“Does Karishma need to be in the meeting?” Siddhartha asked, sounding casual, but as far as Soumen was concerned, Siddhartha’s eyes were penetrating through his very soul.

Seeing her boss tongue-tied, Karishma had to come up with an excuse, “Soumen thought I could take notes. It will help him.”

“Right!” Soumen mumbled his agreement.

‘She doesn’t call him Sir,’ Siddhartha made a mental note of that without intending to. “Alright,” he said outwardly, “Let’s get started. First the broad feedback. When you are reviewing a contract, remember that your job is to review the business terms. What can we commit to, what must we ask the other party to commit to. All with a view to what is best for our business. Is that clear?”

His audience of two nodded in unison.

“So, you can leave the grammatical issues aside. The legal team will take care of it before finalizing.”

Karishma went red in face, while Soumen continued to nod. Just another confirmation of what Siddhartha had assumed was going on.

“I think we can now go over the individual contracts you have already reviewed and see which of your comments were valid and which were not. This last one, for example, you correctly pointed out that we had missed the crucial clause against them poaching our customers when the customer details are handed over to them. Given that it is a contract for logistics, this is a very real possibility. So, good work there.”

“Thanks, Dada.”

“But look at this other one. It is for design services. You have mentioned that there is no punitive clause. Why do you think we need it?”

Soumen wasn’t forthcoming; so Karishma had to speak again, “Weren’t you comparing it with other contracts, Soumen? They all had punitive clauses.”

“Yes. All other contracts had this.”

“Okay. But this is different from most other contracts you saw. In a manufacturing contract defects are easily defined, and hence punitive clause can be invoked to cover the damages. But this is for a creative service. The definition of a defect will always be contentious. Besides, if the output of manufacturing is defective, we can ask for another in place of it. But in case of creative service, you either hit it off, or you don’t. At least that’s how I think of them. So, instead of a punitive clause, which won’t solve our problem, and whose conditions will anyway be contentious, we should look at introducing a clause that helps us cut our losses early on. That’s why, if you see, the milestones are defined very minutely in the appendix and a percentage of payment due is specified at each milestone. We also have the right to stop the project at any milestone. If things aren’t going well we would just stop it at the earliest one and cut our losses.”

Karishma took notes furiously for next half an hour, as Siddhartha took them through all eight contracts she had reviewed.

—

After Soumen and Karishma left, Siddhartha leaned back in his chair and let out a sigh. There was no denying the situation. His brother hadn’t lifted even a finger. It was his assistant doing all the work. What made her do that? The desperation to keep her job? The real surprise for him wasn’t that she did it, but that she hadn’t done a bad job for someone completely inexperienced. He wouldn’t have expected his brother to do as well.

But what was he to do about this situation? He had wanted his brother to work; he had no interest in Karishma’s abilities. But now that her potential was staring at him in face, could he just ignore it? A knock at the door brought him out of his reverie. It was Mrinal reminding him of his next appointment.

—

“I have no idea if I am mad or glad about what you did,” Soumen told Karishma once they came out of Siddhartha’s office.

“You were never around. I did it in desperation.”

“What desperation?”

Karishma bit her lips. “Never mind. What do you want to do from now on?”

Her ‘never mind’ put him in a foul mood. “I suppose I am mad after all. I don’t know what I want to do from now on. But I would prefer not to be blindsided,” he said and walked off.

Karishma grinded her teeth to keep herself from retorting. Her job was a dead end from day one, and it didn’t look like she would be able to do much to keep it. Who will fire her? Soumen or Siddhartha?

She looked at her watch. There was nothing for her to do right now. These brothers would do whatever they do. Keep her or fire her. Right now, she had the luxury of her daughter being there at the company day care. And the misfortune of her falling ill. So, she might as well spend some time there.

—

“Karishma,” Soumen found her in the sick room attached to the day-care. The child in her lap started crying.

“Please wait,” Karishma looked up pleadingly, “I just need to put her to sleep.”

He nodded and stepped out.

“I am sorry,” she came out after ten minutes, looking flustered, “It was—It was still lunchtime. So, I thought I would—I’m really sorry. Did you need something?”

“It’s okay. I am not here to—You said your daughter is unwell?”

“That’s not a problem. The staff here will take care of her. I just—I just thought I had time. So—You have some work for me?”

“There is a small project that Dada wants me to get involved in. He wants to promote hand-made things – clothes mostly – from rural women’s collectives with our brand. He wants me to look after the supply chain and logistics.”

“That’s good, right?”

“I am not sure.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. It’s just so—so boring. I don’t want to do it.”

“Well, couldn’t you ask him for something that you would enjoy doing?”

“I know what he will say to that.”

“What?”

“That I need to prove myself first.”

And he didn’t want to do that! There was no surprise there, but Karishma had to bite her lips. Soumen was definitely not in a mood to hear a lecture on his privileges. At least, he had recovered from the foul mood he was in since that meeting with Siddhartha in the morning and was now talking to her again.

—

“Vikram called,” Karishma’s mother informed her, “He’s really upset at how you are behaving.”

Karishma remained silent as she stirred the noodles she was making for Kirti.

“He is right to be upset. Since when have you become so selfish, Karishma? Are you not thinking of anybody else? Is this what I raised you to become?”

Silence!

“Which couple in the world doesn’t fight? Does Kirti not need her father? He misses the child.”

Silence!

She was living under her parents’ roof. If her mother wanted, she could turn her out of the house. But despite her inability to understand how irredeemable her daughter’s marriage was, she wasn’t going to do that to her. Having satisfied herself of that, Karishma had given up on making her parents – mostly her mother – understand anything. Struggling with his debilitating illness, her father hardly seemed to be a party to the discussions anymore. If her boss worked more, Karishma would have happily stayed longer at office. Just to avoid this mother-daughter bonding session every evening. Perhaps she could start staying on late anyway. So long as she packed enough food and toys for Kirti, what was waiting at home for them except a bed to sleep in.

—

To be continued