Revolution 2020 (33 page)

I smiled absently.

‘How is it
going with the DM’s daughter?’

‘Good,’
I said. I wanted to say bare minimum on the topic.

‘You are going
to ask her parents? Or give her the love bullshit?’

‘I haven’t
thought about it,’ I said. ‘I have to go, Shukla-ji.
There’s an accounts meeting today.’

Shukla-ji realised I
didn’t want to chat. He walked me to the jail exit. ‘Life
may not offer you the same chance twice,’ he said in parting.
The iron door clanged shut between us.

The calendar showed
tenth November - my last day as a twenty-three-year-old. I spent the
morning at my desk. The students’ representatives came to meet
me. They wanted to organise a college festival. I told them they
could, provided they got sponsors. After the student meeting, I had
to deal with a crisis. Two classrooms had water seepage in the walls.
I had to scream at the contractor for an hour before he sent people
to fix it.

At noon my lunch-box
arrived from home. I ate bhindi, dal and rotis. Alongside, I gave
Aarti a call. She didn’t pick up. I had back-to-back meetings
right after lunch. I wouldn’t be able to speak to her later. I
tried her number again.

‘Hello,’
an unfamiliar female voice said.

‘Who’s
this?’ I said.

‘This is Bela,
Aarti’s colleague from guest relations. You are Gopal, right? I
saw your name flash,’ she said.

‘Yeah. Is she
there?’

‘She went to
attend to a guest. Should I ask her to call you?’

‘Yes, please,’
I said.

‘Oh, and happy
birthday in advance,’ she said.

‘How did you
know?’ I said.

‘Well, she’s
working hard to make your gift ... oops!’

‘What?’

‘Maybe I
wasn’t supposed to tell you,’ Bela said. ‘I mean,
it’s a surprise. She’s making your birthday gift. It’s
so cute. She’s also ordered a cake ... Listen, she will kill me
if she finds out I told you.’

‘Relax, I wont
mention it to her. But if you tell me, I can also plan something for
her.’

‘You guys are
so sweet. Childhood friends, no?’ she said.

‘Yeah, so
what’s the plan?’

‘Well, she
will tell you she can’t meet you on your birthday. You will
sulk but she will say she has work. However, after work she will come
to your place in the afternoon with a cake and the gift.’

‘Good that you
told me. I will be at home then and not in meetings,’ I said.

‘You work on
your birthday?’ she said.

‘I work all
the time,’ I said. ‘Is she back?’

‘Not yet, I
will ask her to call you,’ she said. ‘But don’t
mention anything. Act like you don’t know anything.’

‘Sure,’
I said and ended the call.

It was time. I
called Vinod.

‘Vinod?’
I said.

‘Who’s
this?’ he said.

‘I am Gopal. I
work with MLA Shukla,’ I said.

‘Oh, so tell
me?’ he said.

‘I want
girls,’ I said.

He cut the call. I
called again but he didn’t pick up. I kept my phone aside.

After ten minutes I
received a call from an unknown landline number.

‘Vinod here.
You wanted girls?’

‘Yes,’ I
said.

‘Overnight or
hourly basis?’

‘Huh?’ I
said. ‘Afternoon. One afternoon.’

‘We have
happy-hour prices for afternoon. How many girls?’

‘One?’ I
said doubtfully.

‘Take two.
I’ll give a good price. Half off for the other one.’

‘One should be
okay.’

‘I’ll
send two. If you want two, keep both. Else, choose one.’

‘Done. How
much?’

‘What kind of
girl do you want?’

I didn’t know
what kinds he had. I had never ordered’ a call girl before. Did
he have a menu?

‘S ...
somebody nice?’ I said, like a total amateur.

‘English-speaking?
Jeans and all?’ he offered.

‘Yes,’ I
said.

Indian, Nepali or
white?’ he said. Varanasi wasn’t too far from the Nepal
border.

‘You have
white girls?’ I said.

‘It’s a
tourist town. Some girls stay back to work. Hard to find, but we can
do it.’

‘Send me
Indian girls who look decent. Who wont attract too much attention in
a college campus’

‘College?’
Vinod said, shocked. ‘We normally do hotels’

‘I own the
college. It’s okay.’

Vinod agreed after I
told him about GangaTech, and how he had to bring the girls to the
director’s bungalow.

‘So when do
you need them?’

