The Bestseller She Wrote (31 page)

‘She might. Some old friends have come over and she is spending some time with them.’ He picked up the drink from the counter and handed it to Aditya. ‘Here,’ he said as Aditya reached out for the glass.

The second peg of Laphroaig didn’t take much time to finish either. All it needed was a couple of gulps. His phone vibrated. He pulled it out and looked at the screen. It was Shreya.

‘Hi, Aditya. Where are you?’ she said the moment he picked up.

‘At home with Sanjay. Sorry missed your calls.’

‘What? Oh okay,’ she said, surprised. ‘Someone from Poonam Saxena’s office, from
Hindustan Times
, had called in the evening. I couldn’t call you earlier because you were on a flight. You had spoken to them about me I guess. They wanted to do a telephonic interview tomorrow. I haven’t dealt with these media guys; wanted some gyan. They said that she will call me at ten tomorrow morning.’

‘It will not be too complicated. She is an experienced and professional journo. You won’t have any problem with her. Just be yourself. Don’t try to ape anyone. It will be . . .’ The shrill ring of a phone interrupted him. He looked around. Sanjay smiled at him. ‘It’s Diana’s. I set a loud ringtone for her. Of late she has been accusing me of missing her calls too often.’ He rushed to pick up the call, leaving Aditya alone talking to Shreya.

‘Where were we,’ Aditya said. ‘Oh yes—Poonam, the
Hindustan Times
. You don’t need to worry at all, Shreya. It will be fine. You will be one of the first debutant authors that they would have covered, if they end up covering you that is.’

‘She is sure to ask me about you. What should I say?’

‘Tell her that I am your boyfriend and that I am someone who you are madly in love with.’

‘Shut up, Aditya. Seriously, tell me please.’

‘Just say that it is too personal for you to answer and that if she needs any clarifications she can talk to me. That should work.’ He advised Shreya on a few other things and disconnected.

He went to refill his glass. Sanjay was in the living room still talking to Diana. He looked at the clock on the wall. It was fast approaching midnight. He refilled the glass and plonked himself in front of the TV. Star sports was playing highlights from the Indo-Pak world cup pre-quarterfinals match in 1996. It was always fun to watch India vs. Pakistan matches. He recollected those days from campus when they would go to watch the matches in the stadium. They would go in a large group—Maya, Sanjay, and a few other friends of theirs. Great atmosphere, great company, great energy. He missed those days.

73

A
DITYA PICKED UP
Shreya on his way to work next morning. She wanted to prepare for the Poonam Saxena interview.

‘If you max it, and she ends up being impressed with you, she can work wonders for you,’ said Aditya. He gave her tips on how to manage tricky questions. ‘Do not let your guard down at any point in time,’ he told her. Just as he was driving into the office building, he added, ‘One last piece of unsolicited advice. There is nothing off the record for the press. If anything has to be off the record, then keep it that way. Don’t say it.’

*

Diana came looking for Aditya that afternoon. ‘I wanted to talk to you yesterday. But Sanjay told me that you had conked off.’

Aditya gave her a wry smile. ‘I had a drink too many,’ he confessed.

‘I had a long chat with Maya yesterday.’

‘About?’

‘You. What else?’

Aditya’s interest was aroused. He sat up straight and rested his elbows on the table in front.

‘She is upset. Really upset to see that you are still with Shreya helping her launch her book. She was referring to your tweets. I tried explaining to her that you are doing it more for visual impact. But she is not ready to believe it. She thinks that’s a tale you are spinning for our consumption too.’

‘I would have been disappointed had she not got upset. She just refuses to talk to me. I can’t even speak to her and explain,’ Aditya rued.

‘I know it is none of my business, Aditya, but I was a bit concerned,’ Diana continued. She looked nervous. The pen in her hand was nervously scribbling on the blank paper lying on Aditya’s table. ‘I was talking to Sanjay yesterday
and . . .’

Their conversation was interrupted by Aditya’s subordinate who walked in without knocking. Not wanting Diana to leave, Aditya stepped out of the room leaving Diana behind.

‘Asshole . . . These guys can never do anything on their own,’ he complained as he walked back five minutes later. ‘Anyway, what were you saying Diana?’

‘I was saying that I had mentioned this to Sanjay in the past and he didn’t seem too perturbed. That’s probably because he knows you for a bit too long now. But if you promise me that you won’t get upset, I will tell you what is bothering me.’ She was struggling to look him in the eye, probably embarassed to ask him something which she felt might offend him. The pen in her hand was constantly scribbling away on the paper on his table; a sign of her being jittery and anxious.

Aditya noticed. ‘What is it, Diana? The days when I was upset with you are over. Now I know you are on my side.’

‘I know we had rationalised this in the past, but the fact remains that Shreya has caused much angst—she screwed up your reputation, set you up in a manner that made you vulnerable to accusations of being a plagiariser. In essence she ruined your personal and professional life. I’m worried that in the quest to save yourself by sleeping with the enemy, are you getting deeper and deeper in the quagmire? Are you getting into an inextricable position?’ Diana looked up at him, worried.

‘Nothing in life can put you in an inextricable position unless you yourself want to be in such a position,’ Aditya said.

‘But she can harm you. If history is something to go
by . . .’

‘True but history also gives you a precedent to go by. History tells you what to expect. And now that I do know, I am very careful. Trust me, Diana, I know what I am doing.’

‘I will never understand this,’ Diana sighed. ‘As far as Maya is concerned, all I can say is that she will take a helluva lot of convincing.’ She got up from the chair. ‘And by the way, the expense management committee inputs from your team are pending. I have got the reco from all the other teams. Can you send it by tonight?’

