Swear You Won't Tell?

by Vedashree Khambete-Sharma

  ‘Ah. Yes. Right. Then when—’

  ‘Hi, I’m Shibani,’ said a voice behind her. The girl attached to it was flashing Dhruv a delighted grin.

  ‘Er … Dhruv Juneja,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, I knowwww,’ she breathed, shaking his hand warmly, ‘I’m a huge fan!’

  Dhruv smiled uncertainly. ‘Thanks—’

  ‘Nathan just told me about your photo-feature! I’m soooo excited! I’m the arts and culture editor,’ she said pointing to herself. ‘Do you want to discuss some ideas later in the evening? I know this great place? Awesome music and really cool drinks, you know? Anyway, I just thought I’d introduce myself and ask if you need any help? Because you can totally call me if you need anything, you know?’

  Avantika stared at her open-mouthed. How is this woman not teaching a course somewhere, she wondered. Dhruv had a hunted expression.

  ‘Er, sure,’ he said, ‘But I’m a little busy tonight so—’

  ‘Great, tomorrow night, then,’ she said, walking away. ‘You can pick me up from here at eight? Awesome.’

  They watched her retreating back, which even Avantika had to admit, was an attractive sight, what with the pencil skirt and the heels. Her own sensible flats and skinny jeans were no contest.

  ‘So,’ she said lightly. ‘That’s your weekend sorted.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ Dhruv said.

  ‘No, really,’ she said, coming over all serious. ‘Shibani has you in her sights now. There is no escape. You better prepare yourself for extreme origami dubstep or something.’

  ‘Extreme what?’ he asked, laughing.

  ‘You’ll see,’ she said in an ominous tone, before walking away towards Uday’s desk.

  ‘Who was that?’ Uday asked, as she leaned against his desk.

  ‘Dhruv Juneja. Aisha’s brother. He’s a photographer. Nathan’s got him doing some heritage photo feature for us.’

  ‘Seems to like you,’ Uday muttered.

  She gave him a sideways look. ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘Body language,’ he said, not taking his eyes off his screen.

  ‘Aren’t you supposed to be working on a story? What happened to focusing on the job at hand?’

  ‘It’s called multitasking, babe,’ he said with a smirk.

  She decided to ignore the ‘babe’.

  ‘I have a question for you,’ she said instead.

  ‘Shoot.’

  ‘If I wanted to get information from someone who I think knows something, hypothetically you understand, and for some reason I can’t get in touch with them over the phone, is it totally unacceptable to go over to their workplace unannounced and ask them questions?’

  Uday turned away from his computer and gave her a long look. ‘What the fuck have you been up to?’ he asked.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said, trying to look innocent. ‘This is just a hypothetical what-if scenario.’

  He nodded.

  ‘Sure, sure,’ he said. ‘Tell me, does it say I’m a moron on my face or is this a conclusion you have arrived at after running some tests on me?’

  She made a face. This was not going well. ‘You’re overreacting,’ she told him, ‘I just wanted to know—’

  ‘And I just want to know what you have been doing, because it sounds like you have been doing something and not a very good something at that.’

  She backed away from his desk. ‘Forget it,’ she said, ‘I’ll figure it out.’

  ‘Oh no, you won’t,’ said Uday, getting up. ‘Not without telling me what the hell is going on because—’ He didn’t get a chance to finish, because at that moment the door to Nathan’s cabin flew open and Nathan stormed out, his face dark and his voice loud.

  ‘Pandit! My office! Now!’

  Uday looked at Avantika.

  ‘What did you do?,’ he asked, the argument forgotten.

  ‘Probably something terrible,’ said Avantika sourly, ‘like breathing.’

  1996

  Dhug. Dhug. Dhug.

  The ball bounced against the steel grey concrete of the basketball court, as girls ran back and forth trying to score a shot. Avantika sat on the stands that had been put up on one side of the court, watching the match with the rest of the girls. It was quite a crowd—a mix of her own classmates from 8A and students from 9B, whom they were playing against today. There were even students from other standards. But then, this was the intra-school semi-final.

