Mrs Goody Two Shoes XXIV

Not quite on the wanted list


What do you do when someone clings on to you? Run


"Didi, can I sit beside you please? I want to see how you write."
"Umm... sure, why not?"
I have to admit that I am totally averse to someone staring while I am writing. Although some, even if just a handful, would eventually read the rapid-fire words I type on my computer screen, sometimes doing it so mechanically that I can even doze off while at the task, I don't like it a bit if someone sees it during the process of creation. I feel violated, like someone is encroaching upon my private space.
But I made this one exception. Since the intruder was a junior, just starting out in the professional jungle, I thought it was my moral responsibility to take her under my wings and give her some invaluable guidance.
So she sat there, and after almost every few lines, she had a question. Which was all right since she was there to learn, wasn’t she? But after a few further lines, the questions were gradually metamorphosing into comments.
“You know what, I once wrote a travel piece like this (excuse me!) and I would never put that line like that” or “Don’t you think that’s too poetic?” followed promptly by “Oh, that sounds so dry!”
See, I don’t shout, usually. I try not to be rude, or should I say, honest, putting in a lot of hard work and sweat to be this Mother India prototype and balance and juggle and act to be on everyone’s good books. But even I, the epitome of saintliness, draw a line. With every increment in her familiarity, my jaws hardened, my expression turned from patronising to distant to stony.
Before an eruption though, she had to leave, and I tried to forgive her. She was but a puny, inexperienced nobody. The problem was, she returned, every day and began feeding on my mothering instincts, clinging on to me like a leech.
I was her “role model”, so she would go with me everywhere, to the canteen for a coffee, latching on if I went out for a story, sometimes even waiting in the office till I finished work and tagging along with me saying “I stay only a kilometer from your house" (trust my luck). So, being the 'elder', I had to drop her home first, almost every other day, and throughout the auto ride, I had to listen to her sagas of boyfriends, achievements, illnesses – the last especially for my benefit so that she could go "such a headache", or "I couldn’t sleep all night" any time I assigned her some work. Also, so that she could drain every ounce of my sympathy from me.
The danger signal beeped really loud the day she asked me, "What are you doing this weekend?" "Not too sure. Guess I will go out with my husband." "Oh, okay, I had thought you and I were going out," she said with a pout and an attitude as if I was breaking a vow.
Saturday morning, and I woke up with a smile. I was lazing on the rocking chair with a book, when the bell jangled. There she was. I froze on the spot. "You, what… wow.. how..?" I was stammering as if in an interview."
"I thought you said you wouldn’t be home," her cold stare was killing me, “Anyway, I was just passing, so just thought will check (check what, if I had lied?). Gotta go now, since you are ‘busy’ and all.” The sarcasm oozed out like pus from her mouth.
Next day, at office, she was there. She did not look at me and asked Disha if she was interested in a coffee. “Anyway, I don’t like hanging out with people who fib and act smart," I saw the arched glance she threw at me. I typed away furiously.