Recap: In Jamshedpur, Vik and Josh bond conspiratorially over “what-Tilo-doesn’t-know-can’t-hurt-Tilo”. Meanwhile, Nisha is on the verge of a meltdown as Pixie insists on keeing the polka-dotted puppy. Luckily, Vik arrives just in time to swing it for Pixie and avert a crisis.

It was half-past-eight. Outside, Calcuttans were walking about with their sleeveless sweaters and woollen mufflers, now that it was officially winter. Inside the office, under the neutral glow of fluorescent lights, Aaduri Bagchi was looking over the copy of the next day’s lead story, when she was interrupted.

The final once-over was something she did herself most days, almost obsessively, and the lack of typos or bloopers or fake news references that this ensured had already begun to distinguish their content from a lot of digital stuff produced by their competitors. Somewhere in the middle of the piece — We Divulge, Finally, the Definitive Recipe for Calcutta Biryani, With Alu and Dim, for the Daring Probashi Homecook — Aaduri became conscious of a very faint whirring next to her.

It was Tiana Mitra, her newest team member. She had arrived in their office exactly a week ago, armed with a degree in popular culture from an American university, which Aaduri did not care about, and a good grounding in grammar, about which she most certainly did. Currently, Tiana was standing by her desk, almost vibrating in excitement, and giving off the distinct impression that she was about to explode as a result of some kind of a Eureka moment.

“Yes?” Aaduri asked, even though she wasn’t very hopeful of Tiana’s Eureka vibrations. She’d had to shoot down twelve ideas from the kid in the last hour.

“So, you know the actress Pragya Paramita Sen?” Tiana began, already bubbling over.

“Tiana,” said Aaduri patiently (what kind of a ridiculous name was Tiana? What were her parents thinking, giving her a neither-here-nor-there name like that?), “Since we haven’t seen her act yet, I am not sure we can call her an actress. As a journalist, you must learn to be exact. But yes, Pragya Paramita Sen, soon to make her debut in Ronny Banerjee’s new film...”

“Has just started an Instagram account. It’s about saris and books and paintings and cities — and the account is really very aesthetic. May I do a story on it? I can even get a quote from her social media consultant.”

“She has a social media consultant?”

“It’s my friend, Mimi,” Tiana said, “And the angle...” she added carefully, having been asked but-what-on-earth-is-the-angle on the dozen previous occasions by Aaduri, “is that Facebook and Instagram are essentially different. Facebook is about your life in all its messiness or boringness or bourgeoise-ness while Instagram is about aesthetics. Very few celebrities get this. They post the same old pictures of themselves on photo shoots or hanging out with their other celebrity friends on holiday or the Pujas or whatever on Insta. But Pragya is actually doing aesthetics, thereby changing the game.”

Aaduri raised her eyebrows. “Tiana Mitra, it is possible that you may have finally understood what an angle is. And it is also possible that you may have shot up in my estimation. Go write this piece. Be biting about the celebrities who don’t get Insta. I want to read it first thing tomorrow morning. Let’s run the first story on this before those blithering idiots who do that ‘welcome to Instagram’ or some such show on that Bengali YouTube channel. And — if you do everything properly — you’ll get your first byline.”

Tiana gave a little whoop.

“Hemda!” she said joyfully, as she spotted Hem walking towards them, “I just shot up in ma’am’s estimation.” They did a high-five and Tiana sailed away in a cloud of bouncy bliss.

“Are you done?” Hem asked.

“No. Shush,” Aaduri said. “I need to read two more pieces and sign off on this.”

Hem pulled up a chair and sat down behind her. He surreptitiously glanced at the clock that hung above their heads. “You’re putting pressure on me, Hem,” Aaduri complained, “I hate that clock. And yes, I do have eyes behind my head.”

But in reply, Hem only smiled.

And unseen to him, Aaduri betrayed the briefest of brief smiles too, a tiny inflection that most people would see as a mere involuntary twitch, but it was, nonetheless, a smile.

***

Meanwhile, at Ghosh Mansion, the lights flickered mysteriously in Manjulika’s quarters but never went out. Ronny, Lata, Molly and Manjulika were all sitting cross-legged on Lata’s bed, at least three of them chattering nineteen to the dozen.

