Serendipity

18

"Anupama," Vanraj muttered under his breath. Then he kicked the dust underneath his feet. That's how he saw her - a nobody, a doormat, a being who'd done as he'd asked without question for 26 years. He'd walked all over her, brought his girlfriend home, declared his intention to divorce and all Anupama had managed to do was cry.

She wasn't even strong enough to fight him, to question him, to stand up for what belonged to her. She hadn't even contested the divorce, had not asked for any alimony. She had signed all the documents willingly and had moved out of the Shah house, leaving her children and her life of 26 years behind. She couldn't sell a comb to her grandmother. How had she managed to entice Anuj Kapadia?

"Anupama," Kavya wrung her hands together in frustration. She thought of all she'd done to entice Vanraj, a man who was 17 years older than her. Kavya was younger, fashionable, more beautiful, and better at the seductive arts than Anupama had ever been. Or so Vanraj had claimed.

She turned back. As the door to Anupama's shoddy little apartment closed she caught a glimpse of Anuj Kapadia. The magazine covers hadn't done him justice. She'd always thought he looked regal in those pictures because they were shot in royal settings - on his yacht, inside his private jet, in the living room of his villa in Malibu, California, on the balcony of that same villa, overlooking the beach. But she was wrong. Sitting on that divaan, in Anupama's apartment, Anuj Kapadia still looked like the king and he'd called the shots. Unlucky for her, Vanraj and she were on the receiving end of his ire.

Anger, at herself and Anupama, raged within her. She was the beautiful one. She was the more fashionable one. If anything, Anuj Kapadia should have fallen in love with her. She should've been the one featured in that newspaper article. Anuj should be telling the world off for her. And yet, it wasn't her who was getting engaged to Anuj Kapadia - it was that behenji Anupama. How had she managed it?

Her thoughts went back to Anupama's shack - that appalling excuse for an apartment with peeling paint and washroom doors that clearly showed water rot. That place wasn't fit for a beggar. And yet Anupama had managed to entice Anuj Kapadia to the extent that India's biggest business mogul was comfortably sitting on broken plastic furniture drinking tea out of a melamine cup.

She recollected the way Anuj Kapadia had chastised her when she'd made a snarky comment about Anupama and her face turned red. What was Anupama's secret? She literally had Anuj Kapadia eating out of her hands.

Kavya sighed. She'd clearly picked the wrong partner. As she'd figured out soon after having married Vanraj, he was no good. She should've befriended Anupama. After all, hadn't Anupama managed to snag V all those years ago?

A thought struck her. Maybe something was brewing between Anupama and Anuj even before the divorce. That's why she didn't put up a fight or ask for alimony. Otherwise, who would willingly go live in squalor?

Six months into the divorce and she was wining and dining India's richest businessman. And here Kavya, well, the less she thought of her current situation, the better. She'd miscalculated and now she was stuck. She'd have to carefully wiggle her way out of this mess.

*****

"Did you speak to that shameless woman?" Leela Shah questioned her son as soon as he walked into the house.

"And what did she have to say?"

Without responding to his mother's questions Vanraj made his way to the sofa and sat down. "Baa, can I please get a cup of tea?"

Leela turned to her daughter-in-law: "Kavya, go make tea for Vanraj."

Kavya raised her eyebrows but nevertheless made her way into the kitchen. She needed peace and quiet to think about her next move. She'd already memorized the script of the drama that would currently be unfolding in the living room.

The Shah family was going to complain about how Anupama had shamed them in society. And Leela Shah, who only loved her son other than herself would lament on the shame her ex-daughter-in-law had brought on her son, about how the family had been nothing but kind to Anupama and yet the ingratitude with which she'd repaid them.

But Kavya had bigger fish to fry. She had a new goal - to replace Anupama in Anuj Kapadia's life. And for that, she'd have to get close to him. The quickest way would be to befriend Anupama. The Shah family had outrun its usefulness.

With Kavya in the kitchen making tea, Leela sat down next to her son and gently placed her hand on his head. "What's wrong?"

"It's true, all of it's true."

"About Anupama and that businessman?"

"Yes. I met him at Anupama's house today. And it didn't take him two minutes to show me my place."

Leela was unfairly partial to her son. But she also knew when he was not telling her the entire truth. She was one of the first people to find out about her son and Kavya's affair and had helped him hide it from the family for the longest possible time. Her husband had never forgiven her for it.

"What is really bothering you?"

"Anupama."

Vanraj had always found it easy to talk to his mother. She never judged him. She always understood his frustrations. Taking a deep breath he said: "The place and position that I held in her life for 26 years, she's now given to Anuj Kapadia. I met the two of them today; they have such fantastic compatibility. She hero-worships him. And he, he's ready to rip tongues out for her.

"What is it that he sees in Anupama, that he cares for her so much? What is it that makes him treat her like a precious diamond?"

Leela could sense her son's turmoil. He'd given up his relationship with Anupama, but he was finding it difficult to give up his right on her.

She patted her son's head. "It's all new love, Vanraj. All of this will soon fade and Anupama will be back where she belongs." Leela firmly believed that her useless daughter-in-law was just a passing fancy for Anuj Kapadia.

The tea arrived. And the three of them quietly sipped on their cups, lost in their own thoughts. Leela was worried about her son's health that had shown signs of excessive stress since reading the news this morning; Vanraj, for the first time, was wondering if he'd acted hastily by divorcing Anupama; and Kavya, well she wanted to become Mrs. Anuj Kapadia and was thinking about she needed to do to get there.