The Zoya Factor (9 page)

'And he wears a neelam on his middle finger,' I added and sighed. This guy Hairy was obviously a fruitcake. (A neelam-wearing fruitcake with a strained groin. How gross is that?) 'Look, Lokendar,' I said, 'the bottom line is that I need those shots fast - I have to print bottle labels
and
roll out posters within a week.'

'Okay, okay,' he huffed and puffed. '
Mein kuchh karta hoon...'

But of course he couldn't do a thing. The whole day went by chasing those idiots. My idiot client Ranjeet called Sanks who called me and freaked out totally. 'Why are you not on top of things, Zoya?' he ranted.'Do you want me to pull Ishaan out of the ICU and send him there to show you how it's done?'

Please.
I'd trained Ishaan from scratch. Did he really think he could get under my skin with that pathetic ploy? 'I
am
on top of things, Sanks,' I said soothingly. 'And don't insult me by going on about Ishaan all the time. I also have some Standing in thee Society, you know...'

***

The next morning I pulled on my cargos and a tee shirt I'd borrowed from Neelo (I was fast running out of clothes) and hit the ground running. Time was running out. Vishaal was piling up an unimaginable food and beverage bill and my much looked-forward-to Bombay shoot was almost over. I had to nail those bastards today.

I got into the elevator to find Khoda on board, looking freshly showered and riding downwards in his grey Gold's Gym tracks. 'Good morning,' he said pleasantly. 'Aren't you late for your flight?'

'No, actually,' I said sweetly. 'My boss says I can't leave till I get
all
my shots.'

He looked a little taken aback. 'What d'you mean? Don't tell me your photographer couldn't finish all the shots
yesterday
either!'

That made my hackles rise. I mean, Vishaal would've finished all the shots on the
first
day itself if Khoda hadn't rushed his boys for practice. And now, he was insinuating
we
were slow when it was the boys who were dragging their feet!

'He didn't get a chance to shoot yesterday, at all,' I said, feeling my nostrils beginning to flare. 'Your openers are suffering from strained
groins
and so are unavailable to shoot.'

He looked surprised, and not unamused. 'Harry's strained his groin?' he grinned. 'First I've heard of it.'

'Well, he says he has,' I said as neutrally as I could. I mean, I couldn't call Hairy a liar to his skipper's face. 'And so has Shivnath, apparently.'

Nikhil nodded, his smile getting wider.

'And so my shoot' - my voice wobbled a little but I couldn't help that - 'is off.'

Khoda was grinning unabashedly now. 'So Little Miss Fix-It has run up against something she can't fix!' he crowed in a not very captain-like manner.

Then, as I looked up at him, practically teary-eyed with frustration, he said, in a nicer voice, 'Tell me, do you think they're faking it?'

Well, he'd asked for it. 'Yes!' I nodded, vigorously. 'Harry and Shiv are playing hide-and-seek with me. They're thinking that maybe they won yesterday because of me and so they want me to stay here for the next match-breakfast to test the theory! I can't - obviously! Because I have a
life
too, you know. So now they're trying to delay my departure as long as possible by kidding around with my shoot...'

'But
you're
the one who put the idea into their heads,' Khoda pointed out, infuriatingly logical. 'Didn't you go, all chirpily,
"Hey, maybe I bring you guys good luck!"'

I winced. He'd mimicked my voice perfectly. 'It was a
joke
,' I said defensively. 'I never thought they'd take it seriously.'

He was quiet for almost a whole minute. Then he said, 'Look, why don't you just do what the boys want? Stay till day after, eat breakfast with us, get your shots in the evening, and leave?'

I was surprised. 'But, you said, that day... ' I started and then stopped.

'...that I don't think you're a good-luck charm?' he said calmly enough. 'Of course, I don't. But the next match is against Australia, so I don't want to take any risks. If it gives some of the lads more spunk, I'm all for it.'

'But suppose you win that one?' I protested. 'Harry's quite capable of insisting I stay on for the match after that too!'

Khoda smiled enigmatically. 'Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. You set up your patchwork shoot for the evening after the next match and get yourself a seat on the morning flight.'

I nodded back at him doubtfully and he reached out and tousled my hair in a nice, elder-brotherly sort of way. 'Now smile,' he said.

I smiled.

The elevator
pinggged
open. He stood aside to let me exit first, in this very cheesy mock-chivalrous way.

'By the way, Zoya?'

I turned.

He grinned at me, white teeth flashing in his brown face, 'Nice life philosophy.'

Huh?

He glanced down at my tee shirt quizzically and then walked away.

Puzzled, I yanked it away from me and squinted at the lettering. There, in bright firoza blue on a purple background were emblazoned three words I'd failed to read when I'd slipped on Neelo's tee shirt in the morning: DRINK. HUMP. DIE.

I aimed a woman-of-the-world-ish shrug in the general direction of where he'd gone. 'Yeah...heh, heh,' I said weakly, 'pretty nice, huh?'

***

Later that day when the three of us went down to the lobby we saw this big
Zing!
banner strung up outside one of the banquet halls. It said 'A SODA WITH KHODA' in big blue letters and underneath was a message in Bangla which Neelo translated for us, '
Welcome Little Winners of the Share-a-
Zing!
with Nikhil Khoda Contest
!'

There was a scrum of dark-eyed, excited-looking kids at the door, most of them looking no older than twelve, escorted by some event management people in
Zing!
tee shirts. A perspiring Lokey was standing by the door, talking on the same cellphone Nikhil Khoda had shaken threateningly under my nose a couple of days ago.

