The Benefit Season Read online

Page 4


  I pause as the waiter brings the scotch, and I ask him to bung rocks into it. I take a deep swig and a good look at the coarse woman knocking back the bourbon, half-turned away from me. I start over.

  ‘Who is managing you now?’

  ‘My husband’, she laughs and nearly chokes on the olive. I don’t know how that’s funny.

  ‘From what I heard back there, you don’t seem pretty impressed with him’.

  ‘The phallus part? That was a joke; what makes a female comedian lick, Arjun? Click, I mean’, she winks at the contrived slip of tongue. ‘Tick?’

  ‘How much do you make- a couple of thousands per night? What about contracts, endorsements, talk shows, the works? Nothing? We could take you from here- to there’; my hand swooshes through the air like a plane.

  ‘Just what do you have in mind, A P,’ she says, making it sound like “a pee”.

  ‘What I have in mind is that we sign you on; we start an exclusive talk show for you on STAR TV. We have cricketers on our rolls; you talk funny to them, shake a leg with them, let their egos sprout wings and fly; you get us the eyeballs, we bring the fat to your plate.’

  ‘Why me? I am new in town’.

  ‘For one, you are a woman- look around you – the small tribe of comics has a heavily skewed sex ratio. Does the feminine form grace the comic horizon as you look far and wide- no sir, it doesn’t; all one espies is a glut of deep-throated, goateed-Billy’s with moustaches on their lips and plumes on their crowns. ‘

  ‘And two?’

  ‘And two- you talk dirty. You are porn audio- you are a comic strip act. Men will sign blank IOUs to watch you and women will love to hate you; to them you will be the dartboard of hatred. Why would I take their love and their hatred from them; after all, these are sides of the same coin.’

  ‘ I guess you may be right…but I don’t know if I would fit in. But, what have I got to do?’

  ‘Take the weekend and think it over. Call me on Monday and make a pitch to my boss. Crack a couple of nasty’s and tell us how we are going to sell the idea to the studios’.

  ‘Monday it is’.

  ‘Monday- is the day your life is going to change. Pip-ship,’ I say, and return to my friends- spent with curiosity.

  ϖ

  On Monday I knock and enter Monal’s office.

  ‘I have an idea I wish to share with you’.

  ‘Really, I was beginning to wonder if we have recruited a sleeper cell’.

  ‘I spent all week chasing these guys, but couldn’t come up with a single catch.’ I brief her meticulously on the clients I had spoken with, and their reactions. She seems amused with my spirited attempts.

  ‘Just keep at it. The fish will bite. Forget about them, what was the idea you had?’

  ‘On Friday we’d gone to this standup comic act by a US returned lady, and my, she was god-awful! She had these vulgar jokes- hardly jokes, on everything that we never talk of- poop, toilets, sex, ovaries and what not. She offended and embarrassed people present- even the vilest of them; which gave me an idea’.

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘That we make a move to sign this lady on, and get her to host a talk show with the cricketing fraternity- we have a ready supply in our own backyard to begin with. Then, once the show floats, we move to others and in the process get those guests to sign with us.’

  ‘But you just said she was pathetic. Only a mad man would hire her. Who would come to her show? After just a couple of episodes the channel will pull the spectacle out. Seriously, are you trying to make us look bad, Mr. Pasricha’?

  ‘Exactly! You are spot-on. But for a moment consider this; she is one of the only lady standup comics out there; even corporates are hiring her for electrifying parleys with their staff, and she has just landed a column for The Times. What were these people thinking? She might be raunchy and crass, but she is a raunchy and crass woman- and therein her USP lies. A broad that bawdy is still hard to come by in our country madam; abroad none may brood’.

  ‘I am a little confused here. Are you telling me we’re hiring her or are we not?’

  ‘If you had heard me carefully, I said, we will move to hire her- not that we will hire her.’

  ‘Thereby…?’

