Enjoy Reading (;
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Vaish was giving Abhay his final lessons. Not lessons but just some points to impress her parents.

"So punctuality is a big factor, so be there on time. Table manners will flatter my mom. Talk about technology with my brother and as for my dad, don't speak to him unless asked to." Vaish said for the umpteenth time and Abhay nervously nodded.

"Last but not the least, don't be too nervous. Be confident, be yourself and rest everything will fall on its place."

"I will try my best fireball." He said and she kissed him on his cheeks and wiped off the imaginary dust on his suit.

"I told you that you look so handsome, right? My mom will be totally flattered!" Vaish said in an attempt to joke and also to lighten the atmosphere and Abhay laughed, genuinely.

"It's good thing to impress my mother in law!" He said and winked to which she just smiled.

"Now go. Shenu and Rehan have already left. You too go. I will message my family that I can't come because of an urgent meeting. Good bye and all the best." Vaish said and Abhay gave a final node before leaving.

***

Abhay reached the hotel on time. He messaged his friends who were in the dining area waiting for Vaish's parents. Her parents have checked in the hotel and were coming to the dining hall in ten minutes.

He was about to enter the elevator when he heard the chaos and saw a young manager talking harshly to an old lady. The lady was hotel staff member and she was literally begging to that manager but he was talking to her harshly.

Now Abhay Singh wasn't the man who will stand by and watch an old lady crying at someone else's mercy, so he turned around and went near the lady who was now wiping her tears as the manager has gone.

He offered her his tissue and she wiped her tears and thanked him. He then asked one of the staff to being him a water bottle and made her sit in the waiting area and offered her a water bottle.

The lady, who was like his grandma, drank the water and blessed him. After a few minutes she finally calmed down, he finally turned towards her and took her hands in his and asked, "What happened Aunty?"

The lady looked at him for a second. She was feeling weak and needed to talk to someone, to share her worries with someone and Abhay seemed the perfect candidate.

"I have worked in this hotel from past thirty years. All my life I have given my time to this hotel. I have been very careful regarding my duties and the older manager here was really respectful towards me. After he retired this young man came and wasn't respectful towards any of us but I didn't quit unlike others.

Now I'm having a family emergency and need money, so I was working overtime. I was working ten hours extra after my normal shift, from past one month. Today was the salary day and when I asked him for extra pay he said that I wasn't doing my biometric for the overtime, so there is no record for my work and I'm not eligible to get extra money.

Son, you only tell me is it fair, that old people like us who aren't familiar with this technology are being deprived of our rights? You can ask any of my working staff, they will tell you about my extra work but none of them will open their mouth in front of senior manager as they can't disrespect their immediate boss and make an enemy out of him! I feel so helpless right now." She completed her story and her eyes watered one more time.

Abhay clenched his feet to control his anger at the behaviour of that manager. This woman was telling truth, he could see her honesty in her eyes and also he can't forget the smug look on that manager's face. He wanted to help this lady.

He felt his phone vibrating, his friend were asking him to arrive soon as Vaish's parents were already there.

Now he had two choices; one was to help this lady and let go of the only opportunity to win over his lady love's parents and other was to stay here and help this woman.

He looked at his ringing phone once again, took a deep breath and made his decision.

He switched off his phone and turned towards the woman sitting beside him and asked her, "Give me your employee's card."

The woman was confused for a second and didn't reply.

"I will help you. I'm a software engineer. Give me your employee's card and tell me about the timings you entered and left the hotel."

He said and the lady's eyes shined with a hope and she ran away to get her card from her bag. He asked the receptionist about the cyber café in the hotel and went there and started working on the website of the company.

He soon found what he was looking for and hacked into the system and altered the lady's time of arrival and leaving. Wanting to teach that manager a lesson, he erased half of the manager's working hours to give him the taste of his own medicine. It took him some time to do that as the system was hi tech but not only he did that but also he managed to hide all the traces of it.

After all, it was his specialty.

He turned to the lady and said, "Aunty, now go and ask the manager to check your hours once again and if he asks you how did your hours increased then tell him that you don't know or may be the website was not functioning earlier. And also tell him that you highly respect his idea of everyone getting paid as per their rightful working hours, including him." Abhay said and that old lady blessed him with thousands good wishes.

"May God give every woman a son like you who knows how to respect his elders and help them. Your parents must be proud of you and your wife would feel so blessed to have you in her life. You are a good man; God will always be merciful to you." The lady said and left and Abhay smiled at her feeling happy from inside.

He looked at his clock to realise that he was forty five minutes late and prayed that the lady's blessing really comes true. He switched on his phone only to see so many messages and missed calls from everyone and sighed. He entered the elevator unaware of the fact that one pair of eyes were intently watching him all the while.

