'Hey,' he said, coming to a sudden halt.
'Hi,' I replied.
There was a weird little silence. I raised my chin and forced myself to look him in the eye.
And still he said nothing. Just looked at me, like there was nothing else to look at in all of Bittoragarh.
Finally, I said, like a very polite moron, 'That was a very informative session.'
His face changed. Closed down, somehow.
'Why, thank you,' he returned a little sarcastically. 'I'm glad my local MP approves of my small environment initiatives.'
I flushed.
'I wasn't being patronizing,' I said awkwardly.
'No?' he asked, a queer little smile twisting his mouth. 'So what's up? How come you're here? No magazine covers to shoot? And isn't the swearing in today?
'It happens alphabetically,' I told him. 'Andhra, Andaman, Arunachal, Bihar... PP is wayyy down the list.' Then I squared my shoulders and added quickly, 'Anyway, I just came to say please and thank you.'
'Please?' One eyebrow rose interrogatively. 'What's the please for?'
Uff! I'd said the wrong thing as usual.
'I mean sorry' I amended quickly. 'For being rude. That day, on the bridge. Not please.'
He stood lounging against the chain link fence, a small smile still playing at the corner of his mouth, the dark eyes glowing strangely. 'Are you sure?' he asked.
Flushing bright red, I pushed past him, shaking my head vigorously. 'I'm sure,' I said airily, as I hurried away. 'In fact, I should be going now. Bye, then.'
'Whoa, hey, hang on!' he said, jack-knifing up from his lounging stance against the fence so fast he made my head spin.
But I didn't look back. I was almost running.
I mean, what was I thinking? That I'd find him all broken and brooding and I'd save him somehow?
Sneakered footsteps sounded lightly behind me, an insistent hand closed around my wrist and the next thing I knew, my back was up against the chain link fence and he had me pinned, a sinewy arm on either side.
'Sure you didn't mean please?' he asked teasingly.
'Yes!' I snapped. 'Why would I be saying please to you, anyway?'
'Oh, I could think of a few reasons...' he drawled, running a finger down my cheek in this very cocky, suggestive way that made me want to hit him.
'Are you trying to be all suave? I said witheringly. 'Because it isn't working.'
'No?' he enquired, not looking too worried about this feedback. 'You've gone the exact colour of a pink guava, by the way. Did you know?'
'No,' I said irritably. 'Your T-shirt's really cheesy. Did you know?'
He looked taken aback. 'It's a present from Jugatramji,' he explained.
Intensely irritated that Jugatram hadn't got me a T-shirt, I glared at him.
'Anyway, why are you following me? I thought nine years wouldn't be long enough for you not to see me again?'
He grinned.
'That obviously rankles,' he said, with great satisfaction. 'Good.'
I glared straight into his chest, avoiding his eyes. His stupid T-shirt left the golden skin at the base of his throat bare. That golden skin had started a whole separate conversation with me.
Giggles sounded behind us. Two small blonde boys were walking towards the courts, racquets in hand. They were pointing at us and whispering.
'Hey, Zak!' One of them waved.
He raised one arm to wave back and quick as a flash, I ducked out and away, restarting my mad, thoughtless dash to god-alone-knows-where.
He didn't say anything, just fell in step beside me and somehow, I don't quite know how, managed to manoeuvre me back into the lobby. Here, he pointed out the numerous restorations that had been made - the chandeliers, the floor, the vaulted ceilings - in a most natural manner, politely ignoring the fact that I was acting like some kind of skittish, headless psycho. He even told me that all the dead mounted animal heads had been moved to a bar lounge on the third level. 'It's got a sort of Jungle Hunt theme,' he said. 'I'll show you later. Come this way.'
So, of course, I came that way. I was walking like somebody hypnotized.
He guided me into a large elevator with mirrors on the walls, punched a button marked Zain Mahal, and a couple of seconds later, we entered a deep blue and gold floor. It was beautiful but untidy, mostly because there were dusty stacks of campaign posters everywhere, including a massive framed one on the wall. 'Vote for Youth! Vote for Change! Vote for IJP candidate Zain Altaf Khan!' it said below a smiling picture of Zain.
