Siya was second of three siblings. Her older sister was already married and was a mother of two perfect kinds. Her younger brother was a happy go lucky guy with a flourishing job and career. Siya belonged to a middle-class family who were able to get financial stability only after Siya's got her job. Siya managed to buy a flat for her happiness and this was the one achievement she was most proud of. However, she was far from being the perfect daughter. She was still unmarried and was too strong to budge or settle under the pressure of people's opinion. Siya was now 35 years old and was hiding a very big secret to protect her parents and family from the hurt and pain this secret would cause them.
Siya was not very passionate about her job, she was underpaid and undervalued but she loved her team. She was a hard worker and didn't mind slogging for it. It was 3:00 AM on a Saturday night, Siya was managing the go-live of a very critical project. One of her junior teammates had goofed up and Siya was doing her best to cover for him. She got into a call, where a very senior Customer Relationship manager was doing his best in blaming Siya's team over the failure of the entire project. Siya refused to accept, and she was very right in doing so. However, this man kept pushing his limits. Siya was very good at handling people but tonight she was incapable of accepting defeat from this man whom she knew more personally than professionally. He was related to one of her cousins and she was aware of all his fabulous accomplishments. He had pushed her too far and she ended up cursing in a major client meeting calling him "You are a fucking piece of shit!". She had not done it intentionally. She immediately got a call on her phone from an unknown Australian number. She was shivering with fear as she had clearly crossed a professional line but cursing on a call. She picked the call and heard a husky voice on the other end. It said, "Hi Siya, this is Raghav Viswanathan". Siya immediately replied "Listen, I didn't mean to… I'm...". He interrupted her "Siya, l am sorry. It was me. I had pushed you. Can we start over?".
Siya joined back the customer meeting that she left hastily, and Raghav made sure she was comfortable. The entire episode was now just a joke to everyone, and Siya couldn't believe she could come through such a mess so quickly. The project was successful, and Raghav was there on call till the end. Siya still couldn't believe a shark like Raghav would ever help someone like her out. In the end she messaged him on office communicator to apologize and thank him for all his help. She was still suspecting he had an ulterior motive to be this nice to her. Raghav responded, "I hope you don't think of me as a piece of shit anymore 😉". Siya was embarrassed and replied, "well that time you were, but thank you for letting it go".
Over the next few weeks, Siya and Raghav would talk frequently. He was good at Management stuff, but Siya had a great technical knowledge. They would seek each other out for work reasons. One Friday night, when it was late evening in India and quite late night in Australia. Raghav was on call with Siya for hours helping her in a major presentation. She tried to cut the call short, but he simply wouldn't allow it. It seemed like he really had nothing else to do on a Friday night. Siya did inform him regarding their mutual connection, her dumbass cousin Rohit. They both had a good laugh discussion his idiotic stories. In the end of their call, Raghav had asked for her number. He was being a little awkward and shy and Siya wondered why he bothered to ask; he could have just fetched it from her email signature. He wanted to share details of a job certification that might be good for Siya.
An hour later, Siya received his text on WhatsApp with details he had promised to send her. Also, there was a comment "You look nice in the picture, I didn't know you were married". Raghav was referring to Siya's profile picture clicked during her cousin's wedding. Siya was wearing a red and gold silk saree and simple gold jewelry. Siya felt uncomfortable and brushed his compliment by cracking a lame joke. That night before going to bed she checked that comment again and slept with a smile on her face.
This went on for a few months, their talks were still about work, but they had started to subtly discuss their tastes, their day and gossip about their colleagues. Siya particularly like to talk about one of Raghav's colleague, Ritu. She was the meanest and the biggest player Siya had seen so far. Siya was quite naïve in dealing with people like her also dealing with people who were much higher in the Project Management food chain. One day Raghav informed her of his visit to India which included his visit to Siya's city... Bangalore. He asked Siya to select a restaurant for a special dinner. He became awkward and hesitated to call this a date so Siya understood it to be a Team dinner that would include everyone. She politely agreed to arrange for it.
A week later, Siya went to the office all dressed up in a formal attire. She wore a light blue well fitted shirt and black trousers with a chic black blazer. She was sitting and chilling with her friends and colleagues whom she had met after a long time. Then arrived this big team from Australia, they all wore suits and blazers and looked so very sophisticated. Siya found her little black blazer completely outdated compared to what these women looked like. In fact, all her Indian colleagues also dressed to impress. They directly headed to a big conference room where all the higher management were seated. A few hours later Siya bumped into Raghav near the pantry. They exchanged pleasantries and shook hands. Raghav held on to her hand for a few seconds longer than normal. He let go of her hand when he noticed Siya blushing a little. This few minutes' encounter is all they could have that day.
