As I emerge from my room, I find the door of Dhruv's room ajar. There's nobody around and unless he is expecting someone, he would not keep the door open so carelessly. I lock the door of my room and knock at his door. Getting no response, I peek through the open space to find his tracksuit lying on the bed. I slowly open the door and step inside. Since my intention is nothing but to check on him, I do not bother shutting the door behind me. It is only now that I hear the shower running. I look around the room and take a few steps towards the balcony. On the other side, between his bed and the armchair, lie his suitcases. Open. How irresponsible! Or was it a theft? There appear no signs of theft. His suitcases appear neatly packed. I consider waiting for him to finish showering before I leave. I turn and look at the bed again. It is only now that I spot his underwear carelessly thrown on the pillow. I sneer in disbelief- it is red. Not even maroon, but a vibrant red.

The water stops running. In a few moments, the bathroom door is unlocked and he comes out, just a towel wrapped around his waist. His body glistens as he hasn't wiped himself dry. Water drips from his hair and mostache. He freezes upon spotting me in his room. He just stares at me, saying nothing.

"The door was ajar. I came in to check.", I say pointing at the door. I should have shut it. Anyone who sees inside would be able to see him half-naked. "I'll leave." I hurry towards the door, but stop at the foot of the bed. "You should lock your door properly. Especially when your suitcases are lying open."

"It was Jagat.", he replies blankly. "He was here when I went for a shower. He must have not shut the door properly before leaving."

"I did not ask for an explanation."

Dhruv nods his head. "But you must know. You must have already thought of me as a careless person after seeing the state of the room."

I look around the room. It is rather clean and impressionable. Nothing to judge him for. Weirdly enough, it smells like him. It's not as if I am trying to sniff around, or get to know how he smells. I reckon, however, that if he has a distinctive scent to him, it is this, not the cologne he wore last night. My phone chimes again and I take it out. It is a text from Yashika. When I put it back in my pocket after replying, his look expresses disappointment. Maybe he just wants me to get out.

He takes a step towards the bed-it might be his way of asking me to leave so that he can change, no, get dressed-but trips in thin air. He fails horribly in his attempt to balance himself and falls face down, right at my foot. All those gym hours wasted. This kid cannot do the bare minimum to save his face. Or something else too. That must have hurt.

The act of balancing did not succeed, and led to another disaster- his towel came undone. He is lying down, flashing his naked butt. Its shape is...

Outside, I hear footsteps accompanied by voices. I rush to the door and shut it. Upon returning back to where he's still lying, I shield my eyes. "Cover your butt."

"Can you not figure out the place I hurt myself?"

Just as I thought. "Sorry." I look around and see a handkerchief lying on the desk under the TV. It is the closest thing at hand, so that is naturally the thing that I use to cover his butt. It does not cover it completely, but reduces the impact of the flash and flesh.

He raises his head and looks at me in disbelief. If he could, he would have killed me right now. I did something ridiculous, and he knows it. In my defence, I have no intention to see his flat, firm and lean butt. He can keep it to himself and flash it before anyone he wants to, but not me. He throws the kerchief aside and grabs his towel. Covering as much part of his butt as he can, he sits first. He grabs his left ankle and presses it. He winces in pain. "I think I sprained it."

I stare at him. "You tripped in thin air and sprained your ankle?"

"I tripped because I twisted my ankle. Now, it is sprained."

"Do you want me to call you a doctor?"

He waves off the suggestion "Not needed." He tries moving his foot and the resulting expression tells me that he needs a doctor.

"I'll ask the reception to contact a doctor."

"Help me up first. And no need to call anyone. I'll be fine."

I hesitate before moving closer to help him up. He stretches out his hand which I grab. It is insufficient to pull this person up with just a hand, especially when he cannot support himself well. I do something which would make me overthink later on. It is a completely unnecessary move on my part; there are better ways to achieve the same end. But anyways, I let go of his hand. I grab his left forearm with my left hand and encircle my right hand around his chest. I feel his stiff chest muscles against mine. His heartbeat is weird. I help him up, as he holds on to his towel for dear life. Under better circumstances, it would look as if we were dancing. I make him sit on the bed and get on my knees in front of him to examine his ankle. It appears a bit bruised. It could be a fracture too. As I try moving his leg, his cock flashes right into my face. Dammit!

I immediately get up to grab his underwear and thrust it in his hand. "Wear it first. You keep flashing your genitals at me like a pervert." I look away as he wears it.

Dhruv chuckles. "Done." He is now sitting in just his underwear, grinning at me. His body is neat and chiselled. I notice a line of hair emerging from the bottom of his belly button and disappearing into his underwear. What am I even observing here?

"Can you please get dressed so that I can call someone to examine you?"

"No need to call anyone. I'll just ask the reception for an ice-pack. Rest easy. No need to feel burdened due to me." He starts putting on his tracksuit. His face bears an uneasy expression. Discomfort? Regret? Guilt?

I have never been good at gauging situations like these. My attempts at reading people have been utter failures, and any success has been by mere chance. I have made some business mistakes due to this lack, which constitutes a grave sin in the corporate world. These are not small mistakes that can be easily forgiven or overlooked. They cost money. Crores of it. Although my family has been supportive of me and has classified these mistakes as lessons that would help me in the long run, the board of directors have divided views on my abilities to lead the family business. They see my family's attempts at preserving my face as their desire to keep the only son in the limelight. I no longer know how it might end, but what I do hope for is that I remain the heir to this conglomerate. There is a lot of money involved here, and living without it is next to impossible for me at this stage of my life. As much as I hate to admit it, I have been bathed in luxury since my childhood. Money is the only thing I have known to work in all situations. Hard work, efforts, relationships- these things are transient. The permanence of money and its assurance of getting things done has become intrinsic to my way of perceiving the world and its workings.