I stopped.
'Zain,' I said uneasily.
He turned around and looked at me, smiling a little.
'I keep meaning to get rid of all this stuff,' he said lightly.
'But then I keep forgetting.'
'Zain, I'm sorry,' I said, even as a huge lump formed in my throat.
He just looked at me. 'Oh, I'm sorry too,' he said ruefully. 'You have no idea.' Then he added, 'Come on through. The decor's a bit oppressive, but I'm sure you'll like the view.'
I walked slowly into the sumptuous suite. It was a really male space--done up in deep reds and emerald greens and Persian blues. Humongous floor-to-ceiling windows looked onto rolling golden fields outside. A deep pool of brilliant sunshine lay shimmering across the plump, inviting, white linen covered bed.
'C'mon here,' he called as he threw open a few of the bay windows. 'I bet you remember this!'
I walked slowly towards the window and looked out. Of course I remembered the view. The rolling fields on one side, the single-storied, yellow brick houses of Purana Bittora stretching out for miles on the other, the glinting water of the curving river, the Lion Bridge, and far away, the hazy golden domes and ramparts of the old Bittora Fort.
I stood there for a long time, inhaling the wood smoke, then turned my back on the view, crossed my arms across my chest, and came to the point.
'So whyn't you use the stuff Gudia aunty gave you?'
He'd been tidying some papers at an ornate wooden desk but he went very still at this.
'What stuff?' he asked casually.
I rolled my eyes.
'The stuff,' I said. 'My bills For well over three crores.'
He shrugged. 'Oh, that stuff,' he said. 'Who told you about that?'
'Gudia aunty told me,' I said, trying hard to get him to look me in the eye. 'She waited and waited for you to submit them - consuming a few gallons of vodka in the process, I'm sure - and then, when the last date was past, she came and told me. So I would know.'
'Know what?' he asked.
'How nobble you are.'
He frowned.
'I'm not nobble,' he said, shaking his head. 'I wanted to use the bills. I couldn't believe it when she just walked in and gave them to me. And for free. I decided it was divine intervention - that god wanted me win this thing. It was my duty to expose Pushpa Pande's hypocrisy. Her pseudo-secularism and so-called Gandhian values. Even your poor aunty was a victim! She told me, crying bitterly, that your grandmother had repaid all her years of service by accusing her of being a thief!'
Err, that was me, I thought but didn't say. And she is a thief.
'I quite liked her,' he continued. 'She's a bit weird, of course, but in a nice way. She reminded me a little of you, actually - she had the same kind of wild rose smell.'
That would be my Body Shop Moroccan Rose perfume, of course, I thought sourly.
'So then?' I asked in an even voice. 'Why didn't you go ahead and expose Amma?'
He pushed his dark hair off his forehead.
'She died, Jinni,' he said. 'And you cried. And your Gudia aunty looked at me from behind you as you cried, with huge, mute, pleading, golf-ball eyes. And then that Saheli Boutique Masterji swung in from nowhere, gushing. How could I do it after that? It would've been... indecent. Besides, once Babu Ram recovered consciousness and talked to me...'
'You figured I wasn't really a hit-and-run-to-hospital driver after all,' I finished. 'Really, how could you even t
hink I'd run over somebody? You know I'm a good driver!'
'He told me what you did that night,' said Zain, ignoring me, his eyes glowing. 'You pulled off that gag from the old Enforcer 49 comic! That was awesome!
'It was your gag,' I reminded him. 'And let me tell you, it was a very stupid, impractical gag. It--'
'Jinni, it was fiction,' he said, shaking his head like he couldn't believe I was for real. 'A fourteen-year-old boy's fiction. You weren't supposed to actually do it!'
I shrugged awkwardly. 'Yeah... well, whatever. Anyway, I think what you did was awesome. Saving Rita. Getting those two together. Organizing their getaway.'
'That was just good follow-through,' he said dismissively. 'You did all the heroic stuff. And it confirmed what I'd been suspecting for a while.'
'What?' I asked fearfully. He thought I was mentally unhinged and that escapade had confirmed it?
'That you weren't just this little puppet dancing on your Amma's strings. You were smart and spunky and so Enforcer 49ish...' he paused, looked up at me and said simply, 'that you totally deserved to win.'