‘Two o’clock
onwards, all afternoon, till six,’ I said.

‘Twenty
thousand,’ he said.

‘Are you
crazy?’ I said.

‘For
Shukla-jis reference. I charge foreigners that much for one.’

‘Ten.’

‘Fifteen.’

I heard a knock on
my door.

‘Done. At two
tomorrow. GangaTech on Lucknow Highway,’ I whispered and ended
the call.

‘The faculty
meeting,’ Shrivastava said from the door.

‘Oh, of
course,’ I said. ‘Please come in, Dean sir.’

I asked the peon to
place more chairs for our twenty faculty members.

‘Students tell
me it’s your birthday tomorrow, Director Gopal,’ the dean
said. The faculty went into orgasms. It’s fun being the boss.
Everyone sucks up to you.

‘Just another
day,’ I said.

‘The students
want to cut a cake for you,’ the dean said.

‘Please don’t.
I can’t,’ I said. The very thought of cutting a cake in
front of two hundred people embarrassed me.

‘Please, sir,’
said Jayant, a young faculty member. ‘Students look up to you.
It will mean a lot to them.’

I wondered if the
students would still look up to me if they knew about my
specifications to Vinod.

‘They have
already ordered a ten-kilo cake, sir,’ Shrivastava said. ‘Make
it quick,’ I said.

‘Ten minutes,
right after classes end at one,’ the dean said.

The faculty meeting
commenced. Everyone updated me about their course progress.

‘Let’s
look at placements soon,’ I said, ‘even though our
passing out batch is two years away.’

‘Jayant is the
placement coordinator,’ the dean said.

‘Sir, I am
already meeting corporates,’ Jayant said.

‘What is the
response?’ I said.

‘We are new,
so it is tough. Some HR managers want to know their cut,’
Jayant said.

‘Director
Gopal, as you may know...’ the dean began but I interrupted

him.

‘HR managers
want a cut if they hire from our colleges, correct?’ I said.

‘Right, sir,’
Jayant said.

Every aspect of
running a private college involved bribing someone. Why would
placements be an exception? But other members seemed surprised.

‘Personal
payout?’ gasped Mrs Awasthi, professor of mechanical
engineering.

Jayant nodded.

‘But these are
managers of reputed companies,’ she said, still in shock.

‘Mrs Awasthi,
this is not your department. You better update me on applied
mechanics, your course,’ I said.

You are a strange
customer,’ Roshni commented.

‘Shh!’ I
said and slid between the two naked women.

Roshni quickly began
to kiss my neck as Pooja bent to take off my

belt.

I started to count
my breaths. On my fiftieth exhale I heard footsteps. By now the girls
had taken off my belt most expertly and were trying to undo my jeans.
On my sixtieth inhale came the knock on the door. On my sixty-fifth
breath I heard three women scream at the same time.

‘Happy birt...
Oh my God!’ Aarti’s voice filled the room.

Roshni and Pooja
gasped in fear and covered their faces with the bed-sheet. I sat on
the bed, looking suitably surprised. Aarti froze. The hired girls,
more prepared for such a situation, ran into the bathroom. ‘Gopal!’
Aarti said on a high note of disbelief.

‘Aarti,’
I said and stepped out of bed. As I re-buttoned my jeans and wore my
shirt, Aarti ran out of the room.

I followed her down
the stairs. She ran down fast, dropping the heavy gifts midway. I
navigated past a fallen cake box and scrapbook to reach her. I
grabbed her elbow as she almost reached the main door.

‘Leave my
hand,’ Aarti said, her mouth hardly moving.

‘I can
explain, Aarti,’ I said.

1 said don’t
touch me,’ she said.

‘It’s
not what you think it is,’ I said.

‘What is it
then? I came to surprise you and this is how I found you. Who knows
what ... I haven’t seen anything,
anything,
more sick in
my life,’ Aarti said and stopped. She shook her head. This was
beyond words. She burst into tears.

‘MLA Shukla
sent them, as a birthday gift,’ I said.

She looked at me
again, still shaking her head, as if she didn’t believe what
she had seen or heard.

‘Don’t
get worked up. Rich people do this,’ I said.

Slap!

She hit me hard
across my face. More than the impact of the slap, the disappointed
look in her eyes hurt me more.

‘Aarti, what
are you doing?’ I said.