'Hey, hey stop!' Neelo said, grabbing the back of my, well actually
his
, stupid tee shirt (which I was now wearing inside out). 'Let's go in and watch. It should be a blast, man!'

Lokey said it was cool if we watched, so we went in and found some chairs in the back row and settled down. There was a little stage up front and lots and lots of kids, some of them with bats and balls and pads,
all
of them with
Zing!
bottles in their hands.

'Where are these bachchas from?' I asked Lokey as he came in and collapsed on a chair next to me.

'From all over the subcontinent, they are thirty-five in all,' he puffed.

'What did they have to do to win, dude?' Neelo asked curiously. 'Some of them look really small.'

It was an under-the-crown-cap scheme, the event management guy explained. They all got to have a Q and A session with Khoda, and one of them (the first Indian kid to have found the A SODA WITH KHODA crown cap) would get to read out a special message that he wrote himself (well, with a little help from his dad or his elocution teacher or whatever) for the Indian team. He pointed out the winner kid to us, very small and brown, but with spiky hair and eyes as bright as buttons. He was wearing a shiny suit with a ready-made tie on an elastic band and had a very purposeful expression on his face. He held a thick sheaf of papers in his hand.

'Khoda had better watch out,' Vishaal snorted. 'That kid means business, dude!'

'Where's he, anyway?' I asked, hoping Khoda wouldn't be starry and show up late or not at all and fully break the children's hearts.

'He's here, Joyaji!' Lokey puffed. 'Look, he's walking in now.'

Sure enough, Nikhil had just emerged from behind the stage in a blue
Zing!
tee shirt and grey tracks, grinning happily, waving with both hands.

The kids all jumped up and cheered, '
Khoda
!
Khoda
!
Khoda!
'

It was infectious. I found I'd leapt up too, clapping madly.

Khoda pulled the mike out of the upright stand, walked forward casually, collapsed cross-legged right at the edge of the stage and started talking to the kids in a babble of English, Hindi and broken Bangla. They asked him a million questions on training, muscle building, diet, stroke play, team management and strategy, all of which he answered solemnly and without a hint of being patronizing. The kids were nodding seriously and some even took notes (which Neelo found hysterically funny for some reason).

And then it was the little winner's moment in the sun.

His name was announced with a flourish of trumpets. A spotlight followed his small figure as he strutted forward, plucked the mike from Khoda's hands and waited for silence with quiet confidence. There was a little whispering and shushing and Khoda had to put his finger to his lips and glare at the kids mock-threateningly a couple of times, but finally silence fell and the little dude started to speak. (Vishaal pulled out his camcorder at once.)

His voice was in that just-about-to-break, sometimes-hoarse-sometimes-girlish zone, but confident, with just a tiny betraying quiver to it.

'It was sunny days in thee jungal,' he began impressively.

'Oh cool, the lateral approach!' Neelo guffawed. I kicked him hard in the shin.

'It was sunny days in thee jungal,' the little boy repeated. 'Guru Drona was giving his dissy-pills an arching lesson. Thee guru strung up a clay...a...uh...a clay-birdd on a tree and baded the princes to come forward and aim on it, one by one. As each prince stood before him, closing one eye, thee guru asked
ki
"Whatcanyousee, O prince?" And each prince said, "Thee birdd, O teacher, thee tree, a little piss of sky and thee jungal's behind." And the guru was very much waxed and bid them to move on. Till it was Arjun's turn. "Whatcanyousee O prince?" "The eye of the birdd, O teacher," little Arjun replied. "What else?" asked teacher craftily. "Canyounot see thee tree, a little piss of sky and thee jungal's behind?" But little Arjun said stud-fastly, "The eye of the birdd is
all
I see O teacher." Much happy, Drona bid him shoot, shoot! and little Arjun's arrow flied straight and pierced the eye of the birdd, falling it to thee ground.' The little boy stopped here for a sip of
Zing!
and looked Khoda straight in the eye. 'I am sure, Mr Nikhil Khoda,' he said, very man to man, 'that you are knowing this story.'

Nikhil inclined his head gravely and said that yes, he did know it.

'I am no Drona-achaar,' the little fellow said shaking his head modestly. 'Australia' (he gave a light laugh), 'is not a tree, and the ICC World Cup is not a
birdd,
but is a
cup!'
He raised one dramatic finger to the sky, 'A cup-birrd! And if you want to win it you must' - he turned and bored his burning eyes into Khoda's face - 'see only thee eye of thee cupboard, Mr Nikhil Khoda!'

He swung around to face all of us, speaking in ringing accents, 'See only thee eye of thee cup-birrd, Team India!' 'See only,' concluded the little thespian, his voice dropping to a whisper that could be heard in every corner of the hall, 'only
...only
thee eye of thee cupboard.'

Huge applause rang out from every corner of the hall. Vishaal and Neelo got to their feet whistling enthusiastically. I blinked back tears and blew my nose vigorously as I watched the upright little figure accept the standing ovation with a grave bow.

And then it was Nikhil's turn to speak. 'That was an excellent speech, sir,' he said and he sounded like he meant it. 'You're absolutely right. Just like when the exams come around you must focus totally and concentrate only on your studies and
nothing
else, in the same way when you wear the blue uniform you must stop thinking about internal politics, or personal records or
Zing!
ads or' - this with a rueful grin that made all the little boys laugh out loud - 'girls, and see only the eye of the bird. I promise you guys today, that till the ICC World Cup is over, I will see only the eye of the cupboard. Only' - he gave the same dramatic pause the little boy had done, but in the
nicest
way possible - 'the eye of the cupboard. Thank you.'