Deception

He watched her sashay in, all shampoo-ad hair and generous smiles. A couple of boys from the crew around hastened to find her a place. Even the way she said thank-you, if only seen with audio on mute, seemed as if she were saying 'You're welcome. For not many have the privilege to serve me. Yeah, I am that precious.'

He couldn't help noticing her. Having spent the last five minutes figuring out a strategy to extend his stay in the coffee shop without having to spend another rupee, he was both attracted and repelled by the aura of easy privilege that surrounded her. He didn't get paid for his job at the upscale apparel store, where he worked as a sales assistant, till the week after and he had just enough money to scrape through. More importantly, he had a paper coming up, one of the important ones if he wanted to get a degree in Accounting, and he needed someplace quiet to study.

He couldn't tear his eyes away as she sat down, looked around, her glance alighting on him for a second but moving away with an expression of having wasted that second. She took out her phone, which looked more like a piece of jewelry due its glittery case, than something that had functionality, and proceeded to furiously type. He was struck by the speed of her typing, somehow attributing that too to a pampered upbringing. He thought of his own basic phone, and how his skeletal contact list didn't have anyone he wanted to exchange speedy messages with. He had spent most of his life avoiding interaction with peers, and most had been only too happy to oblige. In school, he had always felt ashamed of his holey hand-me-down keds, belts whose leather was always peeling away like skin and worst of all, the faded, too-tight school uniforms.

Two years in the apparel store had taught him much. He now hand-washed his clothes carefully, preferring to splurge on detergent instead of meals, routinely oiled the two belts he owned and gave his shoes a good airing out and a brisk polishing every week. Best of all, he had a deal worked out with the store manager where for every twenty hours of overtime, filling in for somebody or during peak times, he would be allowed to choose an item of clothing from the defective pieces in the inventory. He didn't look anymore like a forlorn neglected little boy living off scraps thrown his way by well-meaning but equally beaten-down relatives. He knew that and was proud of it.

So he thought, this..princess didn't have a clue of how the real world functioned. She and him, they inhabited different worlds, and that they were now breathing-in the same air, struck him as one of the many marvels of this universe.

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Just before entering the coffee-shop, she took a deep breath and with great deliberation told herself, 'You are a Queen. Everyone you meet aspires to be like you - smart, fun and stylish. You own this. You OWN this.'

She walked in, outwardly packing a nonchalant swagger in her walk, inwardly calculating carefully the swing beyond which it would start to look unnatural. Judging by the attention her entry garnered, she seemed to be doing it right.

Today was the ninth job interview she was going for. And given how difficult it was turning out to be, landing a receptionist's job, one would think it was the most important work anyone did in an organization.

She sat down and did a quick scan of the room. Not too many people around at this time, which is why she had suggested this time slot for the interview. Her desperation was a tangible presence to her, more solid than her shadow, and definitely more persistent - never leaving her side. She thought others must smell it too. And so she did her best to mask it. The carefully selected perfume, the self-made mobile case, the leather bag from Dharavi. She was especially proud of her perfume, it was a replica of the expensive one she had liked at the mall and then of which she had carried the stick to her local beauty store, asking them for something similar. She had got it at one-tenth the cost.

She took out her phone and quickly sent a couple of texts to her two best friends, to remind them to text her back during the course of the next one hour. It always helped to appear in demand.

She looked at her watch nervously, involuntarily letting her diva act slip for a second; but quickly realized it and a-fixing a contemptuous look, glanced around the room again. This time she noticed this well-groomed young man sitting at a table nearby, watching her. Why was he watching her? It irritated her, made her want to check her hair, maybe a strand was out of place, maybe her lipstick had smudged? It irritated her even more that she cared so much. Judging by the amount of gel in his well combed slicked-back hair, he probably didn't know how difficult it was for a girl to appear put-together on almost no money, one had to use creative solutions like borrowed hair rollers and hot-air hand-driers in less used washrooms at malls. He probably didn't know. She flicked her hair away, as if flicking away a lifetime of self-doubt and told herself again, quite sternly this time, 'You are a Queen.'