the morning, just to talk to him. I would feel sleepy in office,’ Mr. Gupta said.
‘As if you do anything else in office, that milkman is cheating us. We are paying him two hundred extra and he gives us one bottle less’, she said.
This hit a raw nerve with Mr. Gupta. He hated when someone tricked him of his money. It was not hard- earned but all the same it was his money and he was not going to give it to anyone without a fight.
‘I am not getting up at five in the morning,’ he said.
‘Who is asking you to get up at five, you can call him up and speak to him,’ she said. This had not stuck Mr. Gupta; he always hated it when she made him look silly.
He searched for the bill that the milkman had given and there found their contact numbers.
‘I put five bottles there every day, sahib,’ the milkman said.
‘ I got only four, last two day…only four’
‘I am telling you the truth, sahib. As it is, it is a stiff climb to your house. I know I put five bottles there’.
‘THERE WERE ONLY FOUR BOTTLES, today and yesterday,’ Gupta said. His voice was now loud and shaky.
‘Sahab, do not get angry with me. Why would I lie, I am telling you that all five bottles every morning. Someone is stealing one bottle,’ the milkman said.
Mr. Gupta has not thought about this before. Stealing milk…that sounded silly.
‘Why would anyone steal milk,’ he thought. This new direction in the argument calmed him down though.
‘Let me check. But if later if I find out that anyone is fooling me, I will complain to the police’, Mr. Gupta said.
The milkman on the other side of the phone laughed, he knew the local police well. They did not bother to register cases of robbery and theft, and were certainly not going to entertain any one coming in to report the theft of a milk bottle.
‘Yes Sahib, you should certainly go to the police,’ he said.
Mr. Gupta detected a hint of sarcasm in the voice.
‘Yes I will, ‘Mr. Gupta replied and disconnected the call.
‘Could someone be stealing the bottles?’ thought Mr. Gupta,’ let me check with Varma ji.’
The Varma’s were the nearest neighbors they had. Verma was an officer with the income tax department. He lived with his wife and son, on the other side of the road. He would have been around the same age as Mr. Gupta but they still added a ‘ji’ after their names as mark of respect.
R.K Gupta did not like Mr. Verma. Verma looked young for his age was a fitness fanatic and used to go on an early morning jog. Mrs. Verma was in her early forties but retained the looks from her younger days. Survana did not like her.
The Vermas’ were from Punjab and had all the arrogant, pushy, exuberance that characterized their tribe. Their son, Mohit, was in junior college, good-looking and quite popular with the girls. Mallika, Gupta ji’s daughter had noted this the first time the Verma’s had come over to their house. Since that day, she would never let go an opportunity to watch Mohit from her house. There were certain vantage points in front of the house where if you sat, you would be clearly visible from the Verma’s house. She hoped Mohit would be watching her and eventually who knows how things might turn out in future…
Mr. Gupta made the journey downhill. By the time he had reached the Verma’s front door, he was out of breath.
‘I must start some form of exercise, even coming down the hill is making me tired,’ he though as he gasped for air and rang the doorbell.
It was Verma ji’s wife who opened the door. Varma ji’s wife, Vandana was on the wrong side of forties and tried her best not to show it. She was wearing a tight T-shirt and stretchy pants. There was something written on the front of her t-shirt. Gupta had to struggle with himself, to keep his eyes from reading the message on the front of the t-shirt. Vandana had noticed how men were always ogling at young girls who wore outrageous costumes, which hardly left anything to imagination. She knew that at her age she had to show a bit extra, to stay in the completion. Men like Gupta ji though were easy targets.
‘ What a pleasant surprise, Gupta ji,’ she said in her shrill voice, pressing herself against the door
A faint whiff of body lotions and perfumes was wafting from her direction and Gupta ji was finding it difficult to breathe. He still managed to mumble out a few words.
‘How are you Mrs. Varma?’
‘Vandana… call me Vandana,’she said. ‘Or you can call me Vandu’.
Mr. Gupta’s heart started beating erratically. Small beads of perspiration started forming on his forehead.
‘I was going on my morning walk and thought I would drop by,’ Gupta said.
‘Oh, Mohit’s father has still not returned from his early morning jog. Why don’t you come in?’ she said. ’Mohit is still sleeping’.
