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Rewritten: 23 February 2024

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Cabir

The crackle of a cheese-coated puff between my teeth made Manish Malhotra raise his head from his hands. Pale unblemished skin sagged around his cheekbones under remarkable stress and, of course, age. While he had sunken in the revolving chair and had battered himself with a multitude of reputation resurrection techniques, I had mindlessly picked up the half-eaten bag of Cheetos and dug out the crispier ones from the bottom of the packet, popping one in my mouth.

"What do I do with this boy?" Dejection was clear in his tone. 

Any guesses for who was the subject of his concern? Of course, Mr. Manik Malhotra, the heir to one of the biggest fashion empires in Indian fashion. 

I was his father's go-to person for any complaints surrounding the rebellious prince of Manish Malhotra's Fashion House, who was hell-bent on even destroying his life but definitely not taking over a business that had been crafted over decades... It only made sense why Uncle was irritated beyond measure at Manik's stubbornness. 

Naturally, I had to take a pacifying role. 

"Actually, I was talking to the cameraperson earlier and –"

"This kind of carelessness and apathy to everything is not going to get him very far in life, and I'm afraid he's already gone far beyond my reach." Every phrase took copious amounts of strain to sound normal as his drooping shoulders, in one split-second, reflected his turmoil.

It wasn't an apathy to everything. There were certain things Manik cared more than life itself. One of those things was music, and fashion... fashion came nowhere close to the same niche as music.  

"Come on, Uncle. His reckless temper, you know about it." I said appealingly, flashing a hopeless grin at my role model figure.

Yet, I couldn't help notice how incredibly lucky Manik was... to have someone so deeply care for his future, to scope out threats even before he encountered them first-hand...

If only someone looked out for me in that manner.

All those devastating years when I dived into battling with my identity, I had no guiding figure to tell me not to jump head first. My only muddled motivation was to bind myself to music, shield my illegal homosexuality with my craft, and keep myself sane and alive through some medium of expression. For that, I needed to practice and sharpen my rusty skills – even if Fab 5 was not with me anymore.

I drummed for a variety of artists, genres, and platforms in Manchester, regardless of the pay and benefits that came with it. The first few times were nerve-wracking, many of which were impromptu performances with less than an hour of lead-time, some of those artists had me perform, recorded my work for their purposes, and ditched me once their job was complete, while a couple of homophobic artists outright degraded me on personal grounds and shattered my spirits completely. Still, I took any scraps I could find in the bleak hope that I would find the niche I gravitated towards in one of those projects.

One day.

From that hollow crater of a series of depressive episodes, Mr. Malhotra uprooted me and selflessly took me under his wing, sharing his insightful wisdom gained through his extra years of experiencing the world, and honing me to the professional musician I currently was.

I owed everything to him, everything that I was in my adulthood was a result of his mentorship; yet at the one juncture where he truly requested my assistance, to handle his son who was once a fragment of my identity, there was nothing I could do to help.

"I – I can't believe it sometimes, that he's my blood,"

"Well, he isn't... that's half the problem right there, we can't take responsibility for something we don't consider ours to begin with." 

Marvelled by my own spontaneously wise quote, I turned to the wise old man resting in his seat deep in contemplation.

Humility exuded every gesture of his even when he barely tried; in my eyes, he was the pinnacle of a successful businessman, who had been through his share of tough times and hence valued his growth more so. Even in his early sixties, the thrill and steadfast dedication the man had for his business stole the limelight of his praises.

The only current setback in his life, the only ugliness in his life currently, was his adopted arrogant son.

Arrogance was always a trait Manik possessed, but over the last seven odd years, it had reacted with other insecurities and had become corrosive, to say the least, leaching its poison into other aspects and people of his life. 

God forbid the day his toxicity consumes his present girlfriend, Diyah Somerhill, one of the lawyers in Manish Malhotra's company.

"I am not forcing him to take over the business like other fathers in Bollywood movies, I've given him the freedom to pursue what he wants but if he's waiting for an opportunity to be served on a silver platter, I'm sorry – the real world does not work that way,"

"What do you mean," I asked, stuffing another Cheeto in, "Manik's gotten offers but has rejected them?"

"You know he insists on going solo." While I was not certain what his crazy obsession was behind playing or singing alone after years of being coddled and affirmed by our friend group even for taking a shit, several of his current day taunts fell under the umbrella of me being a chameleon. Apparently, my decision to make or break my career with random bands meant I changed colours and sides as and when I pleased – and was hence, beneath him.

That animosity had not always existed between us. It was only after Fab 5 fell apart seven years ago. 

Mr. Malhotra continued, "Ashok Khurana has offered to sign him on along with a band but I know His Majesty will refuse if I pitch him the deal."

"By Khurana, you mean Q Label?! Holy shit, that's insane! They're a global record company!"

He grinned, appreciative of my background knowledge of them and contrasting reactions to his beloved cocky son's. "And they're wanting to launch in Mumbai. Wait a minute – do you want me to talk to them and get you onboard?"

