‘I’ll have them done by the afternoon, sir.’ I exhaled.
‘We have a presentation scheduled for them this afternoon. Have them ready by eleven. I know you can do it.’
I cut him off before his ‘You’re the idea man’ speech could be recalled and regurgitated.
‘I can’t come up with a campaign for that stuff so easily.’
‘You have to.’
‘Let me see what I can do,’ defeated, I said.
‘See me in my office in ten minutes, I need to make a call or two before that. Pushpa will bring you in.’ He smiled.
‘Bring me my numbers,’ he told his big-spectacled secretary. She flashed us with fake smile number thirteen from the Close-Up catalogue. I cringed. I cringed because for the past couple of months I had been doing the same thing, groping in my bag of tricks for the right smile. One that combined the right approving nod with just enough conviction and enthusiasm. My bag was empty. I had been brought up to respect what I do. I tried my best to get through the days, chipping away at the old block, trying to find my way.
I had spent time in many a meeting watching people’s mouths move. It was my little malediction, to watch them rack up numbers on a chart and babble along while I struggled with my own personal 1929. I was sure they were making sense and being eloquent. It had become white noise to me. The fancy lingo and generic format for communication made it easy for me to respond appropriately and in a timely fashion. I would have responded ‘correctly’ if these people were all speaking Latin, German or Cantonese. The meetings and requirements were so well structured. Besides if you are even half listening you can say the right shit just by gauging the tone of the sentence someone throws out at you. Try it sometime.
I ambled over to my desk and switched on my computer. Some of the guys strolled past my desk without saying hello or good morning. I think people in my office were a little scared of me. Lately I had been putting them down more frequently. Their lunch conversations would bore me. They made me more acerbic. They made me see what I was and made me compare it to what I ought to be. Their unbridled positivity was anything but contagious. Vaibhav came over. He was a short chap, I could only see his eyes over the wall of my cubicle. His eyebrows danced as he told me how great a day it was to be at work. I looked at him blankly. He had just been given a compliment by the boss for his handling of the XS3000 account. They were new in India and were going to have a huge launch in a few weeks. He wanted me to share in his mini celebration as he handed me his project plan for kudos and criticism. I barely looked up at him. The dancing eyebrows gave one last exasperated bounce and disappeared.
I opened my email for the briefing documents. There it was, in front of me again. Pegasus.
Pegasus was a client that I would happily award to my worst enemies. They sold the most inane and irrelevant things. Things for which a lot of my friends would stand in line for hours in the rain, just to get a look. They say that is normal. Wanting a good life is normal. A good life being defined by the new Pegasus Flex Master 7007 leather chair with vibrating ass pads, arm massagers and neck cushions that’ll make your mother weep when she sees how fucking successful you are. How fucking normal!
Often my friends had implored me to join them on their weekend self-improvement-through-retail jaunts. I told them that an ass in a hat was still an ass.
Normal meant stoking your ego with the latest television, hooking you up with crystal-clear information about quality merchandise that could make your life brighter, easier and indescribably more fulfilling. Normal meant being on a frequent-flyer programme that racked up points like a blitzkrieg, so that you can ride around in one of your Zeppelins to Barbados. Normal meant being on a frequent-flower programme with the most exorbitant and pretentious florist in town, to keep your demanding wife or girlfriend pleased enough to go to Barbados with you. Normal was death. Normal was oblivion. Normal was a painful pin reminding us that we’re satisfied living for ourselves. Fuck normal.
Shahnaz called. She wanted to know how I was doing.
‘I need to get out. I feel like writing. I feel like falling off the top of a building and writing on my way down, weightless, with the wind in my face, people in the windows watching me fall, some screaming, some in awe. The pen slips out of my hand, it doesn’t go far, I reach for it and continue to write …’ My free-falling ways met their abrupt, concrete end when Pushpa walked by and I thought my time had come.
