Buffering Love Read online

  Sonam disconnected the phone and went to her Twitter profile. Hundreds of people she didn’t know were congratulating her on the article. Sam sent her a few screenshots of laudatory messages he received from his peers in other publications. Meanwhile, some smart-ass tagged Kavya, commending her on her wisdom as a teenager.

  While this madness was going on, a leading prime-time TV presenter decided to host a Facebook Live event for the first time, describing Sonam Carvalho as a brutally honest, independent, caring mother and the best columnist he had ever known. He also called Sonam one of their own because she had come in for one of the channel’s panel discussions last year.

  A stunned Kavya came into the living room and hugged Sonam. She sobbed. ‘You are the best writer ever. Never ever let me tell you what to write.’

  Sonam sunk into the same couch that had led to this circus and logged in to Twitter.

  She then turned on the TV and put it on mute.

  The news tickers said, ‘Indian Cosmopolitan writer bares heart and raises hope for single mothers worldwide.’

  The word ‘writer’ gleamed back at her more than any of the others.

  Shop Now

  Shashank Raman was addicted to online shopping. It occupied every minute of his waking hours and consumed him in his sleep. He had gone past the mainstream digs of Banjara Hills and Jubilee Hills of Hyderabad. For him, the new wave in the online shopping scenario in India was represented by the likes of boutique dwellings such as Bombay Shirt Company and Gentleman’s Corner.

  A minor impediment in his online shopping addiction was that Shashank was still a final year engineering student at IIIT, Hyderabad, with no prospect of an independent income on the anvil. His father, a physics professor at the same university, had given Shashank a free rein on his career choices, but Shashank couldn’t care less. For him, engineering was merely a stepping stone before he joined the fashion industry. His mother, separated from his father, didn’t have much to say about it. When Shashank spoke to her, she appeared more concerned about the alimony from her father being delayed the last couple of months.

  ‘I will speak to dad about it,’ Shashank comforted her.

  ‘He is still sleeping around with those whores from his university, isn’t he?’ she snarled.

  Shashank remained quiet.

  Listening to his mother convinced him that it was she who was unreasonable. And when he spent time listening to his father, he was convinced of the contrary.

  To get away from these unpleasant exchanges since his parents’ separation three years ago, Shashank immersed himself in online shopping. The neatly organized stacks of gleaming footwear and apparel, at the command of his scroll, came in handy to get away from the bitterness his parents harboured for each other. Slowly and steadily, Shashank found all his weekly pocket money diverted to these online indulgences. While most students his age took to pornography on campus to relieve their stress, Shashank relied on online shopping.

  He had also found a way around to order new shirts, belts, jackets and what-not without spending much. It pertained to the loophole in the return policy on these sites. Almost all the shopping sites had at least a seven-day return policy.

  This meant that Shashank could order a new set of clothes on a Tuesday, which would invariably be delivered at his home in Gulshan Colony by Friday. He would wear these clothes for the next few days and then return them to the website within a week citing fit, quality or design concerns. For some websites, he had to keep the shopping tags on, while others were a lot more generous. Once the original merchandise reached the website’s warehouse, his money would be refunded to his credit card.

  Once every couple of months, Shashank also made sure that he bought something he liked from the sites whose merchandise he was frequently returning. That established him as a genuine buyer on these platforms and helped him evade a deviant shopper red-flag that smart-shopping platforms were quick to raise.

  Shashank’s reliance on this sly modus operandi escalated when his father saw his credit card bill and discovered a slew of shopping sites mentioned on it. He was incensed that Shashank was spending every cent of the Rs 10,000 he received every month on clothes.

  ‘This money was for you so that you learn to spend it on things that are important for your education. Not for this ghastly purpose you are putting it to,’ he growled and promptly stopped Shashank’s monthly allowance.