  ‘You once mentioned our competition follows our moves closely. I remember this Prerna trying to filch our ideas and clients from right under our nose. All I am saying is that we spread the word that we’re hiring this lady, and as surely as the clouds above, Prerna or someone will make a move to steal her. This Paz thing is all over the media- you will notice- for the right or the wrong reasons. So our move will appear legit.’

  ‘Then?’ Monal is beginning to drum her fingers on the table.

  ‘When they bet their money on Paz, they will shoot a lot of episodes in one go before it actually goes on air. After the first couple of shows itself- my bet is three episodes, the idea will come a cropper. Their clients- from what I have seen of her show- will tear up their contracts in disgust and come running into our waiting embrace. And that will make our competition look bad and we’ll look like the saving grace.’

  ‘You are deeper than I thought. It just might work. You haven’t got me any clients so far, but you’re losing others theirs, which I guess is quite all right with me. How do you say we go about this?’

  ‘I’ll call this lady to pitch in front of you. We’ll make it appear that we’re interested in hiring her, and plant this news at the right places. Once word gets out, others will make a beeline for her, and we’ll let her slip through our fingers- careless rookie that I am. We will just let things take their own course from there, and I’ll be waiting with a net when the stars tumble out of her show’.

  ‘Don’t underestimate our competition. They might not bite’.

  ‘Either way, what have you got to lose?’

  ‘You’re’ right! Ok, I’ll play along, just to humor you. But don’t stop looking around for fresh faces for my businesses.

  ‘Yes madam, thank you madam’. I bow and exit, to plan the risky gamble.

  Paz has left a couple of messages for me at the reception. I call her up and she seems excited at the chance to be represented by a famous MNC brand like ours; having her name etched in stone alongside the biggies of page-three. I feel a little guilty at the sham I’m playing with her, but what the heck- she might just strike lucky there and move to a different plane with all the mileage that she’s going to earn out of this. I invite her to meet my boss and pitch to her whenever she’s ready. She wants to come right away. I tell her that’s not possible and put her on hold and ask Monal when she can take some time out for some bad entertainment. She laughs and puts her down for an appointment in the next week; ‘don’t let us appear too anxious to hire her’, she advises.

  I tie up for the meeting with all concerned and get back to my diary and phone; getting so many rejections has somehow steeled me as I cheerily thank the next wicket-keeping jerk who goes,’ I was hungry when you called- now I’m plain fed up!’

  As the day wears on the list of insults I pile up on my desk and my self-respect grows till I can’t remember when it was last that someone had been nice to me. Lele and Lily rescue me briefly over the next few days during coffee and lunch recesses, but its not helping. I wonder if I’m really cut out for marketing and sales, and whether my sworn tormentor Khosla was right about this being a lousy job, and about me being better off in the army- a fine place for proud, fit and upright men. But I am not a quitter and I need the cash to prove to Khosla, Aarti and my mom; the only three people that matter in my life at this instant, that I am a responsible man o’ the house capable of surfing in choppy seas and breaking ashore with the fat of fine flour, milk, honey and balm.

  ϖ

  Office is agog with talk of the impending visit of the crass and cross Paz. Monal and I had planned for an audience of just the two of us for Paz’s pitch. But people are begging Monal to let them also watch. She resists initially but then gives in with amusement.
Fun is rare in office where we are usually at the receiving end of a very demanding, obnoxious, and eccentric clientele. People are agape that a rookie like me would gamble his career on such a risqué bet. They are also sure that my not draping the customary veil of secrecy over the wooing of the new client is not likely to go down well with the company’s morals and ethics department.

  On the appointed day the comedian arrives to a hall full of eager staff. All the nerds are there- adjusting their glasses and waiting for their first oral-porn experience. Her first two columns have already made it to the papers, which make her a potential personage of uncertain denomination. But they do not care for the written word; all they want is to hear her obscene profundities, and in that she does not disappoint them.