Gupta ji had almost stepped in the house when the phone in his pocket started ringing and brought him back to reality.
‘ May be some other time, ’he said and stepped back. On his way back across the street, he thought of Suvarna who had now put on tons of fat and hardly ever smiled at him.
‘Verma ji is a lucky man. Why can’t Suvarna be like her,’ he thought. The sound of screeching tires brought him back to the world.
‘Watch where you are going, you jerk,’ the driver shouted.
‘You idiot, can’t you drive more carefully,’ Gupta shouted back.
‘Idiot, I am in a car, you are the one who was walking on the street’ the driver replied and speed away.
‘Come out of your car and I will show you,’ Gupta shouted, but by then the car had disappeared in the distance. As he stood there, he remembered that the phone was still ringing in his pocket. He took it out and saw a big ‘S’ showing as the callers identity. It was Suvarna calling.
‘Shit,’ he said and disconnected quickly.
As he reached the door, Suvarna was waiting there for him, arms on her hips with an irritated look on her face.
‘Why did you cut my phone?’ she asked.
‘I was on my way back, I thought why waste one call,’ he said. ‘You distracted me, I was almost run over on the road’
‘so, did you ask Verma ji about the milk bottle?’
‘ What milk bottle?’ Gupta ji had almost forgotten the reason why he had gone there in the first place. ‘I…I…I was just talking to Verma ji….about the pay commission. We were discussing how it would affect our salaries’. He had come up with that in a second. He knew mentioning Vandana at this point could start an argument, which he had no chance of winning.
‘You went to their house at eight in the morning to discuss about the pay commission. You must have stood there and chatted with that woman’. At times, Suvarna’s intuition was uncanny.
‘She was not there, at least I didn’t meet her,’ said Gupta and hurried to the bathroom.
‘I am getting late for office,’ he said as he closed the door behind him.
‘Yeah right, you have a lot of work in office, ’she said sarcastically.
Baring the car-driver incident, his day had started quite well he thought. He tried to recollect the smell of the perfume. It was a heady combination of jasmine and a few other flowers. He thought about the tight t-shirt. ‘Call me Vandu’, he remembered.
‘I think she likes me,’ he thought and a shiver went down his spine. He dressed quickly and hurried outside. The coldness with Suvarna continued and she did not come to see him off. Not that Gupta ji minded that. Suvarna was watching hidden behind the curtains as Gupta ji left. She watched as he walked down the stairs, went into the garage got his scooter out, started it , got on and rode away down the road. Then her eyes went towards the Varma house and she saw Verma ji coming back from his jog. This made her think.
‘If he has returned just now from his jog, who was talking with Ramu?’ she thought. ‘So he is hiding things from me. Let him come home today, I have a few things to ask him,’
The next day again one bottle was missing. Suvarna had woken up without any pr
ompting that day. In fact, she had been unable to sleep properly the previous night. She had had a nightmare where she saw a younger version of herself, in school uniform. She had watched in horror, as a dark man in a t-shirt with TB written on it was throwing milk bottles on the ground and breaking them. She had woken up drenched in sweat and found Mr. Gupta still asleep, as his alarm had still not gone off.
When Mr.Gupta returned and reported the missing bottle again that morning, Suvarna had exploded.
‘ What is the use having you in the house?’ she said,’ you cannot even find out where one bottle of milk is disappearing’,
‘What can I do about it?’ said Mr. Gupta , ‘I have a thousand things to worry about’.
‘Right, name one?’
‘ I don’t have to prove myself to you’
‘Right, you have all the time in the world to go and talk to that female,’ she said point at the house of the Varma’s,’ Yet you do not have any time to solve the problems in your own house’.
Back and forth, it went for some time. Mr. Gupta knew there was no way he could win the argument. So he took the easy way out.
‘ I am going to office,’ he said,’ I don’t want any breakfast,’
He stormed off towards the bathroom, had a quick bath, dressed, and still fuming went down the steps. There he go on his scooter and drove away. He was half way to his office when he saw someone waving him over. It was Varma ji on his way back from his early morning jog.
Gupta pulled up beside him on the street and took off his helmet.
‘ Where are you going, fully dressed, even the market would not