Chapter 31

Arif was smiling. Laughing. Chortling. Throwing his hands up in the air and leaping around like an ecstatic acoylte at the Kumbh mela. Freaking out.

This was the happiest day of his life.

Sarla was gone. Out of his life. Vapourized. History.

Past tense.

The woman who had plagued him these last few years. Whose constant demands had become a drain on his resources -- both emotionally and financially. Whose interests, choice of friends, and outlook on life had developed so differently from his own that they had become two completely different individuals from the people they had once been, back in the ancient times when they had met, mated and married.

The wife who had become his worst enemy.

The daughter of the rich lala from whom he had made the mistake of borrowing money -- not really borrowing, but simply accepting the "interest-free loan" Mr Gupta had given him -- to set up his business. A business that had become a travesty of everything he believed in. The exact opposite of how he had wanted to function.

And because Sarla's father had financed him -- and continued to finance him when the business struggled against mounting losses -- he had felt trapped, imprisoned in a life he had never wanted for himself.

And Sarla had assumed she owned him. That he was nothing without her. That she was the great benefactor who had raised him up from the gutter. And without her father's money and her so-called social contacts and snobbish graces, he would have been just another nobody slogging in a mid-level job for the rest of his life.

But now she was gone. And he was free. Free to live life on his own terms. To do as he pleased. Work as he wished. To pursue the dreams that really mattered.

And so he was happy. Maha khush. And to prove it, he was dancing a jig around the empty flat, still holding the note that Sarla had cello-taped to the inside of the front door.

"BYE, SARLA!" he yelled as he danced. Repeating it over and over again, like a disco crowd at a hot dance shop chanting a favourite chorus. And as he yelled out the words, he fell automatically into the rhythm of one of his favourite numbers, the old Everly Brothers number, Bye Bye Love:

"Bye bye, love/ Bye bye, happiness/ Hello, loneliness/I think I'm gonna die!"

He was singing so loudly, he didn't hear the phone ring at first. Then, as the strident jangling echoed through the empty flat, he caught it and slowed down. He stopped whirling and grinned stupidly, drunkenly dizzy from having spun around so fast and so long.

Staggering to the phone, he punched the speakerphone button and spoke in a monotonous, bored voice:"You've reached the Merchant residence. We're not here right now, but you can leave your name and number after the beep and we'll get back to you." He followed it with a sustained "Beeeeep" the veered dangerously close to a fart. And stood there, waiting.

After a moment, a very husky female voice spoke with a distinct trace of amusement. "Cute, Arif. But I don't think answering machines get out of breath, do you?!"

He frowned, trying to recognise the voice. It sounded so familiar, loaded with such a strong evocation of sensuality and suppressed eroticism that he was certain it was a woman he had known very intimately. Perhaps even a woman he had--

It came to him with a tiny thrill of guilty pleasure: Lena Kapoor. He was about to snatch up the receiver when she spoke again, her next words throwing him off-guard.

"I heard about Sarla," she said.

He blinked sweat from his eyes. How could she have "heard" about Sarla when he himself had just found out about her about ten minutes ago? Before he could think of a suitable response, she went on: "I think you could use a pick-me-up right now, don't you? I'll come by your place in about, let's say, half an hour? There's something I'd like to show you." And he was left with the dial tone in his ear.