I’m sitting in a glass-walled conference room at my new start-up, a ten-minute delivery company that I joined a couple of months ago, and like every start-up, this one too thinks it can disrupt the disruptors who in the first place weren’t disruptors at all. The other people in my team are arguing about data points and customer acquisition cost. They’re using words like ‘synergy’ and ‘hyper-local optimization’ at eight in the night when everyone should be home doing something actually meaningful. It’s a game, really. If you can zoom out enough, you can really laugh at it. And I’m quite zoomed out. Though I’m not laughing at these chimps thinking they are doing important work. Which is okay; for everyone, their work is important, but these start-up bros who jerk off to posters of Elon Musk and Sam Altman, they really believe they are changing the world.
My smile is broken by the buzz of my phone. It’s a text from Aditi. I see the notification and ignore it. And there it is: another one. I ignore it again. And then, my phone starts to ring.
Shilpi calling.
‘Bhaiya,’ she sobs. ‘He’s here . . . he’s . . . Papa’s here.’
‘What . . . where—’
The world goes cold. When I look up, everyone is staring at me.
‘My father...’ I say, standing up abruptly. ‘He’s in an accident.’
Before anyone can give me permission, I’m already outside the meeting room, striding towards the elevator.
‘What? Where are you?’ I ask into the phone.
‘The event . . . at the restaurant . . . he’s screaming . . .’
‘What . . . event . . . where?’
‘Saket. I came with—’
‘Shit,’ I say. ‘I’m coming . . . hold them off . . . Where’s Aditi?’
‘She’s out . . . she’s outside . . . talking to him.’
‘I’m coming,’ I repeat.
I don’t remember the elevator ride, or jumping into the nearest cab. But I remember the cold dread uncoiling in my stomach as I shouted at the cab guy for twenty minutes straight to drive as fast as he can. This is what my father does. This is what... he does. I can hear the shouting before I even see him.
The restaurant. The standee that says ‘Connect’ with a bunch of hearts on it. A crowd has formed a semi-circle that is slowly swelling. And in the centre of it all I spot my father. He reminds me of the uncles who are in road rage videos, videos where they are spitting on the road and when someone points them out, they act out, the kind of asshole that you never associate with being a father, or being the kind of person who should be allowed to hold a little baby, care for it, and yet they are, and yet he is. He’s pacing around, his face red, a vein throbbing in his temple. He has Shilpi cornered near the entrance, his finger jabbing at her, shouting at her. Aditi is standing between them.
‘Hey! Hey!’ I start shouting as I run towards them.
In the background, I see Kunal, tall, hulking, useless. He’s trying to say something, trying to move my father towards the exit, his hand on my father’s arm. My father shoves him away with a guttural roar.
‘Listen, sir—’ he tells him.
‘OYE,’ Papa warns him.
‘HEY!’ I shout again.
My voice finally reaches him. And he turns around to see me. He stands facing me, hands on his waist. I can smell the alcohol on him.
‘Papa, go back to where you came from,’ I say, my voice low and tight.
‘You will tell me what to do?’ he grumbles.
‘Stop creating a scene.’
Shilpi runs and comes behind me, her face smeared with snot and tears.
‘So this is what you’re doing, huh?’ he roars, his eyes blazing. ‘THIS!’
‘What do you think we are doing?’ I snap back.
‘First you, and then you bring your sister to places like this!’