‘Tiny insignificant detail, this, but you usually use a laptop n’est ce pas? You really want to free-fall with your new expensive toy?’ Shahnaz joked.
‘No, initial notes are usually in longhand, but I could free fall with the toy too. Neither of us would make it, so there’s no risk of heartache.’
Shahnaz laughed and disconnected with a cheery ‘See you later’. Snapping my phone shut, I stood up for a moment and looked around at the people in the office.
Pushpa Brar in her push-up bra stands up from her desk and starts pacing up and down in front of it. On a slow day my mind usually takes flight. Everything else switches to autopilot and I walk through the day, knee-jerk responses and appropriate vocalizations save my ass and get me through. Pushpa is still pacing up and down in front of her desk. Like a human pendulum she hypnotizes me. I sit back down in my chair.
Atmospheric sounds of distant guitar twangs washed over me as I sat in fake alertness at my desk, typing away furiously. Asdfghjkl asdfghjkl poiuytrewq qwertyuiop. Perfect sense! Or should I say mnbvcxz zxcvbnm.
I waited at my desk, staring at the screen, asking myself another one of my favourite questions.
‘Now what the fuck am I going to do?’
3. THANK YOU FOR THE COFFEE
It was as if there was no light, the office was nothing more than a dark hall, still and silent, holding its breath ominously. I sat waiting in my cubicle. Expecting the fluorescent panes above me to brighten my day and rid me of my gloom. It was a near-spiritual experience. It was a dream. I sat gaping into what was now a mirror. Like Buster Keaton, an uninspired and insipid reflection stared back at me. What was all that training for? What was all the hard work for? Years of preparation for something big, something worthwhile and fulfilling were ending in a despondent fizzle. I was frothing with ideas yet tied down by a system that was so smug and demented that I didn’t know where to start.
Perhaps with the Pegasus shorts.
Pushpa Brar in her push-up bra slithered up behind me.
‘Boss will see you now,’ she cooed.
I rose from my chair and made my way to his office. He had stepped into the loo it seemed. I waited for a few minutes before the executive flush of the executive bathroom was executed and faintly heard. Those things were supposed to be practically inaudible. He stepped out drying his hands with a look of great concern on his face. It was as though he seemed to know something that was disturbing him and he was waiting for the right moment to share it with me. He seemed pensive, visibly searching for a way to start the conversation.
I thought I’d help him out and give everything a second shot.
Before I could say something inane about how impressive the view from his office was, how magnificently it encompassed the delicate architectural balance between modernity and tradition that is characteristic of Mumbai, my heart screamed for me to bite my tongue. This job was turning my anatomy on itself.
I remembered a recent lunch with him. We had gone down to the café with a few colleagues. We sat down at the usual table and looked at each other. Our boss had a big set of lunch boxes packed by his imaginative and creative wife’s overworked and harried maid. He sat in front of me and looked at what I had. It was a small sandwich that I had just bought from the first stall at the corner. He looked at it with wanting eyes and then looked back up at me.
I said, ‘Would you like a piece?’
He smiled and said, ‘Thanks, I’ll help myself.’
With that he reached across the table and made a large incision on the left side of my
chest with his elaborate cutlery. He then proceeded to feel inside my chest for my fist-sized muscle and pulled it out. He bit into it and little bits squirted around at us all. No one reacted too much, it was impolite to do so.
‘This is fantastic! Where did you get this?’
‘Delhi, sir, it’s from Delhi,’ I whispered before I fell unconscious on my seventy-five-rupee sandwich.
Maybe that didn’t really happen.
‘Sit, Pranav, sit.’
‘Thanks.’
He appeared agitated.
‘How are you finding your projects these days?’
‘They’re okay,’ I stated with a matter-of-fact nod.
‘How about working with the new team?’
‘It’s been good.’
‘You aren’t having trouble getting along with them?’ He was disappointed by my short answers.
‘They’re all right’.
‘I see …’ He looked down at his pen, and then stealthily towards me.