  Unlike a standard comedian she makes no attempt to connect with her audience. Instead, she rolls the eyes, waves the long knotty fingers, bares her teeth in a snarl, and with an affected accent launches a grand soliloquy on penises on wheels, and hymens that take winged flight. She only pauses to ask the whiskered geek perched on the armrest in the front row if he carries a license for looking that ugly, and if he has ever had sex, with a partner that is. She wonders who let the cage open for the monkey scratching her armpit in the second row, and whether the fluff there may be used for camouflaging a small tank. “A farewell to armpits,” will be the title of her next column she promises. She explains why terrorists would never hijack the brown Indian in the third row with the smell of curry on his sleeve, and why they would never name the presidential residence in America as the Black House even though they had Obama there now. After talking on hairy fairies, erotographomanic fairytales and priests that come before acne on twelve-year-old boys, she continues to shock people with erotica on cellulite, body hair, and the importance of being earnest on climaxes. She rounds off by slapping her bums, grabbing her crotch, and squirting laughing gas through imaginary tits. Disgusted, the audience gape at her with dropped jaws, while I, the sworn defendant of the freedom of speech, rise to my feet and clap for my life. Monal looks at me with surprise, and then catching on, is quick to her feet for joining me in a standing ovation. The two of us look like fools clapping away in the dazed hall, but the audience, not to be outdone in their show of solidarity with their hard-as-nails boss, are soon cheering and clapping their winning horse’s victory lap. Paz is surprised with the applause and her mask of severity slips to reveal a childishly pleased artist hungering after false praise.

  I escort a beaming Paz to Monal’s office.

  ‘So you two are engaged’, Paz begins.

  Monal looks at me quizzically as I hurriedly explain that I am engaged to some other Monal back home in Delhi. She gives me a wicked smile as she taps her pencil on the desk and swings in her leather chair. I kick myself over a silly slip of the tongue that has me telling lies all around.

  ‘Well I really liked your show, and as you can see, it was such a hit with our staff too. So Paz, we’ll ready the paperwork, and let you know when we’ll need your autograph on the dotted line’, says Monal with a straight face.

  Paz seems thrilled as I escort her out; I take the trouble of calling a cab for her and seeing her off on the clammy street outside.

  ‘Wow, that was bad…horrific! What poor taste. Who let her out her cage I want to ask, and who gave her a license for all that vulgarity. I mean, come on, it’s not funny of course, but what she has is sheer lowlife stuff’, Monal says as I sink into a chair.

  ‘ Now you see what I meant?’

  ‘I see, yes. Provided the others fall for her- do you think they will? If my competition is that foolish then I need have no worries in life’.

  ‘To help them make a decision, let’s drive up her TRPs a couple of notches. I’m sure Monal, a couple of calls from you to the media houses should improve Paz’s visibility in the public eye and drive Prerna rushing into her lap.’

  ‘I’ll work on it right away- now be gone,’ she says, playfully chucking a crumpled piece of paper at my face.

  Once Monal is at it you can trust it to be done and done well. Things go according to script and Paz suddenly finds herself on every news channel and girlie magazine, telling the world why hairy shins have no takers. She calls me, and texts me several times a day and I start to ignore her. She says there are many people calling her up to sign her on but she would like to work with us only since we’ve gotten her this break into the crazy world of glitz blitz. I know there is only person chasing her and that person is Prerna.

  Finally, she signs a contract with Plagiaristix when she finds me giving her the cold shoulder. Prerna has fallen hook line and sinker for our grand idea and puts it into motion without any delay. They start rolling film and invite their top star, captain of the ‘Delhi Bellies’ IPL team, Calvin Paterson and his wife for the first episode.

  ‘Are you married’, Paz asks Mrs. Paterson as the show begins.

  Mrs. Paterson smiles shyly.

  ‘Was your wife a virgin when you got married?’ Paz says to a shocked Calvin in her trademark bitchy style. ‘ Did you insist she bring her hymen to the table before you cross the aisle?’ Then she turns to the blushing wife, ‘did you insist he bring his uncut foreskin to the table in return, Mary?’

  I am standing at the gates with the contract as Calvin storms out of the studio yelling on his phone, firing his agent.