Immersed in my thoughts, I failed to notice him coming up and standing in front of me. He could be two-three inches shorter than me, or it could be his limp making him look that way. He is holding on to the bed frame for support. Staring at my face is not the best way to bring me back to the present. How do I explain this to Dhruv? Even though I have now noticed him, I am scared to look at him. I have seen enough for the day. More than I wanted to. I feel some anxiety rising up. I hope he does not reveal what happened today to anyone. It would be his loss too, but mine equally. Vansh Shah looking at someone's genitals? Not a good thing.

"Are you imagining things after seeing that?" He tries chiding me.

"Wh- What? Imagine what?" I blurt it out in my defence. I got the tone wrong. He will now believe that I was indeed imagining stuff.

"Horny much?" He smirks.

"What are you thinking?" I try looking away. "I think you should sit." Miraculously, he obeys and sits on the bed. "And stop flashing yourself."

"You do not appear a voyeuristic person. But it seems you quite enjoyed the view."

"Stop being nonsensical. What are you trying to imply?"

"What are you making out of my comment? That's more important." He takes a pause and observes me. I am getting nervous for no fault of mine. "You appear too shaken for someone who's denying it." A naughty smile plays on his lips. He begins shaping his moustache nonchalantly.

"I- I am leaving." I stutter and rush out of the room, remembering to shut the door behind me.

I unlock my room and enter it, shutting the door behind me. I take in deep breaths. What is that kid trying to imply? I have no interest in naked bodies. At least not those which belong to men. I do not mean I like women naked. I like nobody naked. People should wear clothes; that's what clothes are made for. Realization hits that all of my supposed clarifications are useless. To whom am I giving these? I make no sense to myself. My reasoning abilities are six feet under the ground. If I cannot explain something so simple to myself, how would I explain it to someone else? This is disastrous. I seriously need to work on my skills.

We do not interact with each other after that. The wedding and reception go by smoothly, without me making a joke of myself. No business deal is achieved. Here, I admit that I have made a lavish joke of myself. I must also mention this- I saw him staring at me quite a few times. Him keeping his mouth shut is a blessing. I'd rather not interact with him anytime soon.

In light of how my life tends to take shape, I should have not said no. They were already up for negations. A business deal is in the pipeline. I have to interact with him soon. I just don't know of it yet.

Two weeks after the wedding, when I am having breakfast with my parents, my dad makes an announcement. I have to follow his orders as I have always done. Warning bells ring in my head and my concerns rile up as my father continues speaking. Once he is finished, he looks at me for an answer. I nod my head in agreement, when in reality, I did not even register everything he said. I just heard some scattered terms after the first three sentences, which went- "The Sanghvis are constructing a new heritage hotel near Jaisalmer which you already know about. We will be responsible for installing solar panels there, but they have to be incorporated into the very architecture of the hotel. You and Dhruv will be handling the project for which you are accompanying him to his ancestral home there for a month."

My intuition tells me that something is about to go wrong. Provided that kid does well, I will screw up somewhere. If I screw up, I will definitely be kicked out of the board of directors. I have to perform well to impress them. My ideas have always been better than my execution of them. Even if I have performed exceedingly well in the energy sector of the company, these pervasive thoughts and apprehensions remain, thrusting me into a zone of consistent uneasiness.

With Jagat and Tara married, they could have just let the newly married couple handle it. Why put their brothers to work? Why send me to Rajasthan of all places and that too with Dhruv? "What about my projects in Vidarbha and Deccan plateau?" I ask my father. His plate is as empty as mine is full. He stares at me and shakes his head. "It's just for a month. Someone else can look after those in the meantime. Just do a good job there."

"We are making it too obvious that Tara and Jagat's marriage was for business." I wait for his answer.

My mother replies instead. "It was obvious enough when we made the announcement. There's no need to prove or disprove anything now. This is how things have always worked."

This refusal to change has always bogged me. Business circles appreciate diversity on paper, but seldom accommodate them in real life situations. Although it has always been age-old methods that have worked best for conglomerates, some change is needed, especially when it comes to allowing heirs to choose their partners. Marriages have become nothing but mergers and acquisitions and investments and diversifications of portfolios. If it's not limited to businesses, it gets extended to politics. Profits come before people.

As much as I hate this, I am a part of the same ecosystem. I dislike the system, but I do not make active attempts to change them either. I derive comfort and assurance from existing practices. If any of it were to get disrupted, I would lose ground. I am barely standing up. How can I allow myself to collapse? Even if I find her smarter than me and the acceptance of it makes me uneasy, I will eventually marry Yashika. I'll grab the hand and never let go of it. I will pride myself on being loved by her, without ever knowing my ability to reciprocate it. I am a drowning child desperately in need of someone to save me. My marriage will be my lifeboat which would keep me on the board. Eventually, I'll become one of them. Eventually, I'll be a failure.

I have never been courageous in my life. One needs courage to show courage. I don't have that in me.

My business deals would succeed, but my self-confidence will plummet. I'll be lost. There will be no hand to grab and save me.

A few hours later, I find myself at Jaisalmer airport, tightly grabbing the handle of my suitcase. Dhruv is standing outside his car, grinning. I head towards him.