<p>She paused agitatedly in her bustling shuttle between the kitchen and the doorway and glared at Hari.<br /><br /></p>.<p> The effort was wasted as he was burying his bulbous face in a wide open daily, the newsprint screen he puts to use cannily to avoid eye contact with his outraged life-mate when she is fretfully awaiting the erratic maid servant or a delayed LPG cylinder.<br /><br />“I don’t know why Rani has not shown up as yet. Do you know what would have happened to her? Really! That cheeky woman thinks she is a regal rani.” But Hari differed.<br /><br /> He felt Rani should more appropriately be called a duchess. The way she breezed in, snooty nose in the air, with a haughty lift of the trimmed eyebrow plus a busier-than-thou and a you-need-me-but-I may-not-need-you attitude — an Elisa who did little — possibly trained by a Henry Higgins’s clone.<br /><br />He chuckled teasingly. “How will I know why Rani did not show up? There is no mention in the papers. Or breaking news in any news channel.”<br /><br />Her eyes spat fire. “The house stinks like a municipal dump after two days’ downpour. Kitchen sink is crammed with dirty dishes and bathroom with soiled clothes. Here I am agitated all about it. And what you do is to crack tasteless jokes. Don’t you have a beating heart under your ribcage?”<br /><br />Hari melted like clarified butter. “Sorry, Lalli, sorry. I was only joking. Let me see. Rani has a mobile, right? Didn’t you call her up?” She exploded like a discarded tetra pack run over by a two-ton-truck. “A hundred times I did. But she has switched it off. <br /><br />The cheat! Did you know I fully financed her cellphone, an android, I repeat, an android — she wouldn’t settle for less — with easy to pay equated monthly installments? And in a moment of weakness, I wrote off the loan during Diwali even before the first installment was paid? Yet…”<br /><br />Her further remarks were cut short by the ringing of the doorbell that sounded like the lusty chirrak chirrak sound roosters make while playfully running in circles. When the door was opened, Rani stormed in, talking importantly into her cellphone with the air of a CEO of a multi-national corporation sailing past underlings in their work stations with unseeing eyes. And hotfooted to the kitchen straight like an arrow from Arjun’s dhanush. And to the utter bewilderment of Hari, went out of the flat in a flash within minutes, after a muffled conference with her mistress in the kitchen.<br /><br />Bespectacled Hari blinked like a barn-owl that had cataract. “Lalli, I…I can’t understand. Why did you pack her off so quickly?” Lalli rubbed her hands with glee. “Not without reason, Sir. Don’t you worry about my kitchen work. Only a few grimy dishes. <br /><br />A small load of clothes. And only a 2BHK rat-hole-flat — and no Pranabda’s sprawling Rashtrapathi Bhavan with 340-odd rooms to dust, sweep and mop. Can do blindfolded like a junior Sorcar. But listen! There is a big fight going on between Susheela and her daughter-in-law Sushma in B12.<br /><br /> Rani told me that. And ma-in-law Susheela is packing to shift to an old age home. Serves that old big mouth right — though I dread the safety of the existing inmates. If Rani is there now, right on the spot, she will witness the mud-slinging duel frontline. And give me unedited word-by-word report when I phone her. <br /><br />Hope the uppity maharani would keep my cellphone switched on... Now, now, c’mon, Hari, don’t you look at me mockingly like that. These are feminine matters you men will neither understand nor appreciate.”<br /></p>
<p>She paused agitatedly in her bustling shuttle between the kitchen and the doorway and glared at Hari.<br /><br /></p>.<p> The effort was wasted as he was burying his bulbous face in a wide open daily, the newsprint screen he puts to use cannily to avoid eye contact with his outraged life-mate when she is fretfully awaiting the erratic maid servant or a delayed LPG cylinder.<br /><br />“I don’t know why Rani has not shown up as yet. Do you know what would have happened to her? Really! That cheeky woman thinks she is a regal rani.” But Hari differed.<br /><br /> He felt Rani should more appropriately be called a duchess. The way she breezed in, snooty nose in the air, with a haughty lift of the trimmed eyebrow plus a busier-than-thou and a you-need-me-but-I may-not-need-you attitude — an Elisa who did little — possibly trained by a Henry Higgins’s clone.<br /><br />He chuckled teasingly. “How will I know why Rani did not show up? There is no mention in the papers. Or breaking news in any news channel.”<br /><br />Her eyes spat fire. “The house stinks like a municipal dump after two days’ downpour. Kitchen sink is crammed with dirty dishes and bathroom with soiled clothes. Here I am agitated all about it. And what you do is to crack tasteless jokes. Don’t you have a beating heart under your ribcage?”<br /><br />Hari melted like clarified butter. “Sorry, Lalli, sorry. I was only joking. Let me see. Rani has a mobile, right? Didn’t you call her up?” She exploded like a discarded tetra pack run over by a two-ton-truck. “A hundred times I did. But she has switched it off. <br /><br />The cheat! Did you know I fully financed her cellphone, an android, I repeat, an android — she wouldn’t settle for less — with easy to pay equated monthly installments? And in a moment of weakness, I wrote off the loan during Diwali even before the first installment was paid? Yet…”<br /><br />Her further remarks were cut short by the ringing of the doorbell that sounded like the lusty chirrak chirrak sound roosters make while playfully running in circles. When the door was opened, Rani stormed in, talking importantly into her cellphone with the air of a CEO of a multi-national corporation sailing past underlings in their work stations with unseeing eyes. And hotfooted to the kitchen straight like an arrow from Arjun’s dhanush. And to the utter bewilderment of Hari, went out of the flat in a flash within minutes, after a muffled conference with her mistress in the kitchen.<br /><br />Bespectacled Hari blinked like a barn-owl that had cataract. “Lalli, I…I can’t understand. Why did you pack her off so quickly?” Lalli rubbed her hands with glee. “Not without reason, Sir. Don’t you worry about my kitchen work. Only a few grimy dishes. <br /><br />A small load of clothes. And only a 2BHK rat-hole-flat — and no Pranabda’s sprawling Rashtrapathi Bhavan with 340-odd rooms to dust, sweep and mop. Can do blindfolded like a junior Sorcar. But listen! There is a big fight going on between Susheela and her daughter-in-law Sushma in B12.<br /><br /> Rani told me that. And ma-in-law Susheela is packing to shift to an old age home. Serves that old big mouth right — though I dread the safety of the existing inmates. If Rani is there now, right on the spot, she will witness the mud-slinging duel frontline. And give me unedited word-by-word report when I phone her. <br /><br />Hope the uppity maharani would keep my cellphone switched on... Now, now, c’mon, Hari, don’t you look at me mockingly like that. These are feminine matters you men will neither understand nor appreciate.”<br /></p>