  The economic sanction that his father placed on Shashank upset him. But he continued with his usual mode of ordering-for-the-sake-of-returning style of purchases with increased fervour. His frequent orders and returns made him a familiar figure with the delivery boys of his neighbourhood. Soon, he became friends with one of the delivery boys—twenty-year-old Yousuf Anis.

  Yousuf offered to introduce Shashank to the warehouse manager at Myntra, who was always happy to employ more delivery boys.

  ‘I know the warehouse manager well. You won’t even have to prepare a résumé for a job. And if you get hired, I will make an extra Rs 1000 as referral bonus,’ Yousuf added.

  ‘I will let you know. I want to get my final exams out of the way. I will then be able to devote more time to make these deliveries,’ Shashank informed him.

  This was true. Shashank’s final year project on applications of machine learning in primary education was a daunting affair.

  Shashank wasn’t exactly a gifted student, but he was happy to put in the hours required to earn a respectable grade. To be a student in the same college that your father teaches in carried its own pall of expectations. This added pressure of the final project meant spending more time on the laptop. It also meant that he went a little further in his online shopping invasions in the month of March.

  One day during his final month at college, Aalia, a tall damsel and the daughter of a famed beer brewing family, who sat next to Shashank in an elective class, had something to ask him.

  ‘Shashank, I never see you repeat your clothes. Am I wrong, or am I just imagining that you have an unending wardrobe?’

  Aalia, the angelic but high-flying diva in their college, who had set many a young man’s heart aflutter, was never known to initiate conversations.

  Coming from a family of means, she was known not just for her lineage but also for leading her metallurgy class. She was a shy girl who spoke rarely, but when she did, she had everyone rapt. She never dated anyone and word had got around that she probably didn’t deem anyone good enough to match her stature. The truth was that no one had caught her eye until now.

  Shashank, who had nursed a crush on her for a long time, saw an opening in her question that could potentially open doors to a friendship, if nothing else. He wasn’t going to squander it.

  ‘Yes, I like experimenting with my clothes,’ he replied.

  Aalia liked men with a good taste in clothes. After that class, one question led to another, and later that evening they went out and had a long chat over several home brews at Belgium Beer House, the veritable treasure of a beer house that Aalia suggested.

  Aalia, too, had a weakness for shopping. That provided another window of conversation between the two. Unknown to Shashank, Aalia, under the pseudonym Girlwithcoloursgalore, ran a fashion blog which among other things had also been featured in Cosmopolitan India.

  ‘What are you wearing for the farewell dinner next month? I really want to know,’ she asked Shashank with her dreamy blue eyes.

  Shashank had an eye on an expensive grey suit from Gentleman’s Corner that he had saved under the Wishlist section on the site. He showed it to Aalia on his phone.

  She admired it in a way only a fashionista could and sighed. ‘You would look like a million bucks in this. I would love to carry a feature on you on my blog. Could you order it right away? Do they have enough stock?’

  ‘Yeah, it will be done. Now that you approve of it,’ Shashank replied with a cheeky smile.

  As their evening wore on, Shashank discovered some more delightful things about Aalia. She was an e
xpert baker and an accomplished black belt in karate. That she was sitting across the table from him in their last month of college together was a miracle for Shashank. She had already signed up for her master’s at the National Institute of Fashion Technology (What else could a rich heiress of a beer baron do?).

  It drizzled that night as Shashank saw her off in a cab. She reminded him once again that he should order the suit soon. ‘I will be in Bengaluru to meet Sonam, the Cosmopolitan features editor, on the 19th, the day before the farewell dinner. We wanted to discuss in detail the other features I could contribute to the magazine. But I am taking the 1 p.m. return flight from Bengaluru on 20th. I should be in the city by late afternoon. Let’s do a candid shoot just between ourselves that evening before the farewell. I will call a photographer friend of mine. His pictures are to die for.’

  He kissed her on the cheek before the car sped off.

  Why wouldn’t Shashank agree to this delightful proposition? All his purchases and returns, those hours he had toiled into the wee hours of the night with only the dim light from the laptop for company, had paid off. He was at the mercy of this beautiful lady’s love.

