Club You to Death Anuja Chauhan (best ebook reader for ubuntu .TXT) 📖

The Uber heads towards Nizamuddin in silence. Kashi glowers at the empty night roads and replays the events of the evening in his mind. Or, to be specific, one precise moment.

Would you ever consider getting back together with me?

Why, he thinks moodily, did their paths have to cross at all, all those years ago? His mother could’ve signed him up for horse-riding instead of swimming; he could’ve gone through life happily and healthily, riding horses, playing tennis, eating shakkarkandi and reading books – until the moment Kuhu Bannerjee pulled up in her little car and offered him a ride because Kalra thought he had broken his cock. How simple and untainted and uncomplicated everything would have been then.

But no, he had to bump into Bambi when he was six years old, blow air into her wretched armband, and be condemned to live forever with a hole in his heart where their relationship had been.

No more ‘friendship’ with Bambi Todi, he tells himself firmly. You’ve literally been flirting with fire. You have to get back to work soon anyway, and that can be the perfect excuse to drop casually out of her life. In fact, why wait till you get back to work – move to Noida right away, and spend the rest of your leave hanging with Ma and Dadi and Nattu. Begin the Bambi-detox ASAP.

Feeling a lot more sorted, he settles back into the seat and closes his eyes.

Would you ever consider getting back together with me?

Brig. Dogra is swinging dreamily on the white garden swing in his Noida kothi when Kashi’s Uber rolls up at the gate the next afternoon. He looks up, and slowly stows his phone away.

‘To what do we owe this honour?’ he demands as Kashi approaches the gate. ‘You? Here? How come?’

‘Hi, Dad,’ Kashi says lightly, as he lugs his rucksack down the driveway. ‘Where’s everybody?’

The brigadier looks at the bulging rucksack, his expression half-grumpy, half-hopeful. ‘Moving back with bag and baggage, are you?’

Kashi grins. ‘That’s the idea. We can rig up a net on the lawn and practice some shots, I thought.’

A matching grin lightens the brigadier’s face. ‘Mala-D!’ he shouts. ‘Suna? Your ladla has ditched the fleshpots of Nizamuddin and come to stay with us!’

‘For three days, Ma,’ Kashi says as his mother rushes excitedly out of the house to greet him. ‘I have to get back to work on Thursday.’

‘Put your bag in your room,’ she says. ‘I’ll need to put in fresh sheets and towels, and there may be a smell – we’ve been storing unripe mangoes under your bed! I’m making rajma chawal. Is that okay?’

‘It’s awesome.’ He gives her a quick hug. ‘I’m sorry I don’t come over more often, Ma.’

‘Stupid boy.’ She kisses him soundly, then pushes him away. ‘Go say hi to your Dadi. And that must be full of dirty clothes, na? Leave it in the laundry basket. And call Nattu – we can all have lunch together!’

Kashi walks slowly up the stairs to the upstairs living room, which leads off to two bedrooms. His, which has a cross-stitch embroidery sign reading ‘Kashi’ over the door, and Natasha’s which has a matching sign that reads ‘Tashi’. He enters his room and it is exactly as he had left it last. There are the same Doon School football groups on the wall, the same bunch of inter-school and college medals, the graduation picture from NLS, and a baby photo of him sitting on his grandparents’ knees. Outside, from his balcony, is the familiar view of the gulmohar tree and the terrace of the Bharagavas’ house

next door.

He doesn’t need to shower, but he does. Wearing his Jaipur House soccer shorts and an old tee, he comes running downstairs lightly, feeling suddenly revitalized and centred. He realizes with a queer little shock that he has spent the last several days free-floating about in a sort of confounded daze.

‘Kashi!’ Old Mrs Dogra beams delightedly when he pops his head into her bedroom. ‘Come and sit here!’ She pats the bed.

‘Hi, Dadi!’ He bends down to give her a hug.

She pats his back with gentle hands, then pulls away to gaze at him with affectionate rheumy eyes.

‘How are you, beta? How’s Boohoo?’

‘Kuhu,’ he corrects her gently.

‘Your mother said Boohoo,’ the old lady replies firmly.

‘What! Why?’

‘Because she cried so much when we all went to see Parasite,’ Nattu’s voice comes from the door. ‘During the climax. She tried to hide it, but of course we noticed. Didn’t you know?’

‘That she cried or that you guys call her Boohoo?’ he demands. ‘Why are you so mean to her, anyway?’

‘Shut up! You know I like her, Kashi!’ Nattu says as she hugs him. ‘And so does Dadi – don’t you, Dadi?’

‘Bengali girls are churails,’ says the old lady seriously as Nattu hugs her. ‘Hairy also.’

‘Having quite a lucid day today, I see,’ Kashi murmurs in an aside to his sister as she sits down beside him.

Nattu giggles. ‘Oh yes, she’s in great form nowadays.’

Presently they sit down at the big dining table before a lavish lunch.

‘OG group!’ Nattu says happily as she ladles steaming hot rajma into her plate. ‘Yay!’

‘OG means original, not olive green,’ Mala Dogra explains to her fauji husband, who is looking confused. ‘What should the OGs do? Let’s go for long walks, and swim and drink tea on the veranda – spend a lot of quality time together, basically!’

‘Time is time, not an ice cream,’ grunts the brigadier. ‘What is all this kwality and quantity?’

‘Really?’ His wife snorts. ‘Okay, kids, imagine your father is a piece of ganna.’

‘Okay,’ Kashi says obligingly.

‘Eww, Ma, why?’ objects Nattu.

‘Be quiet! Haan, so early in the morning, Balbir Dogra is this nice fresh chunk of sugar cane, tight and bursting with sweet juice! But, even before breakfast, his golf buddies get their teeth into him. Then, after breakfast, his stockbroker son-in-law phones him and has a gnaw! Then he goes to the gym where the