She didn’t say
anything, just slapped me again. My hand went to my cheek in reflex.
In three seconds, she had left the house. In ten, I heard her car
door slam shut. In fifteen, her car had left my porch.

I sank on the sofa,
both my knees useless.

Pooja and Roshni,
fully dressed, came down by and by. Pooja picked up the cake box and
the scrapbook from the steps. She placed them on the table in front
of me.

‘You didn’t
do anything with us, so why did you call a third girl?’ Roshni
demanded to know.

‘Just leave,’
I told them, my voice low.

They called their
creepy protector. Within minutes I was alone in my house.

I sat right there
for two hours, till it became dark outside. The maids returned and
switched on the lights. They saw me sitting and didn’t disturb
me.

The glitter on the
scrapbook cover shone under the lights. I picked it up.

‘A tale of a
naughty boy and a not so naughty girl,’ said the black cover,
which was hand-painted in white. It had a smiley of a boy and a girl,
both winking.

I opened the
scrapbook.

‘Once upon a
time, a naughty boy stole a good girl’s birthday cake,’
it said on the first page. It had a doodle of the teacher scolding me
and of herself, Aarti, in tears.

I turned the page.

The maids had
prepared a lavish dinner with three subzis, rotis and dal. I didn’t
touch it. I lay in bed and checked my phone. Aarti hadn’t
returned my calls all day. However, I didn’t call her again.

I thought again
about my plan.

At midnight, Aarti
called me.

‘Happy
birthday to you,’ Aarti sang on the other line.

‘Hey, Aarti,’
I said but she didn’t listen.

‘Happy
birthday to you,’ she continued to sing, elevating her pitch,
‘happy birthday to you, Gopal. Happy birthday to you.’

‘Okay, okay,
we are not kids anymore,’ I said.

She continued her
song.

‘Happy
birthday to you. You were born in the zoo. With monkeys and
elephants, who all look just like you,’ she said. She sang like
she did to me in primary school.

Corny as hell but it
brought tears of joy to my eyes. I couldn’t believe I had made
my plan.

‘Somebody is
very happy,’ I said.

‘Of course, it
is your birthday. That’s why I didn’t call or message you
all day.’

‘Oh,’ I
said.

‘What “oh”?
You didn’t even notice, did you?’ she sounded peeved. ‘Of
course, I did. Even my staff wondered why my phone hadn’t
beeped all day in office.’

I got off the bed
and switched on the lights.

‘Anyway, I
thought hard about what to give you, who has everything.’

‘And?’

‘I couldn’t
figure out.’

‘Oh, that’s
okay. I don’t want anything.’

‘Maybe I will
buy you something when we meet,’ she said.

‘When are we
meeting?’ I said, even though Bela had told me her plans.

‘See, tomorrow
is difficult, I have a double shift.’

‘You won’t
meet me on my birthday?’ I said.

‘What to do?’
she said. ‘Half the front-office staff is absent. Winter
arrives and everyone makes excuses of viral fever.’

‘Okay,’
I said. I must say, she could act pretty well. I almost believed

her.

‘Happy
birthday again, bye!’ she said.

A number of birthday
messages popped into my inbox. They came from various contractors,
inspectors and government officials I had pleased in the past. The
only other personal message was from Shukla-ji, who called me up.

‘May you live
a thousand years,’ he said.

‘Thanks, you
remembered?’ I replied.

‘You are like
my son,’ he said.

‘Thank you,
Shukla-ji, and good night,’ I said.

I switched off the
lights. I tried to sleep before the big day tomorrow.

Enough, enough,’
I said as the tenth student fed me cake.

We had assembled in
the foyer of the main campus building. The staff and students had
come to wish me. The faculty gave me a tea-set as a gift. The
students sang a prayer song for my long life.

‘Sir, we hope
for your next birthday there will be a Mrs Director on campus,’
Suresh, a cheeky first-year student, announced in front of everyone,
leading to huge applause. I smiled and checked the time. It was two
o’ clock. I thanked everyone with folded hands.

I left: the main
building to walk home.

Happy birthday!:
Aarti messaged me.

Where are you?: I
asked.

Double shift just
started.  she sent her response.

Vinod called me at
2:15. My heart raced.

‘Hi,’ I
said nervously.

‘The girls are
in a white Tata Indica. They are on the highway, will reach campus in
five minutes’