  Avantika watched as Aisha feinted to the right and escaped from the player designated to shadow her, dribbling the ball furiously as she made her way to the basket at the other end of the court. She was the captain of their team and Avantika had to admit, rightly so. The same growth spurt that had left Avantika howling with achy legs had turned Aisha into a slim, tall girl, who could net a ball with one easy jump. She made a good basketball player. And if Laxmi was to be believed, a good captain as well.

  Laxmi! She was on the team as well and that was the only reason Avantika had come to watch the match. Sports was not her thing. Okay, correction, sports was not her thing anymore. Especially after she’d tried for and hadn’t been picked for the basketball team. Laxmi had, and she was having a blast, from the looks of it. There she was now, jumping up, arms outstretched, asking for the ball, dodging, weaving, trying to shake off the girl who was blocking her. Further down the court, Aisha’s opponent had caught up to her. Aisha ignored her and raised the ball high over her head. No way, Avantika thought, she was standing almost at the free throw line, there was no way she could score a point. Aisha leapt, throwing the ball with all the might. It passed neatly through the basket and landed with a satisfying thud on the court. The crowd erupted in cheers and applause.

  Avantika clapped grudgingly as Aisha and Laxmi exchanged a high-five on the court. They were becoming friends, Avantika could see. She had hoped it would be a passing thing. But then, the other day, a chit had dropped out of Laxmi’s notebook and she’d realized that it was anything but that. It was a FLAMES calculation. She’d seen other girls do those. First you wrote down a boy’s name and your name, then you cancelled out all the common letters. Then you wrote FLAMES underneath, counted the remaining letters and cancelled every corresponding letter on the word ‘FLAMES’, till you were left with just one. If it was F, it meant you’d be friends forever. If it was L, it meant you’d fall in love and so on. She didn’t know any boys interesting enough to warrant a FLAMES calculation from her side. She wanted to do one with Mr Darcy from Pride and Prejudice, but Fitzwilliam was such a stupid name. Clearly, Laxmi didn’t have many options either because the chit had her and Aisha’s name on it. And it had thrown up M for marriage! Har, har, har, like that was going to happen! She had asked Laxmi about it, meaning to tease her, but the girl had just shrugged.

  ‘We were just bored,’ she’d said. ‘Anyway, who says you can’t do FLAMES between girls? M is the only problem. And that doesn’t have to mean ‘marriage’. It can mean … it can mean ‘mates’, you know? Like British people say.’

  ‘Okay,’ Avantika had said. ‘So … you and Aisha are mates or what?’ The only reason she hadn’t used air quotes was because they hadn’t been invented yet.

  ‘She’s fun,’ Laxmi had said, looking away, ‘and she’s not as bad as you think.’

  ‘But … but, why do you need to hang out with her so much?’ Avantika had asked, trying to keep the jealousy out of her voice.

  Laxmi had looked at her as if she had gone mad. And then, worst of all, she had laughed.

  ‘Avantika, don’t be silly,’ she’d said. ‘I hang out with you because I like hanging out with you, no? I hang out with her because … I like hanging out with her also. With you I can talk about books and drama and with her I can talk about basketball and music and things.’

  Music. Pfff. Aisha and her fancy MTV music, which she, Avantika, wasn’t allowed to listen to yet. Aai said she should focus on her studies and was there really time to watch MTV when you had to go to tuition class right now? And B
aba, he had asked what was wrong with our Indian music, why do you need to listen to this Madonna-Bidona when we had Kishori Amonkar? Parents, she thought bitterly, what did they know? How could she possibly explain that listening to English pop music was an important rung on the social ladder that she would now not be climbing at all, thank you very much? How could she explain to them what ‘cool’ is? They thought it was a fridge setting.

  Another cheer from the crowd brought her reeling back to the present. A girl from the other team had scored a basket. Laxmi looked crestfallen. It seemed she hadn’t blocked the girl properly. Aisha placed a sympathetic hand on her shoulder and said a few words to buck her up. It seemed to work, because Laxmi nodded briskly and bounded away on the court.

  ‘Buck up, Laxmeeee!’ Avantika yelled over the crowd and clapped. Could her friend hear her? Would it make a difference?

