at the dining table. Payal wore a blue pinstripe suit, ready to leave for office. I was in workout clothes since I was planning to hit the gym after Payal left.
‘But you love it,’ I said, peeling my one dozen boiled eggs and separating the whites.
‘Sometimes, what we love can be bad for us,’ she said.
‘Deep,’ I said, eating the bland egg-whites one by one.
‘How can you eat that? Do you even like it?’ she said.
‘Nothing to like. It’s for my protein targets. Now, let’s focus—how was the dinner?’
‘Boring,’ Payal said. ‘Lots of feet touching and eating unhealthy carbs you would never approve of.’
‘I didn’t even approve of doing this dinner in the first place.’
‘I spoke to Parimal privately.’
‘What did you tell him?’
‘I said I’m not ready for marriage right now. Our parents are obviously excited, but I’m too young. Also, that it’s too early in my career, and I want to focus on that for a while.’
‘What did he say?’
‘He said, well, doesn’t matter what he said.’