‘What was it that you wanted to see me about? You seem ill at ease, sir.’
‘The thing is, Pranav, I don’t know what is bothering you and want to find out. I somehow get the impression that you’re not … happy.’
The H-word, he hesitated to use it at first but then for lack of a better alternative, there it was. The H-word.
‘Why do you say that?’ I was intrigued and wanted to see where this was coming from. This was new.
‘Well, I’ve noticed a sharp decline in the quality of your work. You’re sluggish. You don’t seem to take any joy in it any more.’
‘That is perhaps true.’ Yes Edison, twist your bulb and tell me more. Call Tesla, maybe the two of you can figure it out.
‘We’d like you to be more prompt with your deadlines. It’s been weeks since we had the last meeting to discuss the Pegasus shorts.’
I listened to him patiently.
‘Now, I’ve tried to be like a mentor to you. I care about talented people like you. Quite frankly, you’ve been an asset to the firm. I have people calling me for beauty product ads just because of you! Because of what you did for the P&G guys. That was brilliant.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ I said, feeling sick.
‘What’s bothering you?’
‘I just …’
This was it. His obvious and apprehensive line of questioning deserved to be answered with honesty. I didn’t think I could continue with my charade any more. I was no longer convinced that I had to slowly saw off my limbs every day of my life to climb some ladder that would lead me to a great promised land, or promised floor in my case. One that came with enrichment, glory, respect and hope. Most of all, a sense of self-worth.
I could no longer be the whore.
‘Tell me, Pranav, we haven’t got all day.’ Mild agitation marked his tone as he looked over my shoulder at Pushpa who had stuck her head in with some papers. He gestured violently, asking her to leave.
I looked down at the fancy carpet under our feet, then at the ‘Vinci’ on the wall.
‘Look, if you can’t tell me we won’t be able to fix whatever is wrong. Things, as they are, are largely unacceptable, especially for a bright chap like you.’
Terse, rational threats garnished by hope-inducing praise. Sounded like a quote from page fourteen of the Manage Your Morons handbook. He must have the hardcover version.
I looked at him, then through him and I saw the Porus Towers behind his balding head. They looked like horns. Was he the devil? I doubt it. He was merely an instrument, a small-fry facilitator recruiting for the cause.
‘I can’t do it any more,’ I said, shaking my head.
‘What do you mean?’ His response was calm. He seemed distinctly pleased with himself as he thought that I was opening up to him.
‘I can’t do this any more,’ I repeated, coldly this time.
This was met with a look of glee in his eyes. He now thought he knew what the problem was and began on a boisterous declamation to set me right.
‘Oh, everybody has bad phases! Writers call it writers’ block, advertisers call it a dead-end day. Oh, it happens even to the best of us, as is evident from the fact that it is happening to you!’
‘It’s not that I can’t write, sir. I’m just tired of what I am writing.’
He sat up in his chair and then sank back into it. He was getting impatient, I could see. He tapped his fingers on the arms of his chair and then stopped.
‘You’ll have to help me understand this.’
I was in, this was indeed it.
‘I don’t like what we do here and I can’t sell a stupid cold drink like it’s the cure for cancer any more. I can’t sell things that mean nothing to anyone until they hear about them. It just doesn’t do anything for me any more.’
A deathly silence followed. He squinted at me, and the lines on his forehead grew thicker as he prodded me more.
‘Again, you’ll have to help me understand this …’
‘It’s quite simple, sir. I thank you for your effort and openness but this is not what I was meant to do. I won’t be able to convince myself that my life is worth anything if I continue here.’
‘You were responsible for almost 15 per cent of our profits last year! That’s massive, son!’
‘I don’t care about that! I can’t be the 15 per cent guy living for numbers, bullshitting and juicing a system based on stoking the desires of people.’
‘You’ve developed a conscience? Is that what this is?’
‘I’ve always had a conscience, sir. I’ve just stress-tested my being and I refuse to take it any further.’
