Every Time It Rains

by Nikita Singh

  ‘Usher-Vusher is great and all but nothing comes close to Honey Singh, yaar. No comparison only,’ he announced, having a good old time singing along. ‘I’ll take you clubbing to this place in Gurgaon next time—faad music. Full desi.’

  Laila loved the clubs in Gurgaon that played Hindi music, but somehow, no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t imagine herself being sucked into a second date with Ronny. Ronny, on the other hand, seemed very happy. The night was probably a grand success to his mind, but outside the small world inside his head—not so much.

  When they reached Laila’s house, he hit the brakes rather harshly, causing them both to jerk forward. After steadying herself, Laila turned to him and said awkwardly, ‘Umm, good night then.’ She pulled on the door handle, not wanting to prolong the disaster date any more.

  ‘Wait!’ Ronny said, leaning in. Laila had barely turned back towards him when she realized he was aiming straight for her lips. She moved away and Ronny ended up planting a kiss on her cheek. He laughed. ‘Why such a hurry? Stay with me, baby.’

  ‘Ronny,’ Laila said in a firm voice, one hand on the door and the other one clutching her purse securely. ‘I think you got the wrong idea. This … isn’t happening.’

  ‘What do you mean? You didn’t have fun with me tonight?’

  ‘Yes, but …’

  ‘Then let’s have more fun!’ Ronny said. He held her elbow and tried to pull her to him.

  ‘Ronny, stop!’ Laila looked at him, holding his eyes with hers. ‘No.’

  The smile on Ronny’s face faded slowly, and Laila could see the realization slowly seep in and make its way from the real world into the little world inside his head.

  ‘We’re very different people,’ Laila said evenly. ‘I’m sorry, but this isn’t going to work. Good night.’

  With that, Laila stepped out of the car and to the gate, which creaked when she pulled it open. She made a mental note to oil it the next day as the car behind her accelerated angrily as Ronny drove away. She paused to catch her breath, her heart beating wildly in her chest. Even before she’d reached the door, Maahi pulled it open from inside and peeked at her anxiously.

  ‘So?’ she asked, following Laila inside. ‘How was it?’

  Laila pursed her mouth and walked wordlessly to her room, ignoring Maahi, but she persisted.

  ‘How was it?’

  ‘It was whatever.’

  ‘What did you guys do?’

  Struggling to control her emotions, Laila muttered, ‘Let it go,’ and slammed the door shut.

  Maahi pulled the door open and entered. ‘What happened?’ she asked, sounding scared.

  Laila paused near her bed and spun around to face Maahi. She had had enough. First Ronny and now Maahi. Why did people think they could or should dictate what she should do even when she didn’t want to do it? All she wanted was to be left alone, but Maahi had had to come marching in, asking questions that Laila made clear she didn’t want to answer. All her anger at Maahi, pent up from the week and that horrible night, came rushing out of her. ‘What happened is that he is a child who decided to take over the evening and made decisions for me all night. He fed me, literally fed me chicken tikka masala, which he ordered, by the way, without even asking me if I ate meat. What if I were a vegetarian? And what if I didn’t like champagne or didn’t drink at all? He made me dance like a couple and wouldn’t let me go, or just be, for one fucking second. He did all of the things he probably thought were sweet in his own little world and instead of it being Laila and Ronny, we spent the night trying to be his perfect, imaginary couple, probably from some bad rom com. It was like he was following a script—checking off a list of things he was supposed to do. He wouldn’t even let me pay for my meal—even when I told him it would make me way more comfortable.’

  Maahi was staring at Laila horror-struck, worried that her friend might burst into flames. The way Laila was feeling, internal combustion didn’t seem entirely unlikely. As she inhaled huge gulps of air, Maahi left the room and reappeared a short moment later with a bottle of tequila, which she raised as a peace offering.

  After glaring at Maahi for another few seconds, Laila finally sighed and nodded.

  ‘Come with me,’ Maahi said and left the room.

  Laila followed her to the kitchen, where Maahi was setting up glasses. Out on the counter were two flavours of ice cream, garam masala and the bottle of tequila. Laila watched as Maahi scooped ice cream in tall glasses and sprinkled garam masala over them followed by tequila. As she began to stir the weird mixture, Laila looked at her as if she’d gone mad. ‘What the fuck are you even doing?’