  The catch was that since the farewell dinner was four weeks away, Shashank couldn’t have risked ordering the suit now. Those websites only operated with a seven-day return policy. He wanted to order the suit only when the final date was closer to the dinner, so that he could simply wear it that night and return it to the website the next morning under their customer-friendly return policy.

  In order to do that, Shashank would have to convince his father to let him use his credit card one last time. He thought it best to approach the topic with his father in a couple of weeks.

  As the date of the farewell dinner approached and early touches of spring began to graze the air of Hyderabad, Shashank received a mail from his favourite shopping portal—Gentleman’s Corner. It said something to the effect of how Shashank was a valued customer but considering his recent purchase history, they were temporarily blocking his account for any further returns. The site still allowed him to purchase anything if he so wished but carried a caveat of no more merchandise returns on the account.

  This was a complete shocker for Shashank. He went over his purchase history with his favourite site and realized that one fateful night a couple of weeks ago he had ordered clothes worth over Rs 30,000 from Gentleman’s Corner.

  Shashank needed these extra pieces of clothing for a series of final year meets that were being organized at the university. He wanted to have a different look for each of them since Aalia was now keenly following his wardrobe selection.

  To keep pace with these social appearances, Shashank did what he did best and ordered a consignment of some of the season’s latest shirts and jackets and denims and trousers and other accessories to go along with it. Little did he realize while ordering that this would turn out to be a consignment worth Rs 30,000. He recalled seeing that number, but it didn’t matter to him at all. It was a tried and tested plan. He was only ordering these to return them in a couple of weeks. And he did return every single one of those clothes. Nothing could’ve gone wrong.

  Except that back at the customer analytics division of Gentleman’s Corner, Shashank’s expensive purchase popped up as a red flag. Someone from the analytics team took notice of this consumer behaviour and flagged it under what has today come to be known as ‘anomaly detection’.

  Those sharp nerds took a quick look at his purchase history and arrived at the appropriate conclusion that Shashank was what in their business was known as an ‘unsustainable customer’.

  This species of customers would inevitably order more than they could chew. The cost of handling their logistics of delivery and return was more than the net profit these specific customers brought to the website. With regard to Shashank, when they delved deeper into his transaction history, it became an easy decision for the team to take. They immediately shut down his returns tab and that precursory warning of a mail found its way into Shashank’s inbox.

  Shashank was in a fix. In less than two weeks, he was to attend that farewell party along with his evening shoot with Aalia. Since their drink that evening, Aalia had also showed him an off-white designer dress that she had purchased off Myntra. It was expensive but Aalia liked Shashank’s sartorial adventures and had proceeded to spend Rs 15,000 on her gown at Shashank’s behest.

  Shashank had only two choices—either he could buy the suit from Gentleman’s Corner and not opt for a return, or forget about that specific suit and look for something similar on other websites.

  The first was not a real option because the suit was listed at a hefty Rs 20,000 plus taxes and shipping. His father would never allow Shashank to spend that kind of money. He considered setting up another profile on the website, but without a credit card he was in no position to work around the website. Could he borrow anyone else’s credit card? That would be opening a Pandora’s box of explanations and justifications. He decided against it.

  With his options dwindling, he spent a couple of nights browsing grey suits on all other websites but nothing pleased him about any of those. He wanted the suit he had shown Aalia.

  The last resort was to get a suit tailor-made, but the farewell was less than ten days away. And what if he didn’t get the exact shade and Aalia recognized the difference? She did a have trained eye for fashion.

  He thought of people who could possibly bail him out. Yousuf was the only name that popped up in his mind.

  ‘Listen, I’ve got myself in a fix. Umm . . . you remember my shopping habit?’ he asked Yousuf.

  ‘Yeah, man, sure. You want a job at Myntra?’

  ‘Not exactly a job. Not now at least, but I need to get in touch with Gentleman’s Corner. Do you know someone there?’