  The score was 1–1. The referee, their physical education teacher and coach, Miss Rastogi, blew her whistle in two short blasts indicating a break in the game. She was the only teacher allowed to not wear a sari to school. During PE class she usually turned up in a salwar kameez, dupatta tied firmly to the side. But on match days and interschool sporting events she switched to the smart grey track pants and the modest white t shirt she wore today.

  The players huddled in two opposite corners of the court. Ignoring the ouches of girls on whose toes she was inadvertently stepping, Avantika made her way to the corner where the 8A team was sitting. She would almost certainly lose her seat and would have to watch the rest of the match standing up, but that was okay. She needed to talk to Laxmi.

  Laxmi was sitting on a low bench, drinking from a bottle of water. Sweat streamed off her in little rivulets and wisps of her long hair had come undone from the tight plait she had tied it into. She was breathing a little heavily. Behind her was the rope, separating the audience from the player area. Avantika reached over the rope and tapped her on the shoulder.

  ‘Laxmi,’ she called.

  ‘Oh hi,’ Laxmi said. She looked surprised, but happy to see her.

  ‘I just came to tell you that you know, don’t let that … affect you. You’re playing really well.’

  ‘It was a stupid mistake, but thanks,’ Laxmi beamed.

  ‘And um … break a leg. No actually, that’s what you say before plays, it’s probably not the best thing to say now. Um. Good luck, then—’

  Aisha, who had been watching their exchange from a distance, came over now. ‘Come na, I just want to talk to the team a bit,’ she said to Laxmi. She didn’t even glance at Avantika.

  Laxmi nodded. Then with a quick smile at Avantika, she got up and followed Aisha to the court. Avantika watched them leave, with a sinking sensation in her chest. She was losing Laxmi. She could tell. As she walked back to her seat, leaving another trail of accidentally crushed toes in her wake, she wondered if there was anything she could do to stop it. She, with her books and her loud mouth and her springy hair and her puberty-given sprinkling of acne. Versus Aisha, who was beautiful, rich, talented and charismatic. She already had fans in school. Fans! Like a Bollywood actress.

  Not that she was the only one. Academic stars, sports stars, stars of the stage and of inter-school events—at St Agatha, those who shone bright, inevitably attracted eager, adoring followers. Most of them were harmless enough, wide-eyed little moths drawn to the flame of talent. They’d huddle in adoring groups, giggling in the corridors when they passed the usually older girl they worshipped. Or they’d stand at a distance, watching her exploits on say, the basketball court, clapping furiously when she scored and glaring at anyone who dared to boo her.

  But sometimes, and these weren’t as few as everybody liked to pretend, the admiration would turn into something darker.

  Avantika had heard whispers last year, about a girl from the seventh standard who had started writing letters to her ninth standard idol—a girl who’d won several singing competitions—using her own blood for ink. Avantika privately felt that this was a waste of perfectly good haemoglobin. And apparently, the girl had to be taken away for counselling and had missed more than a month of school. Her letters, the whispers claimed, had expressed her undying love and devotion to the other girl. It all seemed a bit … much, to her.

  She reached her seat, and observed without surprise that someone else was sitting there now. The girls sitting behind began yelling at her to stand at the side and not block their view. Shoulders slumped, she shuffled to the end of the row, where the seats ended. The view wasn’t that good from here—you could only see what was happening if any players considerately decided to leave the baskets alone and came to stand here solely for your benefit. The place was already packed with girls who hadn’t managed to get seats and they were not happy to make room for a newcomer. They pushed and shoved, till she found herself at the very edge of the first row, right in the corner, almost touching the court itself. If any of the teachers noticed, she’d be shooed away for sure. But there was no place anywhere. She decided to just stand there till someone asked her to move.

  Just in time, as it turned out, because at that very instant Miss Rastogi blew her whistle again, signalling the end of the break. The second half of the game began and a few minutes later, the 8A team scored another basket. Amidst cheers of ‘North-south-east-west-eight-A-are-the-best’, Avantika saw the older team shoot murderous glances at her class team. And as the game progressed, it seemed to get rougher. There was more shoving, girls seemed to be tripping and falling all over the place. From the way her whistle kept blowing, Miss Rastogi seemed to be spotting more fouls on the court than at a chicken farm.