I looked at him in stunned disbelief.
'Just like that?' I whispered, awed.
He flung up his head.
'Of course not just like that!' he said, his sudden vehemence making me jump a little.
'Then?' I asked, confused.
He gave a short, mirthless laugh. 'I agonized over it every day. Especially because the margin we lost by was so small. Only six hundred votes! And, by the way, we rocked Sujanpur, the traditional, loyal Pragati bastion! You know what that means, right? If she hadn't died we would've won for sure! She out-manoeuvred me. I kept brooding over it. Wallowing in loser stench, as your buddy Rumi would say. I kept trying to justify ratting on you, telling myself you had been less than fair - you'd tried to get me disqualified, you'd insulted my family. Every night, I'd decide to go to the EC tomorrow and have you disqualified. Thrown out. Humiliated. Or I'd think about phoning you and telling you I had the goods on you, and making you beg.'
He stopped, panting slightly, his eyes looking beyond me.
'Then every morning I'd think that I was no one to take a high moral stand. God knows I spent more than three crores on my campaign! Besides, what about your stupid aunty - she'd get into trouble for sure - and your mother, who sent me a friend request on Facebook a fortnight ago! I couldn't bring myself to just burn those wretched bills and end the uncertainly once and for all, either. I took them out every day and looked at them and told myself I wasn't such a loser after all... Luckily, Bunty wasn't there when your aunty came - if he knew I had the goods on you, he would have persuaded me to go to the EC for sure. And the day you gave that crowing interview to Nulwallah on Democrazee - that was a really black day'
I still didn't say anything.
I couldn't think of anything to say.
'I think, finally, it was the fear that your grandmother would haunt me that stayed my hand. Can't you just imagine her, floating in through this window here and pitching into me like I was Master Kamruddin?'
'No,' I finally managed to say. 'But I can totally picture her floating in tonight, cooing, You good little boy! Sit in my lap and let me feed you, little Dilip Kumar!'
'Nooo!' He groaned and flopped back in his chair, throwing up his arms. I carefully averted my eyes from his lap and the denim stretched taut across his thighs - it was sending out its usual hello-this-seat's-not-taken signals.
'So!' I said resolutely, getting to my feet. 'Like I said, I came to say sorry and thank you. So, sorry and thank you, Zain. You're a good friend.'
He looked up abrupdy, his dark eyes glittering below his messy hair. 'You're welcome,' he said. 'Next friendship day, I'll give you a friendship band.'
I ignored this stupid remark.
He continued, still sprawling back in his chair, in a very neutral voice, 'Babu Ram also told me that you were aided in your desperate rescue expedition that night by Nauzer Nulwallah, and that the two of you appeared to be an item.'
I sat down again.
'And Mrs Babu Ram told me you seemed very cosy with your lovely cousin Pinky,' I said steadily.
'What!' He laughed, like this was a really good joke. 'That's just plain weird.'
'Anyway,' I said, tossing my head, secretly relieved but refusing to show it, 'why shouldn't I be an item with Nulwallah, huh? He thinks I'm nice, and he votes Pragati, and we don't squabble every three minutes like we're both three years old!'
Zain looked up, his dark eyes glowing.
'I think you're nice,' he said quietly.
I stared at him.
He was doing it again. That just-kidding grin with the disturbingly serious look in his eyes. My heart began its deafening drum roll again.
But then, abruptly, he flung up one hand and shook his head. 'Forget that,' he said. 'You're starting a whole new phase of your life now, you'll get to meet all kinds of interesting people... You should begin on a clean slate.'
'Oh yeah,' I said shakily. 'Because there are all these cool seventy-year-old dudes dying to date me in Parliament.'
'There's Tits,' he reminded me, his voice none-too-steady either. 'And lots of other young guns too.'
'Shut up,' I said.
'Jinni, it won't work,' he said slowly, his voice almost pleading. 'This whole situation is a disaster zone.'
But I wasn't listening to his words, which, of course, were absolutely wrong. I was listening to his voice, which was absolutely right. In fact, it was a voice I hadn't heard in nine years, but remembered very well indeed.
