Changing Shades 8

Things could not have gone on the same way for much longer, and they didn't.

But how matters would come to a head, Mansi could not have even dreamed.

Aditya came into office a few weeks later in a temper. He was early, and neither Mansi nor Anjali was in yet. He barked at Suresh, and sent him scurrying off to call the girls. When Anjali came in, he barked at her too. She answered back politely but fearlessly, and he grouched into his room.

“Send Mansi in when she comes,” he shot at her. “And you can tell her if she's late again, she can look for another job. I don't tolerate nonsense in my office.”

“She's not late, you are early,” Anjali replied, calmly. “She left at past 2 last night. The plans you need are on your desk. She left them there.”
“How do you know?” he barked, and Anjali looked at him coolly. “She called me last night to tell me,” she said, making no attempt to hide her annoyance. “She was afraid she might be late today, because she left so late, so she wanted me to wake her up in the morning.”

Aditya stared at her.

“She's got a whole army of servants to wake her up, and she wants you to call her?”

Anjali didn't reply. She got busy with her computer, and didn't look at him.

“I'll have this lot of letters and the proposal finished by the morning,” she said, briskly. “Is there anything else you need done today?”

“I'll call you when there is,” he said. “Send Mansi in when she comes.”

Anjali didn't look up till he had closed his door, then she stopped her work and gave a sigh of relief.

“Boy oh boy, you nearly blew that one, woman,” she admonished herself, and looked up with a smile, as Mansi opened the door cautiously and came in.

“Storm warning,” she said, briefly. Mansi sighed.

“I really can't take it today,” she muttered, collapsing into her chair. “I'm exhausted, and on top of that, I just got 2 hours of sleep last night. Mummy called in the morning at 5! She wanted to remind me to eat something. It's karva chauth.”

Anjali stared at her disbelievingly.
“Do you still keep it?”

“I didn't the last two years,” confessed Mansi. “It's all over, except in name, so I didn't. I don't think of him as my husband any more, anyway.”

“Then why…” began Anjali, and Mansi looked at her with a twisted smile.

“You'll tell me I'm a fool, again, and I need my head examined. Maybe I do, at that.”

Anjali whistled. “You are,” she agreed. Then she hugged the other girl. “But he’s a bigger fool! He's an idiot if he doesn't appreciate your worth. Mansi, tell him, please. Tell him about Manish.”

Mansi shook her head stubbornly and Anjali sighed defeatedly.

“I thought I told you to send Mansi in as soon as she came,” barked a voice, and both the girls jumped. Aditya was standing at the door of his office, looking decidedly grim. Mansi got up with a sigh. She gave Anjali a look of 'here we go again', and walked towards Aditya's office.

“The plans are already on your table,” she said. “I did finish them last night.”

“I think that either I'm retarded or you are,” he retorted. “I cannot understand what you have done at all. Could you be so kind as to explain what you have drawn? Where are the revisions I asked for?”

That was the beginning. Mansi was exhausted, and she answered back far more sharply than she ever had before. They had a roaring fight, and at the end of it, Aditya stomped out of his office.

“I have a meeting with this client, and I'll be back only after lunch. I want the plans done by then, with all the revisions,” he barked at her.

“You're not asking for revisions, you're asking me to do the whole lot again,” she answered back. “I can't possibly have them done by the afternoon.”

“You'd better, or you're out of this office,” he retorted, and walked out.

Mansi stared after him, almost at the end of her tether. Then she got determinedly back to work.

“He is not going to get me down, nor is he going to drive me out of this office,” she vowed to herself, as she picked up her pencils again.

She was still working when Anjali popped into the room at 6 o'clock.
“It's evening, aren't you going?” she asked Mansi. “You have to go to the nursing home today, don't you?”

“Can't leave before he comes and checks these,” said Mansi briefly, looking up. Anjali gave an exclamation.
“You're done in, Mansi. Go home and get some rest. You haven't eaten anything the whole day. You'll drop dead, the way you're going.”

“I should be so lucky,” replied Mansi, and looked over Anjali's shoulder. “The tyrant is back, Anjali. You'd better get back to your desk before he accuses us of wasting our time gossiping.”

She was at breaking point, and didn't seem to care that Aditya heard every word she said, indeed her words seemed to be aimed at him. Anjali scuttled back to her desk, and Aditya passed her to come into his room and slam the door. He looked at Mansi and it was clear her words had found their mark. If she had intended to provoke him, she had succeeded.

He came up to her and grasped her by the shoulders.

“Don't ever…” he hissed at her in a low, menacing tone “…ever talk to my staff like that.”

“Like what?” asked Mansi innocently. “Oh, you mean, don't call you a tyrant? All right, I won't. She knows it, anyway.”

She was hurting from the pressure he was applying to her shoulders, his fingers digging into her flesh, but she didn't care. Something had finally snapped in her, a combination of the last few months' tiredness, the fights, the tension, and her own exhaustion and hunger, and she felt almost lightheaded as she faced him.

“You are trying to undermine my authority with my staff,” he said furiously. “And, for the record, you are part of the staff here, so…”

“So what?” she retorted. “Are you threatening to fire me? All right, go ahead and do it. Fire me.”

She looked at him and laughed bitterly.

“No, you won't fire me, will you, Aditya? You will never fire me. It gives you too much pleasure to see me here, under your authority, obeying your orders, being completely at your mercy. Face it, Adi, you're not finding fault with my work, are you? For the last four months, you've been punishing me for what I did four years ago, and my work has nothing to do with it. And you want to continue punishing me, so…”

“You flatter yourself,” he broke in furiously. “You and I were finished four years ago, before we even started. There is nothing between us now, so don't manufacture anything, or give yourself imaginary reasons for your inadequacy.”

“My inadequacy!” she cried. “How is it that you are the only person who thinks I'm inadequate? Mr. Suri didn't think so, our clients didn't think so, only the great Aditya Khanna, who is such a brilliant architect, finds fault with my work. No, Aditya, that won't wash. Just because Manish…”

“Don't take his name!” snapped Aditya. “I don't want to hear his name. He has nothing to do with this. Keep him at home, don't bring him into my office.”

“He has everything to do with this,” retorted back Mansi. “He is the cause of all this tension between us, and he doesn't even know it.”

“I said, don't talk about him,” ground out Aditya. Mansi looked at him squarely.

“Why shouldn't I talk about him. He is my husband, he has a right to know how I'm being treated at work, and by somebody who claims to be his friend.”

“Our friendship ended when he got married,” said Aditya savagely. He came to her and grasped her by her upper arms in a grip that hurt, his eyes burning as he looked at her. “Come on, Mansi, tell me that he didn't know you loved me and I loved you. Tell me that he didn't know that there were never only the two of you in your bed. Tell me he didn't know that when you kissed him, it was my face you saw…”

“He knew everything! That was why …!” shouted Mansi. Then she clapped her hand over her mouth and stared at him. He looked back at her, stunned. His hands dropped like stone.

“He knew … everything,” she whispered, her tone anguished. She looked away from him and out of the window, and the anger, the fight went out of both of them suddenly. She looked around at him, and he stared back at her. The room seemed warmer suddenly, sparks flying between them, the tension in the air so thick that it was almost difficult to breathe. Then suddenly, she turned and picked up her plans. Without a word, she walked out of the room.