  ‘Just trust me.’

  ‘Are you joking? You’re the last person I trust right now. I prefer this,’ Laila said, taking a swig of tequila straight from the bottle. ‘This stupid dating game—it’s not my scene, man,’ she said, sliding down against the counter to the floor.

  Maahi joined her a minute later, once she was done stirring or whipping or whatever on earth she was doing, with two glasses full of dirty brown liquid. ‘That bad?’ Maahi asked softly, slipping next to her and handing her a glass.

  ‘Dude.’ Laila turned to Maahi and looked at her. ‘He. Asked. Me. My. Hobbies,’ she muttered slowly.

  They sat in silence for a moment, frozen like statutes, before bursting into laughter. Once they began laughing, they couldn’t stop. Tears escaped from the corners of Laila’s eyes and her entire body relaxed, as she finally let go of her anger and annoyance and let herself laugh at the humour of the situation.

  ‘And somehow,’ Laila said between chuckles, holding the stitch in her stomach, ‘not once in the entire evening did he ask me what I did for a living!’

  ‘Seriously?’ Maahi exclaimed, looking less anxious now that they were laughing. She contained her giggles long enough to take a sip of her drink. ‘Try it. Might help.’

  ‘That looks disgusting.’ Laila screwed up her nose.

  ‘Yep—disgusting and delicious.’

  Laila relented. She took a hesitant sip as Maahi watched her. Laila gulped, waited a moment, and looked up at Maahi approvingly. She was surprised to find that the disgusting brown liquid wasn’t half as bad as she’d expected. It was warm in her throat in a way that ice cream should never be, but cooler than tequila should feel. It wasn’t good but still way better than the rest of her night had been.

  ‘I told you!’ Maahi declared victoriously.

  ‘Well, you also told me to go on a date with Ronny from the gym. So forgive me if I don’t trust your judgement immediately!’ Laila laughed at the worried expression that immediately reappeared on Maahi’s face. ‘But fine, I trust you on this,’ she added, taking another swig of the cocktail as proof.

  Maahi relaxed again and began asking Laila for more details of her date. They talked for hours, sitting with their legs stretched out before them, on the cool kitchen floor. Three brown cocktails later, they agreed that Maahi would never ever try to set Laila up for a date again.

  6

  COFFEE

  Maahi kept her drunken word, and Laila spent the next few weeks in peace. Apart from having to find a new gym, she’d come out of that disastrous date pretty much unscathed and they put it behind them. But just because that matter was put to rest didn’t mean that Maahi hadn’t come up with other ways to give Laila a headache.

  Since Laila and Maahi had divided their roles from the very beginning, they weren’t as good at some operations of Cookies + Cupcakes as others. Maahi knew nothing about inventory and ordering and Laila didn’t know much about their digital marketing plans and brand design. While they didn’t necessarily need to have complete knowledge of what the other person did and how, they agreed that it was a good idea to at least show each other the basics.

  The plan seemed both reasonable and easily executable in theory, but as soon as they began, Maahi got distracted. She became obsessed with the idea of expanding Cookies + Cupcakes further. They opened their first shop one year ago, and
the second five months ago and quite honestly, they weren’t in a position to expand the operation just yet. And even if they were, Laila wasn’t sure that was necessarily what she wanted for their brand.

  ‘For the last time, Maahi—not now. Not yet,’ Laila said.

  ‘I hear you. But would you listen to me for just one second, please? We’ve done so much better than we’d imagined. People want more—I’m telling you. There was this group of kids that came in this morning? They love our cupcakes so much, they want us to make a cake out of cupcakes for their friend’s birthday!’

  ‘We don’t do cakes.’

  ‘Dude, but we can. It’s—’

  ‘We’re a specialty bakeshop. We do cookies and cupcakes—exclusively. That’s our selling point—we concentrate on the things we do best and do them better each time, and that is what sets us apart. We’re only two people, Maahi, and if we take on too much, we’ll be less than extraordinary. Is that what you want?’ Laila said.