I want to kiss you, Jinni. I want to kiss you very much.
It was all the opening I needed and I grabbed it with both hands. And why not? Life is sort.
'Of course it'll work,' I murmured persuasively, as I sank into his lap and slipped my arms luxuriantly around his neck. 'Unless, of course, you're not man enough to take on a woman who has bested you so comprehensively, hmmm?'
It worked. He grabbed the back of my neck instantly.
'Listen, Kidwai Nagar,' he said, shaking me not very gently. 'You only won because I let you.'
I yanked at his hair, hard.
'That,' I shot back cockily, 'is an entirely debatable point. I mean, I could've answered all the questions to the EC's satisfaction and been cleared of all charges.'
One dark eyebrow rose at this, not impressing me a bit.
'Like how you spent twenty-three lakhs on alcohol?' he asked. 'And twelve on twenty-four carat gold nose rings?'
'I would've worked out something,'! blustered.
'You know what, you're right,' he replied wryly, letting my neck go. 'You probably would've.'
We were both quiet for a while.
'D'you think I'm going to slowly turn into a mindless TB sycophant or a cynical line-toer, or siphon off millions from famine relief funds into my personal Swiss bank account, doing this job?' I asked doubtfully.
'No,' he said steadily. 'Not if you don't choose to. Unless you believe I'm going to turn into a rabid soldier of Hindutva doing this job?'
I groaned and stood up. He let me. 'Don't tell me you're going to keep up this sicko flirtation with the IJP?'
'They're going to rename it,' he said doggedly, getting up too. 'I'm pretty confident it's going to mutate into another kind of party altogether. And soon. It has to. The country's waking up to the need for an alternative to your fat-cat, screwed up Pragati.'
'Speaking of which,' I said thoughtfully, 'should I tell TB that Tawny was slipping crores of official Pragati Party funds to you right through the campaigning?'
He looked thoughtful.
'It might be smarter to hold that knowledge over Tawny and pressurize him to wind up all that crap he's been pulling in Durguja, instead,' Zain said. 'But gently. Don't antagonize him. He's powerful. Besides, he's genuinely fond of you.'
'That's good advice,' I allowed grudgingly. Then I snapped my fingers. 'Hey, the first thing I'll make him do is give Munni the assembly ticket from
Champapul in the state election! Hah!'
'Good for Munni,' Zain remarked. 'Whoever she is.'
I looked at him a little suspiciously.
'Are you going to tell me what I should be doing all the time now? I won't let you.'
'Okay, okay,' he said peaceably enough, though I didn't like the way his eyes were dancing. Then he grabbed the end of my sari and pulled me closer. 'But will you let me pull this off? Slowly? Pleat by pleat? It's become a bit of an obsession with me.'
Oh, with me too, I thought fervently. You have no idea.
'Jinni?' he asked, his voice uncertain.
In response, I slid my hands up under his cheesy red T-shirt, my palms tingling as they encountered the muscled warmth beneath. And then I was struck by an awful new possibility.
I looked up at him, panic gripping my belly.
'Oh my god, Zain, what if we've both been building up this whole thing in our heads for years and years, and that's why our sexual encounters with other people never felt really awesome, but now that we're finally about to consume this relationship, what if it turns out to be a total anti-climax?'
He blinked.
But only for a moment. 'Excuse me, please speak for yourself,' he objected even as his hands slid smoothly down past my waist to the swell of my butt and pushed me firmly up against him. 'My previous sexual encounters totally rocked.'
'So did mine, you bastard,' I replied, stung.
'In which case,' he murmured into my ear, sounding suspiciously like he was trying not to laugh, 'I don't see any problem, do you?'
'Umm... none,' I agreed rather dazedly as he pushed me against the pillows.
I fell back, but then sat up and said worriedly, 'Suppose this is just unfinished business? Suppose once this is done, we get totally over each other?'
'Then you can go off with Nulwallah,' he said soothingly, as he lifted my pallu off my front, threw it aside and slid his large warm hands down to the knot of pleats at my waist. And I...' he was definitely laughing now, 'I can go off with Gudia aunty.'
Battle for Bittora Page 36