‘How would anyone ever sell or buy anything without us? You’re questioning the very basis of an economy! Retail is our bread.’
‘A guy works his butt off all day and goes home. He has a meagre meal with his eager, demanding family and they all settle down around the television. Through this magical invention they’re brought in contact with the latest cars, fashions, restaurants, services that rule your market. Film stars exemplify the way you want to look as well as the way you’d like others to look. This makes his family and him even more demanding and it drives them all to a greater state of unrest. We’re stoking fat. We’re building wants. We’re making an entire generation adopt cellphones and motorbikes as their goals. We’re to blame for discontentment. If we don’t get them through the television, we always have papers, magazines and billboards …’
He was angry now. Tilting forward slightly, he raised his voice. ‘I’ll play your game. I’ll humour your fascination with being a myopic commie. What is wrong if a guy wants something new for his wife and kids? If a cycle owner wants to move up and forward to own a new Maruti? What is wrong with defining your success with material goals?’
‘Everything. People are doing everything for the wrong reasons. Worse still, people are doing wrong things for these reasons.’
‘Who the hell are you to decide what the right reason for anyone else to do anything is?’
‘I would much rather have a world where everyone is aware of the fact that your vehicle or shoes don’t make you who you are. I’m sick of the consumer manifesto that we’re pushing.’
‘So what do you want to sell? Ideals? Love, perhaps? No one’s buying that shit.’
‘Now there’s a thought.’
‘So is this the part where you tell me that you’re quitting and moving to the Himalayas?’
‘I am quitting, Mr Khanna. But I don’t need to flee to the Himalayas. My Everest is right here.’
‘You’re making a big mistake. I don’t see a fire for you to put out or run from.’
‘I see a fire, sir. I see a whole generation burning. I loathe what I am when I spend hour after hour in here, scheming about the next assault on the populace. To sell what? Fucking sofas? Consumer debt is through the roof, people are living way beyond their means for that sexy lifestyle, that piece-of-shit vibrating sofa …’
‘There is no need for that kind of language.
’
‘There is no need for that sofa. There is no need for that condo, your fucking TAG and your cream Lexus.’
Now I had really pushed his buttons. I had just made something that had been vague and ill-defined, personal and pointed.
‘Those things make me happy. They give me a well-deserved sense of pride and importance. I will not listen to you demean me in my own office.’
‘Very well. But answer me this, which of these things do you value yourself. What made you value your car or your watch? Where did your perception of value come from?’
‘From working my ass off every day for fifteen years, before I could get those things. How dare you mock me?’
‘Our entire value system is fucked up. Right from the start we’ve got a propaganda going. Things matter, brands matter, you’ve got to have the right stuff, from pin codes to pinstripes, to be considered successful, to be seen as happy. I reject this philosophy. Thanks for all the free coffee. I’m finally up. Goodbye, sir.’
‘Goodbye, Pranav.’ The man was now trembling with rage.
As I marched out of his room, I was just glad he didn’t try sending me to that quack psychiatrist in Bandra who recommends ‘free laughter’ and ‘hourly smiling’ as solutions to a life of banality. A couple of guys from the office were regulars with him. Wonder if they got a group discount or something. Poor bastards.
After clearing my desk, I stepped out of the office with all that I wanted to take with me. Everything seemed beautiful again. An enormous weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I felt like the Pranav my school friends knew. I felt like the kid that everyone expected to shake the earth and squeeze it. I wanted to wreak havoc on this filthy system that tells us what to aspire for, tells us what to be, tells us what to respect. I wanted to make a statement. I wanted to be the Anarchist who saves us. I could almost hear my man Eddie Vedder singing ‘Life Wasted’ behind me, spurring me on.
‘I’m never coming back again.’
The engineer–poet–jinglewriter was on his way home. Finally.
4. IF ROADSIDES WERE BEACHES
THE DIARY OF AN UNREASONABLE MAN Page 3