Nimki had served them her famous jhaalmuri with tea, annoyed that no prior notice had been given to allow her to whip up a culinary extravaganza in honour of Ronny’s return. (Nimki and Manjulika often discussed Ronny and what might have been had Lata and Ronny not broken up and had Lata never met that dashing but innately unsuitable-in-the-long-run Aarjoe immediately afterwards.)

Nimki had given Ronny all the news about the now-retired household staff whom Ronny had befriended in the years he was a regular. Molly had stories of German work habits to share; Manjulika regaled them with the accounts of extreme politics as practised in her primary school; and Ronny made them laugh with anecdotes of Shaarani Sen and her quirks. No one mentioned Pragya though. Not Manjulika, not Molly, not Ronny. Not even Nimki, who kept up with Tollywood gossip as if her life depended on it, brought up the beautiful Pragya who was always photographed in diaphanous saris, and her impending debut in his new film.

The more this went on, the laughter and the familiar crunch of the green chillies that Ronny bit into with abandon, the scent of the winter curling in through the skylights and the settling into the damp patches of her childhood room that remained locked up for most of the year, the more distanced Lata felt from it all. She got up and slipped out of the room into the verandah on the left, which overlooked Dayanara’s courtyard, and, as an inexplicable anger rose in her, she fumed silently at the night.

What the hell were these women — her women — playing at? That in the magical circle they had created upon her bed they would simply spirit the last two decades away, rewind the story and rewrite its ending? Were they pretending that this was still 1999, and Ronny, the familiar Ronny who always carried his camera around, took their photos, and never took to heart Boro Jethu’s bullying, that Ronny — now famous if not rich — would gift Lata Ghosh her happily ever after? And Molly? Why on earth was Molly a part of this? Uff, how disappointed was she in Molly. Her radical JU edge has been completely eaten away by that stupid AJ and the Germans.

Lata pulled her hair into a bun angrily, worked herself up some more and returned to the room.

Everyone fell silent. “Come join us, Munni,” Manjulika coaxed. The same tone she would use years ago when she’d ask Lata to sing a song or recite a poem in front of some relative or the other and Lata would, like a stiff young foal, refuse to play along. And now, from the doorway, she could see Manjulika’s face, the fine lines that had cast a net on her once-flawless skin, lit up in a hope that was, but of course, entirely misplaced. Lata refused to play along.

“Didn’t you have dinner plans with Pragya?” Lata asked Ronny coldly.

***

“So you’ve finally had time to come?” Nimki accosted Aaduri. “There’s a wedding happening, so much aasha-jaoaa-gondogol, but no sign of you! Who is this?”

“Nimkidi,” Aaduri said, “meet Hem. He works with me. Hem, Nimkidi.”

Nimki looked at Hem appraisingly. Tall(ish). Fair(ish). Smiling.

“I know about Nimkidi,” Hem said. “Lata told me she makes the best luchis.”

Tall. Fair. Smiling. Hindi-speaking.

“Lata said you like 5Star?” Hem slunk one out of his pocket and held it in front of Nimki.

The thrill of this Hindi-speaking, exotic animal trailing Aaduri adoringly would have been enough for Nimki’s whole-hearted approval, but the 5Star pushed her to a stratosphere of delight, where even the latest bit of family drama could be forgotten for a bit. She blushed, accepted the 5Star bashfully and led the way down the corridor to Manjulika’s tiny sitting room.

“I can’t believe the depths to which you sink, Hem Shankar Tiwari. If this is the sort of bribery you are displaying at Lata’s, I wonder what you’ll do if I take you to my parents!”

“Is there any hope of that?” Hem asked.

“Of course not,” Aaduri replied, “Now take off your shoes.”

“They’ve had a big fight,” Nimki hung back and whispered conspiratorially to Aaduri. “Ronnyda was here.”

(To be continued)

This is Chapter 22 of The Romantics of College Street, a serial novel by Devapriya Roy for t2oS. Find her on Instagram @roydevapriya or email her at theromanticsofcollegestreet@gmail.com