The next day, Siya noticed that Raghav had arrived late and was immediately pulled into meetings. At noon, she noticed that he was working along in a meeting room. She gathered courage and walked in. She was done showing off her fancy self and decided to wear a simple green khadi kurti and silver jhumkis. As soon as she called Raghav he turned around. He paused his work and gave her a biggest smile. She lightly sat on that big table in the middle of the conference room and Raghav pushed his chair back to talk to Siya. "How's it going?" asked Siya casually. He scratched his head and replied "I didn't expect to be this busy. I'm sorry we didn't get to talk". Before Siya could reply she got a call from her friend. She said, "Everyone is going for lunch, do you want to join us?". Raghav checked his calendar and got up from his chair to leave. Ritu immediately walked in the room, she was tall, leggy and was wearing this short formal skirt suit. She never acknowledged Siya's presence, she grabbed Raghav by his hand and asked him to take her out to some place nice for lunch. Raghav hesitated as Ritu pulled him out. He turned back towards Siya and asked her if she wanted to join. Ritu eventually realizes that the simpleton standing next to Raghav is Siya and asks her to join them. Siya politely declines and goes to join her friends. This encounter had a deep impact on Siya which made her learn her place. She decided to keep her distance and mind her own business going forward. There was a big dinner that evening which was arranged by Siya. Everybody had a blast except for Siya and Raghav. There was now another kind of distance between them, the one of positions, connections, and class.
The next day, Siya was very early to office. This was especially weird because Siya's house was very far, and she must have reached home only in mid night after the dinner yesterday. It was a Friday, and her choice of clothes made her the odd one out. All the other women were dressed in casual dresses bringing their fashion A game on by taking liberty of casual Friday. Siya decided to wear a figure hugging electric blue salwar suit with a similar color printed chiffon dupatta. She teamed her look with a small bindi and delicate earrings. She hid herself in a distant corner cubicle. Raghav realized she was being weird, and his eyes went looking for Siya. He was bowled over by how lovely she looked today. He didn't want to be a slave to his work anymore since he was required to travel the very next day. He went towards her, but she found herself an excuse to move away from Raghav. Raghav didn't give up here and followed her around to the cafeteria.
There was almost a Bollywood filmy scene when Siya's dupatta hit Raghav's face when they were going for lunch with other in the team in an open-air canteen. Raghav flirtingly reacted "ufffff...". Siya immediately grabbed her flying dupatta while the others grinned at the scene naughtily.
It was past 6 and Siya was still in office hanging out with her friends. She suddenly got a text message from Raghav. It said "Hey, can you meet me near the fire exit staircase?". Another text "Now?". She got up from her desk and walked towards the stairs. Before she could reach, she read another text "FYI... I will be kissing you". Siya was confused and reached the staircase. Raghav sighed with relief, it felt like he wasn't sure if she will really come. He wasn't really sure how she felt about him, so he didn't want to ambush her and decided to give her a heads-up of what he plans to do... to her and with her. Siya showed him her phone with a confused look. She wasn't sure about how she should be reacting. He smiled at her and pulled her towards him by her waist. He held her slim waist and kissed her passionately. Siya responded to the kiss willingly. They kissed for a minute but were interrupted with sound of footsteps and people talking. "Damn! Why are these people taking stairs from 11th floor!!" thought Raghav. They paused and separated themselves and stood against the wall. It took a while for the party to leave. To make the scene less awkward Siya tried to small talk. She said, "wonder why people work so late on Fridays". There was nobody around and Raghav was not interested to have this conversation with Siya. He turned around, pushed her further against the wall and kissed her again this time with much more passion. Her dupatta slipped from one side exposing her beautiful figure. He realized how Indian clothing can be ten time sexier than western clothes. Her kurti fitted her perfectly and had a deep neck that just enhanced the look especially from the angle in which Raghav was looking at her. He looked at her with deep desire that made Siya bend her head in nervousness. After looking at her picture in a red saree he had made some estimates about her figure, he was glad that his estimates were absolutely right. He bends his face further down and sniffed near her cleavage. He picked her dupatta and covered her with it and said, "Let's go". Siya asked "Where?". He replied, "I have an early flight tomorrow, let's get to know each other better tonight".