‘Shit. I completely forgot about it,’ Aditya said. ‘I’ll get cracking on it right away. Can you give me one more day please?’ Diana looked annoyed, so he requested, ‘Sorry, Diana. With all the confusion in my personal life, I completely forgot about it. Just one more day?’

‘Okay, fine. One more day,’ she said and left the room.

Aditya looked at all the papers lying on the table, gathered them together and moved them to a side. As he was doing that he spotted the paper Diana had scribbled on. Even the scribble was neatly done, in the form of neat patterns. Her fidgety behaviour amused him. He was about to crumple the piece of paper and throw it into the waste paper basket, when something struck him. He smoothed out the paper and looked at it again. He had seen similar scribbles somewhere else. He couldn’t remember where. He tried hard to, but his memory failed him.

He went back to his laptop. As Diana had said, the expense committee inputs were due. He didn’t want to delay it further.

74

W
ORRIED ABOUT THE
costs in the Retail Bank going up, despite them sacking 300 people, Tim had set up a cross functional expense management team under Diana. The Financial control team had sent details of all costs incurred in various departments to the respective department heads and asked for their recommendations on how to bring the overall cost down.

Aditya cursorily looked at the cost lines. The branch rentals had remained stable. They hadn’t opened a new bank branch in the last one year. The salary costs had marginally gone down, but the cost of separation of 300 people had hit them badly. That apart, the only cost line which seemed high was that of miscellaneous expenses, the incidentals—the cost of tea and coffee in the branches, the cost of client entertainment, staff entertainment, telephone bills, communication, stationery, courier, etc. He forwarded the mail to Diana with a comment. ‘Let’s look closely at stationery, branch entertainment, communication and local conveyance. We might get some joy there.’

He called his planning officer and asked him to get access to the bills paid and give him a top-level analysis. Hardly had he kept the phone down when Shreya walked in.

‘Finished the call?’ Aditya smiled and asked her.

‘Yaaa!’ Her eyes were round in excitement. ‘Poonam Saxena is a terror!’

‘Haha!’ Aditya laughed. ‘Why, what happened?’

‘The kind of questions she was asking me, my god! She is so persistent. Kept nudging and prodding, till I answered all her questions.’

‘Forget all that. Is she putting you on the cover or not?’

‘How can I ask her directly, Aditya? But she herself came up with an interesting proposition. I didn’t know how to respond. So I told her that I would ask you and confirm.’

Aditya looked at her wondering what it could be.

‘She said she is happy to do a big story if you are willing to come on board.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘If you are willing to be a part of the story, they will do a master-apprentice kind of a feature on the two of us. A cover story!’

‘A master-apprentice story or a relationship story? I will do it, if it is the former.’

‘So you will be a part of the story?’

‘Of course. Anything that helps you. Don’t worry. I will speak to her.’

‘Really? Oh, that would be so awesome!’ Shreya exclaimed. Her eyes gleamed with excitement. ‘I’ll be on the cover of
HT Brunch
. Wow!’

‘Only thing that worries me is that if I come on it, they will give me all the weightage and it will take the focus away from you. I just want to make sure that they don’t do that.’

‘Thanks, Aditya.’ She was still grinning from ear to ear. ‘You have made my day,’ Shreya said as she walked out of the room.

The moment she left, Aditya dialled Poonam’s number.

‘Hi, Poonam,’ he said the moment the phone got picked up.

‘Hey, Aditya. I have been wanting to call you,’ she said, her voice clear.

‘No wonder I was feeling so lucky today, Poonam.’

‘Haha! You are in the news. This new chick in your life is making waves.’

‘Oh that . . . The party line is that I am helping her promote her new book. Wink Wink,’ he laughed.

‘I was speaking to her a while ago. She asked me if I would put her on the cover. Even established authors and celebrities don’t ask me that question so directly.’

‘She did?’

‘Yes, she did. Stumped me for a minute. I didn’t know what to say.’

‘Rare occurance, you getting stumped,’ Aditya laughed.

‘Exactly. But I told her that if she gets you to be a part of the story, I will put both of you on the cover.’

‘So gracious of you, Poonam.’

She laughed. ‘You know how it is. Anyway, the moment I said this, she got excited and agreed. She said that she will be able to get you to agree.’

‘When do you plan to bring out the issue if I do agree?’

‘Our next three weeks are already scheduled—closed out. So I guess the earliest we can do is five to six weeks from now.’

Aditya looked at the desktop calendar in front of him. ‘Five weeks from now should be fine. I will come on board.’

‘Would you mind if I help you to make it interesting?’

‘Not at all,’ Poonam readily agreed. ‘It will only lend authenticity to the entire story.’

The ring of his extension interrupted the conversation. ‘Great. Let’s do a story which no one has done before.’ He hurriedly closed his conversation with Poonam and hung up.

‘Yeah?’ he said as he picked up.

‘Can you come up to my room for ten minutes?’

‘What happened?’

‘Come up. I will tell you.’

‘Be there in a flash,’ he said and disconnected the phone.

As promised he was in Sanjay’s room in five minutes. Sanjay was talking to one of his team members and asked him to wait in his cabin. Aditya walked in and sat down on the Featherlite chair. He stretched himself to the fullest and raised his hands way above his head. He was tired. He looked around the room. Sanjay was very organised. A place for everything and everything in its place—Sanjay was one of the few men who believed in the adage. The pens were in the pen-stand and not on the table, papers were neatly filed away, books were arranged systematically, held in place by the bookends which Diana had gifted him. The mail was neatly opened and envelopes stapled to the letters. Everything was so perfect.

Aditya looked around as he thought about his life. If only his life was as clean. The plagiarism issue now threatened to mess up his writing career as well. No publisher would touch him if they ever found out. He had to do something to get out of this mess that life had become.