Disclaimer: Totally a fictitious story. Totally did not happen to anyone, alive or dead.
*avoids eye contact with MS Word*
So, there was a group of young new recruits (management professionals), on a trip to various locations on Corporate Business Induction. There was just one female in the group, by the way; let’s call her The Girl. The induction went rather smooth, as per plan, for the first blessed 2-3 days, with no ‘accidents’ or notable untoward incidents.
One fine afternoon, however:
The group moved out from one particular regional office (in the outskirts), after hours of gyaan and discussion; Lunch at a famous resort some miles away, beckoned- especially to The Girl, who had always shared a more intimate relationship with Food than with Enlightenment. *Blogger pauses to swallow a mouthful of her aadhi-raat-wali Maggi*
She rushed ahead of the group, towards the vehicle, to grab a comfortable seat (in the initial 3 days, she had enjoyed the prerogative of the co-driver’s seat, by virtue of being The Girl. However, as deceptions never last long, she was soon recognized for lack of Lady-Likeness, and brazenly asked to sit squashed in the passengers’ seat- always with too many passengers in it. The Co-driver’s seat, it was established, was to go to the healthier ones. Oh, those sweet days, when she was not counted amongst the ‘healthier’ ones. What? Empathy is an important skill!)
As the others bid farewell to their hosts, and proceeded towards the vehicle, in the second of a divine moment, she noticed, to her horror, a split in the arm of her crisp, relatively new, full-sleeved Formal Shirt. Like a patch of benign tumor, it was there. Proud and visible, but, only just. And so far, visible only to the one who’d know to look. The Girl, usually slow in all responses to everyday stimuli, swung into action, and excused herself to one side. Looking out for some shop (any shop) in the almost-remote area, she discovered one, and hurriedly purchased a roll of thread and a needle, walked back into the vehicle, with as much dignity as she could muster. Note that since half her energy was invested in keeping the tumor out of public view, there wasn’t much dignity mustered.
So, they reached the resort, and starving souls- all, walked right into the restaurant. As soon everybody took a seat, she excused herself and rushed to the restroom with only her bag, and prayers on her badly ripped person. And once in there, she got to work, like she never had. They made the Needle and the thread still the same as they did many years back, when she was a little girl, making homely dresses for Barbie and Skipper (that the spoilt videshi brats would never wear).
It was a huge place- the resort; half way through the task, quite a few minutes had expired, and her phone rang. One of the group members wanted to know where she had disappeared to- it was a small group, and ‘rushing out to shop silly, with an entire group (including an elderly gentleman) waiting on her, for official lunch, was not the best way to bond’ He conveyed something to this effect. In very different words. She drew a long breath, and, as all of us who must take an unavoidable call in the Oh-so-obvious-echo-walls of a loo, she shut her eyes and muttered something cogent in response, before hanging up. Okay, she encouraged herself..almost done! A few more minutes, and this will be as good as it can get! And a few minutes later, the patch was (shabbily) stitched, no doubt..but horror of horrors: it was patched inside out! :-O
As a hypothetical tear rolled down her dramatic cheek, she got another (more polite) call of reminder: Erm.. “Where the *heaven* had she disappeared?” Only, they didn’t mention Heaven. She swallowed the shame of another Oh-so-obviously-loo-voice, and solemnly resolving to never forgive the Ironing lady for scorching her shirt (If she’d wanted it scorched, she’d have done it herself! This was stuff The Girl was good at!). She undid the effort of the first 10 minutes, and 15 more minutes of agony and an sms beep (‘where are u?!’) later, she had managed to pull the rip together. It was not the most professional wear, but, at least not something for which she could be charged with ‘misconduct’. In an illogical act of compensation, she diligently rubbed each of her feet against the legs- in a bid to make her forever-unpolished and soiled- shoes sparkle. Not a bad job- she heaved a big sigh of relief. Drenched in sweat, she stepped out (sheepishly, for she had been in for almost 30 minutes). As she dragged herself to the sink, she did a double take: an unfamiliar face jumped out at her, in the mirror: Behind her, on the floor, sat one of the cleaning ladies.
This one, looked like she meant business. And it was not mops.
Throwing the zapped Girl a look that was suspicion, accusation, disgust, and tch-tch all rolled into one set of deadly eyeballs, she stared hard.
Finally, The Girl, dripping sweat and water (and shame) blurt out a cry: Kya hai?! (What is it?)
The lady, employing her best I-know-what-you-did-last-Summer tone, retorted:
‘Mujhe pata hai aap andar kya kar rahe the’ (I know what you were doing in there.)
The Girl: ???
The Lady, continued, triumphantly, like one who’s just caught a thief red-handed :
Aap Cigarette Pee rahe the na! (I know you were smoking a cigarette)
The Girl: .. (tugging at her freshly-sown arm).. !!!! :-O ??
The Lady confided conspirationally: Aap jaise bahut Madam aati hain yahan pe, cigarette peene ke liye! Tch tch.
(Lots of young women like you sneak in here, to smoke a cigarette. Tch tch!)
The Girl: (recovering from her stupor, rather stupidly): Kya?! Nahi Aunty… main toh.. (Pointing idiotically at her patched up sleeve) yeh fat gaya tha.. main see rahi thi..dekho! (An implied, “Cigarettes! Haww.Chii.” )
(What?! Noo, Lady!.. this had gotten ripped off, I was stitching it back together!)
The Bourgeois-Proletariat divide be damned! It was very important that no elderly lady run around with the idea of The Girl sneaking around to smoke. ‘Non-smoker’ was the only highlight of her otherwise pathetic personal-resume.
The Lady seemed to consider that. Or maybe not. But The Girl had to rush. And rush she did.
Oh, she was not so hungry anyway, she told the table, drowning the sound of a rumbling tummy.
And yes, the little shops outside were fascinating enough.
For anyone would rather be remembered by their newly-acquainted colleagues as The-One-With-The-Bad-Table-Manners than The-One With-The-Wardrobe-Malfunction.
The blogger was reminded of this story, on a completely unrelated note the other day: The Girl was reported by some Metro travelers, swiping her card madly at each of the three exit machines, for good five minutes. None would let her pass. A group of eye-witnesses report that she did finally reach the conclusion that her company-access swipe card may not work on Metro machines. She did not look very happy about the eye-witnesses though. They did not bother to cover up their *pointing and Ha-ha-ha-ha*
The blogger, lately unsettled in her head, was scouting for some stories to strongly distract herself. And this was the one that popped up into her mind.
******* Written last night, posted on March 20, 2012.
Ron