  Yousuf mulled this over and spoke, ‘I don’t think so, but I will have friends who will know someone. Tell me, what happened?’ He sensed a flush of desperation in Shashank’s voice.

  Shashank explained how he landed himself in this awkward position and subtly inquired if Yousuf had a credit card he could lend. Yousuf mentioned he never kept a credit card.

  ‘I have to wear that suit. I have searched for it across all other websites. I am just not getting the one that I want,’ Shashank said, exasperated.

  ‘When do you need this suit? Can’t you rent it from someone?’ Yousuf asked.

  ‘I don’t know anyone who has that suit.’

  ‘When do you need it?’

  ‘About a week from now.’

  ‘Let me see if I can do something about it.’

  For Shashank, it didn’t turn out to be an encouraging call. But Yousuf was looking for someone exactly like Shashank. It so happened that he needed something done and he needed someone who would forget the light of reason in exchange for money.

  Yousuf found Shashank in the sticky spot which many young boys in Hyderabad found themselves in after college—kids without employment, looking to make a quick buck.

  Yousuf, who hailed from Amannagar, a north-western neighbourhood around Hyderabad, was a promising cricketer during his school days who dreamt of playing for Hyderabad. His father, a Muslim cleric, and his mother were convinced that he would make a good cricketer who could one day even be picked up for the Indian national team.

  That dream didn’t quite go as planned after Yousuf’s father was arrested on account of extremist speeches during a peaceful rally around Amannagar. After repeated attempts to have him released failed, Yousuf had no option but to take up odd jobs to support his family. First he became a newspaper delivery boy. Then a grocer’s assistant. Soon he couldn’t manage his school and his day jobs and so he dropped out of the former.

  Other people in and around the neighbourhood came to offer support to Maryam, Yousuf’s mother. Maryam, who saw her life fall apart in less than six months, was clueless about Yousuf’s future. That’s when a wise, old man from the neighbourhood offered to take Yousuf under his wing.

  That m
an was Salah Ahmet. Salah impressed upon Maryam the need for Yousuf to carve his own future and not for him to depend on the mercies of rich Hyderabadis. What he conveniently left out from his merciful submission to help Yousuf was that he was a ground man for the ISIS in India. Salah was the epitome of danger and destruction for humanity in general.

  The first thing Salah did was move Yousuf’s mother out of their current home to a larger apartment. Food and other supplies began to be delivered to the house through Salah’s connections in Amannagar. In exchange, all Salah asked of Yousuf was to find recruits for his movement. It had been less than six months that Yousuf had been working for Salah, but he had already brought in more than twenty-odd youngsters from in and around Amannagar for evening classes with Salah’s trusted advisers. A glib talker, Yousuf could easily convince the youngsters to get a few seemingly inane errands done in exchange for money.

  Salah never told Yousuf the real reason behind this recruitment drive. It was a tacit understanding. Time and again, Salah would ask Yousuf to join his classes, but Yousuf would politely decline. Salah’s arguments would often take the high ground that he wanted the youth not to stray into illegal activities but instead work with him in spreading the word of Allah.

  ‘We advise you to do more important things than smoke weed or drink alcohol. One day you will understand it,’ Salah opined.

  Instead, what used to transpire inside a massive apartment complex that Salah owned was intensive training in the handling of arms and ammunition. Those newly recruited would be expected to carry out attacks in and around India for opposing the ISIS. Initially, Yousuf resisted becoming a part of this drive but seeing how much Salah was helping his mother, he caved in.

  One day, when a Hyderabad cop forcibly asked Maryam to take off her hijab, Yousuf decided he had had enough. He agreed to participate in one of the secret missions. His mission was to identify and kill a few heathen passengers on a train between Bangalore and Hyderabad. In fact, the ISIS had green-lighted a slew of missions across Europe and Salah needed an administrative hand for booking hotels and trains for his trainees.