  Maahi went silent and then muttered, ‘When you put it like that…’

  ‘Because you refuse to listen! We can’t become arrogant or pretend to know everything because we haven’t been doing this very long—and we’ve got so much more to learn.’

  ‘Yeah. Yeah, okay, but can we please just do this one?’ Maahi spoke quickly just as Laila was about to interrupt, ‘For the kid. It’s his birthday and I already said yes. And I am sorry, but I already said yes. I promise you it’s not a cake in the shape of a cupcake or anything. It’s going to be actual cupcakes placed on a base of a huge-ass cookie, arranged in the shape of a pig.’

  ‘A pig.’

  ‘A silly, fat, pink pig with a snout and a swirly tail and everything. I have designs, see?’ Maahi pushed a notepad with a pencil sketch towards Laila. ‘That’s the cookie base at the bottom and the cupcakes on top. I’ll need to make sure I get the colour of the frosting right, and we could use smaller cookies in different shapes for the snout and the eyes.’

  Laila took a moment to think it through. ‘I’ll allow it,’ she finally said. ‘As long as we’re sticking with cookies and cupcakes. Maybe add some green mini cupcakes on the bottom corners for a shrub or something?’

  ‘Good idea!’ Maahi said, grinning widely. ‘And it would be so great for our social. Just imagine how much love this post will get on Instagram! People love cute stuff, and our pig is going to be so damn cute.’

  Laila laughed. ‘I’m sure. By the way, I was thinking—should we invest in a good camera? I mean you’re pretty good with your iPhone, no offense, but a professional camera could be a game changer for our social. Check this out.’ Laila led Maahi to their minuscule office, not much bigger than a cupboard. There was a door on one end, opening into the bakery and a long desk shoved against the opposite wall with two chairs placed next to each other. The only slightly redeeming feature of this cupboard-office was the window in front of the desk, from where they could see the street outside. So even though they were basically sitting in a cupboard, it was a cupboard with a view. Laila pulled out her laptop and opened a few Instagram accounts. ‘Look at how clean these images are. Sharp, minimal and very chic. Also, not hard to achieve. We make new, cool desserts every day—all we have to do is take beautiful pictures.’

  ‘Totally agreed. A good camera and also, we should get Photoshop. A little contrast and exposure adjustment is the difference between a good and a great picture,’ Maahi said sagely.

  Laila rolled her eyes. ‘What else can we do? We could get some cute crockery. Not entire sets, but individual plates and bowls in different designs and colours. Perhaps some place mats to mix up the background?’

  ‘Dude, I handle the design!’

  ‘Yes, and I should help. And you should help me with my stuff too.’

  ‘But you do all the boring operations stuff,’ Maahi moaned.

  ‘You mean the stuff that runs this place?’

  ‘Yeah—and I make it pretty so people come to this well-run establishment.’

  ‘Stop being a child. We’re doing this role-reversal thing at least for a few weeks. Fresh set of eyes means new ideas. I’m taking over your departments and you go do my job and apply your fresh set of eyes to find new, more efficient solutions,’ Laila said firmly. ‘What else did you have scheduled for today?’

  Maahi seemed reluctant to speak. ‘A meeting.’

  ‘With?’

  ‘Forget it—I’ll call and cancel. You’re never going to entertain the idea anyway so what’s the point?’

  ‘What? Tell me!’ Laila asked, closing her laptop. ‘I’ll go to the meeting. Is it for design? Advertising?’

  ‘Advertising, sort of,’ Maahi said. Hesitantly, she said, ‘It’s with this guy I met through Instagram. He wants to collab with us.’

  ‘Collab on Instagram? You mean we give him a shout out and he returns the favour or something like that? What’s his product?’

  ‘Coffee.’

  Maahi’s voice was so low, Laila barely heard her.

  ‘Don’t bother.’ Maahi put her palm up before Laila could speak. ‘I know—we’re a specialty bakery, we don’t want to dilute our brand, we don’t do coffee. I’ll call and cancel.’

  ‘We don’t call and cancel so late either. Where and when?’