"Is that a rhetorical question? Heck YEAH!" Who would ever say no to going back to my home city, the city that never sleeps... Mumbai! Using my fingers as a makeshift hairbrush, I ran my fingers from the roots to the ends, repeatedly going over the caramel-streaked tips so as to set them in place. "Don't you worry – it's Mumbai and he's got some paybacks to do, Manik can't say no this time."

⭒⭒⭒

Manik

The magical trance music has is that by the time you find yourself drowning in the melody of melancholy, or to the tune of harmony in exhilaration, one has already exited the earthly realm and is at least halfway spiritually connected to a power above and beyond their control.

I needed to be in a dingy storeroom comprising of infinite nothingness. To soundproof myself from the rest of the world, my emotions, and my thoughts, I pressed the 'volume up' button on my iPhone until I could no longer hear my pounding heartbeat.

Isn't it strange

That we've fallen apart

My feet tapped to the beats of the soothing song that somehow numbed me from the grief, taking me back to the unsettling feelings I had within while coming to terms with myself. Every song had a memory associated with it; in those, and only those, things I truly surrendered.

An arm sprung around my neck, resting on my shoulder. "You can be anybody in this world – a Malhotra or not – but you'll always be Abhimanyu's best friend. Always." He was dead serious even when he was smiling. My face was slapped twice in a sibling-like manner before I nudged him with my elbow to which he yelped.

Closing my eyes while envisioning only one face, I smiled.

At the basketball court, after wiping my sweaty body with a towel, I mumbled, "If there's one person I won't lose in my life, I know it's you."

"Don't make me cry, you cunt. If you love me so much, get me a mango smoothie."

I grabbed the same guitar that had grown up with me and had all sorts of stickers and random penned lyrics on it since the time I first touched it, on my seventh birthday. Driven by a maniacal urge to strum the strings, to feel the stings, and openly invite new blisters, I synchronised with the music I was listening to.

Knowing these things are unspoken,

We're born to be broken.

A-minor–C–E-minor–D, A-minor–C–E-minor–D, A-minor–C–E-minor–D

The overpowering rhythm cleansed my spirit as if sucking all negativity within a source of infinite energy: the infinite nothingness I was talking about. The cumbersome boulder of loneliness that remained unbalanced in my heart for half a decade slowly found liberation from the guilt I'd held onto. Ever so slowly, my heart leaped, and my face shone with a surreal bliss.

Isn't it strange?

Knowing we're living our lives on borrowing time.

"When the duck walks down to the lemonade stand..." Cabir Dhawan's irritating voice pierced through the dark haven I'd created for myself as he opened the storeroom and aswarm of dust particles glistened beneath the diverged blinding beam of indoorlight.  I thought I was finally at peace with myself, but that dumb idiot just couldn't let me have my moment.

Through my peripheral vision, I noticed his naturally brown hair with the wannabe gelled spikes and dyed tips, a silver-linked fashion chain around his wrist, and his hand that remained restricted in his pocket.

His duplicity could contaminate anything.

I set my guitar to rest and paused the music before slipping my headgear around my neck. "Are you done kissing his ass, or is there more on your agenda until he adopts you and leaves me the fuck alone instead?" I scoffed while pushing my guitar into its bag and sealing it shut.

How Cabir singlehandedly got all the benefit of the doubt from my doting father without any of the trauma was beyond me. What was it about him that impressed my father which I lacked in?

"If you, for once, could get out of your self-pity and off your high horse, you'll know what parental love is about."

With a sarcastic huff, I rolled my eyes as far up as they could possibly go. "Ironic coming from the one who loves this entertainment." I pulled the bag belt over my shoulder after flashing my iPhone to check the amount of time I had wasted in engaging with him. "And one more thing..." I said, retracing my steps and touching the side of my temple as if recollecting my train of thought. "Parental love... hmm... such a foreign concept for an orphan to talk about, isn't it?"

Cabir's piercing gaze was a sign that I had stricken the right nerve, but a consequence was it had knocked the impulsive grin off my face, and as he blankly read me, a nervous sensation akin to raw vulnerability resurfaced, forcing me to peel my eyes away.

Mumbling under my breath so he would not hear the tremble in my words, I said to nowhere in particular, "I'll see you."

"Manik..." He called when I was halfway to the door. "You're right, I don't know the love of a parent, but I do know what it is like to be a lover. A feeling you unfortunately are incapable of experiencing." There was no amusement, just a straight hard slap of a fact.

In a millisecond, my palms were on his chest, shoving him with incredible intensity–a rage that wanted him dead. Maybe if he were, life would be much easier for me.

"Just stay the FUCK AWAY from me. JUST GO AWAY."

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Did you expect that now? Manik and Cabir to be arch rivals? :P

They know EXACTLY what to say to break each other, I wonder why... hmm... :P

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