  Her next victim, a Bangladeshi cricketer in the IPL, Sohail Gazi, is storming out of the show after she puts her second question to him,’ do you clean toilets and wax your legs as you expect your wife to do’, when I block his path and wave my contract under his nose, offering him double of what his agent is giving him. He is happy to settle for half of what I give him, after he’s done showering his agent with the choicest of abuses.

  The first question had been; ‘why aren’t you here in a burqa like your wife?’

  ‘It’s a shame they have pulled her show off the air’, I tell Monal as we sip coffee in her office.

  ‘And why’s that?’

  ‘More guys would have sacked Plagiaristix, and our ranks would have swelled’.

  She laughs happily. Plagiaristix is red in the face while Tom is grinning widely as he approves the contracts we fax to him for approvals. With two guys in the bag in just a few weeks in the company, the skies are bright and the bird’s on the lark. Monal allows me to take the day off to meet Aarti at the airport and settle her at her aunt’s place. Her joining date has arrived and I will be lonely and eligible no more.

  ‘Hey, Monal, can I ask of you a favor?’

  She listens with a growing smile as I explain.

  She slaps her thigh in glee and says,’ wow, so sweet! Done!’ And raising her feet off the edge of her leather and mahogany table, calls her secretary to her office.

  ‘I thought you said her name was Monal’, Monal says cheekily.

  ‘That’s a pet name’; I manage to say.

  ‘Monal for Aarti? Wow. Which one is the pet by the way, Monal or Aarti?’

  I say nothing as I shuffle out of the office, feeling bumpy at Monal’s mirth.

  ϖ

  Chapter 4

  Aarti arrives on the Scene

  Earlier in the day Aarti had made me promise a hundred times that I would be there at the airport in the evening to receive her. And that is, after I had not even suggested such a thing that I wouldn’t be there.

  ‘Please be there, ooh please, pretty please. I can’t wait to see you. Don’t you say you got caught up somewhere,’ she’d insisted. It’s pointless to remind her that I was the one in the first place to rule out her idea of taking a cab to her aunt’s place, her aunt being too old to drive and come pick her up.

  ‘I shall be there darling; there’s no two ways about it’, I affirm.

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘You bet’.

  ‘You’re the first face I want to see when I walk out that airport’.

  ‘You’re the only face I want to see at that airport’.

  ‘Be there in t
ime- I’ve heard horrid things about Mumbai traffic’.

  ‘I’m leaving already’.

  The moment her plane lands at Mumbai and she’s allowed to use her mobile phone, she calls me, ‘are you there?’

  I decide it’s a good time to tease her. ‘Sorry baby, something came up, but my cabbie is there. He’ll be waiting with a sign at the exit.’

  There is a loud pause at the other end. I can hear her breath and in the background the plane announcements.

  ‘So when do I lastly see you’, she asks, disappointment writ large in the tone.

  ‘Tonight itself, I’ve booked this table at the Levo. After you drop off your stuff at auntie’s and dab a little powder at them rosy cheeks, he’ll bring you straight around to me- I’ll be waiting at the table- it’s on your right, in the corner, away from the band, with the candle lights and the red runner on white silk.’

  ‘Is there a dress code… is it a fancy place… do I have to wear a gown or something… can you afford it’, she asks with concern.

  ‘As long as it’s not jeans and your shooting earphones and your firing cap, and a shotgun slung over your shoulders; it’s going to be fine’.

  ‘Arjun’, she says with considerable stress; I know for sure the brows are close and she is waving a forefinger in my face; ‘ I know how to dress for an evening out’.

  ‘Just look pretty then’.

  ‘Though you don’t deserve it, for ditching me, as I always said you would; to you I can’t say no now, can I? Now, tell me what does this cabbie looks like? Ugly I’m sure.’

  ‘Like any other cabbie, except that he’ll be in a white dress with a golden trim that you can’t miss.’

  I stand at the gates waiting for her to fetch her bags from the conveyer belt. Close by, an all-girls school concert band complete with wind and percussion instruments and string basses waits, ready to strike up at the orders of their conductor, standing with his back turned to the gates. An ornate brass stand is placed behind him, facing the gates with someone’s name on it- probably Mr. Holland’s.