  ‘Roast House’s coffee shop in South Ex at three. I’ve been talking to JD, their head of marketing. Cool guy. I could let him know that I have to cancel. I mean, if you’re only planning to go and turn him down, there’s no point wasting his time,’ Maahi said, not trying to hide her disappointment. ‘I was waiting to tell you till we had spoken—and maybe had something that would benefit both C+C and RH.’

  ‘I’ll hear him out.’

  ‘You will?’ Maahi’s eyes widened.

  ‘Don’t get too excited. I’m not promising anything.’

  Laila barely escaped Maahi’s excited hug as she walked out of One. Meeting this JD guy was the least she could do to support Maahi at this point, who seemed insistent on changing things. They weren’t ready to open another new shop, or to branch out into custom cakes or even to collaborate with coffee chains, but Roast House was a big fish with shops all over the country. Laila could give them half an hour of her time and find out what they were thinking.

  So she drove out to South Ex. The middle-of-the-day traffic was light and she got there early. She shoved the parking slip in her bag and checked the time on her phone. She had a good twenty-five minutes. She figured she’d do some research on Roast House before the meeting.

  Roast House coffee shops were all over Delhi. Laila recalled at least five branches she had seen around South Delhi. This one was the big, swanky one, with two floors that had floor-to-ceiling tinted glass walls that allowed her a view of the entire coffee shop. There were high counters with stools against the walls, where people sat with their laptops in front of them, facing the street. Impressive, Laila had to admit.

  As she pulled open the door and the cool air blew her hair back from her face, she heard a consistent murmur of conversation over the music. They seemed to be playing old Hindi film songs. While she waited in line to place her order, the song changed from ‘O Mere Dil Ke Chain’ to ‘Bahon Mein Chale Aao’. She got her coffee and found a table for two upstairs. She had been to several RH cafes before, but this one seemed to have a completely different energy. It buzzed with the chatter of millennials, scattered around in bunches, huddled in groups, heads leaning together over laptops, pushing around notes across tables, or simply chatting. The vintage Indian wooden furniture, the embroidered tapestries and carvings on the walls and ceilings teamed with glass walls, polished floors and modern architecture gave the place a fresh look—an exciting fusion of India with the West.

  Laila could have spent hours just sitting there watching people, and their reaction to what the place offered. She overheard comments about the music every time a new song played. People were showing each other their unique vintage cups and plates, taking pictures. RH seemed to be doing everything r
ight—the smell of freshly brewed coffee, the wonderful music, the interiors that gave a very Mughal- palace-like feel to the shop.

  After she sipped her coffee, she found it even harder to hate the place. She had worked in a coffee shop for a few years before setting up Cookies + Cupcakes with Maahi, and remembered those days as being frustrating, sometimes even suffocating. The coffee, or even the coffee shop, wasn’t to blame for it. It was her who wasn’t happy there, but it was easy to shift the blame. Perhaps she could get over it and they could collaborate with Roast House after all. She wanted to hear what they had in mind first, but she promised herself she’d keep an open mind.

  Reading through the emails Maahi had exchanged with this JD guy, Laila found out that this wasn’t just about shout-outs on Instagram, although that would give C+C a good boost since RH had a gigantic social media following. They probably wouldn’t gain anything by C+C stocking their coffee anyway. The 15,000 Instagram followers Laila had felt proud of now seemed meagre compared to the 1.2 million that followed Roast House. There was something in the emails about some people in RH liking C+C products. Maybe this wasn’t an advertising thing, after all. Did they want their products—

  ‘This seat taken?’ Laila’s thoughts were interrupted by a tall, lanky, goofy-looking man with curly hair pointing at the seat in front of her.

  ‘Actually, I’m meeting someone soon—’

  ‘I’ll be super quick.’ The dude had already dumped his food on the table and was pulling the chair. ‘You can always kick me out if your friend arrives before I’m done shoving this down my throat.’

  Laila opened her mouth to protest but let it go. Even though he looked to be in his mid-twenties, he was skinny like a nineteen-year-old. Or maybe it was just because he was so tall. But in any case, he needed to eat, and as long as he did it quietly, Laila didn’t have a problem. The real problem was that he wasn’t quiet.