Radhika Khatri

I entered the bedroom and looked at the analog clock on the bedside table, which was on the other side of the bed on my left. It was slightly tilted towards me, and showed the time twenty-two-forty-seven with its sharp red light. “It’s good of Kartik to let me live with him,” I thought, “And obviously he won’t ask for money in return. But, I needa repay it in some form.” I glared at the white bed-sheet on the bed and thought, “I came here to help him out with the case, and I thought that I would give it my all, no matter what, to make it a success. Kartik always helps me, but I can never repay. Why?”

Suddenly, my phone started ringing in my pocket. I took it out through my right hand, and looked on the screen with the name ‘Kartik’ flashing on it. “Speak of the devil.” I took up the call by touching the green button, and moved the phone towards my ears. “Hey, everything okay there? What’s the status? Did you find that man?”

“Whoa, firstly you have to say ‘moshi-moshi’ before taking up the call.”

“Stop your weeb stuff, Kartik, and grow up,” I scolded him, with a slight smile on my face.

“I will, someday,” He replied. “But first, answer my question. Why do you sound so sad?”

TING! TRING! The wind chimes suddenly stroked and tinged. I turned right, and looked at the open window, through which I can see the empty black sky embedded with a lot of shiny stars. “Uh, I don’t think I sound sad.”

“Well, that was a hunch, but I really thought you were kinda sad when you first spoke.”

“Haha! These types of things don’t suit you, idiot.”

“Okay, okay! But…” Suddenly, his voice lowered and he spoke, “… we still got no lead.”

“It was just the first day. I know that the tipper will call again.”

“He will, but I’m now starting the think that what if somehow he’s caught up with TES. We can’t lose him, because we needa stop the sinister plans of TES.”

“Don’t think negatively, pal! Take it easy. I know that he will find his way out to you.”

“I hope that too.”

Some dozen of seconds passed away, and there was no talk in those dozen seconds. Just silence. Then, he suddenly asked, “What happened? Do you wanna say something?”

“Uh… I don’t know how I should put it…” I shyly replied.

“Just start speaking what comes into your mind. I’ll understand it.”

“What happened?” The young Kartik in his twenties asked me as he sat beside me on a public chair in front of an empty road in the midst of the night. “You look sad.”

“Uh, do I know you?” I asked.

“No, I suppose. But, from my room, I see you every day sitting here and doing nothing, but staring at the sky.”

“Because… My boyfriend just recently left me for another girl.”

He smiled and said, “Well, I may have no right, but I’d like to say two things here. May I?”

“Sure, you may.”

“Firstly, since he left you, it means that he didn’t like you and hence, didn’t even deserve you. If you two even had a future, neither you nor he’d be happy, right? So, it’s better he left you, because who can leave you for another one now could have done countless shit behind your back.”

I nodded and tilted my head down towards the ground. After some seconds, I said, “Yes, you’re right.”

“Secondly, your life is not a depressing melodrama, right? Because sitting in the dark is not what a truly depressed person would do.”

“W-What do you mean?” I turned at him.

“Ah, I didn’t mean to hurt you. You must have been feeling depressed and sad, and I have no right to judge you. What I really meant to say was, sitting in one corner of darkness… it’s not real. It only happens in movies.”

“Then… What should I do in these times of darkness?”

He stood up, looked skywards, and said, “Get up and fight. That’s what you’re supposed to do.” He turned at me and raised a hand at me. “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“I didn’t mean it like that, Kartik.”

“Oh, then… what did you…?”

“Let’s leave it. Anyways, today, at-at the meeting… Mr. Keshav Arora and Mr. Rahul Khanna came to meet the team during the meeting.”

“Th-That’s good, I guess,” He replied, unsure if it was actually good or not.

“It… It actually ain’t. They asked for the news reports and updates, and when we declined, he said that we were incompetent for the job.”

“W-What?!” He was startled. He thought, “Shit! My plan of not giving the latest updates backfired us!” He asked me, “So, are we out of the case?”

“Y-Yes, we were fired. He even said that… you-you should not have gone on the ‘vacation’.”

“We can’t tell them why I’m here, or what we the latest updates are. And to think of that to… What are we gonna do now?”

“Even Richa and Sonia declined to work independently. They said it had no profit for us, and the other team will do it no matter what.”

“No, the new team won’t!” He shouted. “The PM and his party will do anything now to make sure it’s their men who run this case!”

“I-I never thought of that…” I replied. “It-It completely ran out of my head.”

“It means that we have one more reason to do something about it.”

“But we still have no idea what we are supposed to do now.”

“I-I guess I do…”