  Avantika watched with rising excitement as a girl from the opposing team snatched the ball from Laxmi mid-dribble and raced to the other end of the court to shoot. Both teams sped behind her. The scoreboard was tied. It was going to be a close thing. Avantika saw Laxmi trying to defend the basket, leaping in front of her opponent, arms flailing, to keep her from scoring. The girl spun around to dodge her, elbows sticking out, perhaps just a bit more than strictly necessary. There was a dull thud and a muffled groan. The girl scored. The 9B crowd roared. ‘9B!’ clap-clap-clap ‘9B!’ clap-clap-clap.

  But something was wrong. Aisha had ignored the ball, the players, the game and was rushing toward Laxmi. To Avantika’s horror, she realized her friend was doubled up, face covered, eyes screwed shut. Laxmi was hurt! Without thinking, she turned around and began pushing her way through the throng of girls, trying to reach the other end of the stands, where Aisha seemed to be heading with Laxmi.

  By the time Avantika reached, they were surrounded by the rest of the team. She pushed her way through the other players to find Miss Rastogi holding Laxmi’s hands.

  ‘Let me see, let me see,’ the teacher was saying, as she gently pried the girl’s hands away from her face.

  Avantika felt a pit open in her stomach. Laxmi’s nose was bleeding, tiny red streams flowing down her lip, staining her teeth. A couple of drops had fallen on the pristine white t-shirt, which along with the dark pink divided skirt, was their sports uniform. It wasn’t the sight of the blood that was making Avantika’s heart pound. She’d started her periods last year and a year of that was enough to cure you of any squeamishness at the sight of blood. No, what was making her wince on Laxmi’s behalf was the way her friend’s nose seemed to have twisted a little to the left. The girl was crying with pain, clutching tightly to Aisha’s hand, as the other girl tried to calm her with soothing words.

  Miss Rastogi peered at the bloody mess that was Laxmi’s face and frowned. ‘You need to go to the sick room. This needs a doctor.’

  ‘I’ll take her, Miss,’ Avantika offered, at the same time Aisha did.

  ‘You’re in the middle of a game, Aisha,’ Miss Rastogi pointed out reproachfully.

  Avantika took a step towards Laxmi, but Aisha glared at her, jaw set. ‘Let’s cancel it and have a rematch, a fair one,’ she said, shooting a poisonous look at the captain of the other team, who
had walked up to see the damage. The girl opened her mouth to protest, but Miss Rastogi beat her to it.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ she said with a frown. ‘It’s the semi-finals and there’s a minute left on the clock. Get back on the court.’

  But Aisha stood her ground. She was staring at Laxmi’s face, which was contorted with pain, and for a moment it seemed as if she couldn’t see anything else. ‘Then we’ll forfeit.’

  Avantika was taken aback. Aisha was letting the other team win? Just like that? How would she ever explain that to the team? To the class? They were this close to making it to the finals! What was wrong with her?

  The others seemed to be just as shocked, because they all begin to protest. Even Laxmi, clearly in agony, groaned, ‘I can wait … ow … till the game is done.’

  It was Avantika’s turn to glare.

  ‘You don’t need to!’ she snapped. ‘I’ll take you there right away! Didn’t you hear what Miss said? You need a doctor, Laxmi!’

  Laxmi looked from her to Aisha, then back to her and said with a brave grimace, ‘It’s okay. Aisha can take me after the game.’

  And suddenly on that court crowded with hundreds of people, Avantika felt very, very alone.

  Six

  Tick tock. Tick tock. The clock ticked away, sounding unexpectedly eerie in the small silent cabin. Nathan hadn’t said a word yet. He was just looking at Avantika. No, not looking. He was sitting in his chair, glaring quietly at her, making the suspense mount, making the silence unbearable till—

  ‘You called?’ Avantika asked.

  ‘I had a very interesting conversation today. I’ll tell you why it was interesting. It was interesting because for the first time in my entire career, I was on a call with a PR rep and I had to just shut up and listen.’

  ‘Oh … that’s—’

  ‘I’m still talking. Not only did I have to listen, I had to apologize at the end of that call. Apologise for something you did.’