***

He was late; something that her father disliked.

He nervously entered the dining area and located his friends sitting with another couple.

Rehan noticed him first and made an ugly face towards him while Sanaa just took a breath of relief and stood up.

The other couple turned towards him and looked at him. Smita looked at him with a heart-warming smile mixed with a look of pride in her eyes while Vishal's face was judgemental.

Abhay felt like he was being judged under scrutinising glance of his father in law. So he silently gulped and walked towards the table with a neutral face.

He greeted the couple and sat with them. Sanaa introduced them to each other.

"We were waiting for you to join us." Rehan said with a forced smile.

"From past half an hour." Vishal added with a not so happy look on his face.

Already a negative point in his list! Way to make a first impression Abhay!

"I was stuck with an important work. My apologies for wasting your time."

Please don't hate me now. He prayed.

"It's alright son. Work comes first. We understand." Smita said to erase his nervousness which was clearly visible on his face.

"Shall we order something? Our daughter is so busy to come and meet her parents after three months! Why would she care for her lonely parents after all she is a grown up woman now with her business as her first priority?!" Smita said with her sad dramatic tone and Abhay instantly felt bad for it was his fault to keep a daughter away from her parents.

He knew how much Vaish was missing her parents and she was so excited to meet them after nearly three and half months but he stopped her for his selfish reasons. He was so bad to do this to her, to them.

Sanaa and Vishal, on the other hand knew that Smita was just doing her drama as they knew when she was serious and when she was joking and right now she was just joking.

Rehan felt uncomfortable. Sad woman other than his family were really not his specialty, that's why he made sure that none of the important woman in his life were upset because of him.

"Aunty, you know that you are joking, she is your daughter and you are her priority, always and forever and she said she will come later and spent the entire day with you people. So don't fake your sadness and let's order something fast as I'm sure you guys must be hungry. I know that I am!" Sanaa said in an authoritative voice and both Abhay and Rehan were shocked to see her ordering them so casually and their jaws dropped when Smita just smiled knowingly at her and they ordered their food.

"Only my Princess and you can understand her drama and stop her! I and Samay always fall prey to her drama skills." Vishal said with a genuine smile and Sanaa laughed.

"We are the best, aren't we uncle? By the way where is Samay, I thought he was with you people?" Sanaa asked.

Vishal and Smita looked at each other for a second. Smita looked at her and answered, "He was feeling tired after long flight so he insisted on resting in his room and called for room service. He will sleep for some time now so that he can catch with Vaishali later on without feeling jetlagged." Sanaa nodded at that though she found it very odd because Samay has always been an enthusiastic kid and feeling tired wasn't his thing.

"So Rehan told us that you are a software developer Abhay?" Vishal asked and Abhay felt as if his interrogation has started.

"Yes Sir. I'm a software developer. I design some software programmes and new apps." Abhay said and Vishal nodded his head at him but he felt impressed by the way Abhay respected him.

"Come on son, don't call him Sir. It's too formal. You are family." Smita said and saw everyone looking at her strangely.

"I mean you are our Shenu's friend and she is family so you are family too. So call us uncle and aunty." She cleared her previous statement and Abhay smiled at her, feeling happy to get at least a bit of her acceptance.

She gave him the motherly vibes that he was missing in his life. He wished that all this issue was solved quickly and in a nicer way so that he could be accepted by her family.

"By the way Rehan I heard about your company being the number one in market. It's quite an achievement at this age. Congratulations. You must have worked really hard for this."

"Thanks Uncle. But I wasn't alone in this. My entire staff worked hard with me and my family was also there with me always. And most importantly Ange-... I mean Sanaa helped me throughout my journey. So credit goes to all of them." Rehan replied and felt like hitting his head for calling her Angel in front of people who were like her parents.

"We know that you call her Angel, son. We don't mind it; after all she is an Angel." Smita said erasing his worry and he smiled at her.

"That's the quality of a good businessman. He knows how to manage his personal and professional life very well and don't compromise one for other." Vishal said admiringly and Rehan felt as if he won some medal.

Abhay was happy for his friend but a part of him felt jealous for the first time. Not because he was envious of his friend's success or something... He always wished for his friend to conquer business world with his skills but he was craving for the look of admiration in Vishal's eye when he was describing Rehan.

He knew that he hasn't achieved anything great in his life that can impress Vishal. His business skills were non-existent and he never had any interest in that field too. So he can't relate with him.

"Enough of this business talks; you already do that in your office. This is lunch table not a meeting hall." Smita said and ended the conversation.

"So Rehan who all are in your family?" Vishal asked and Rehan's face immediately lighted up as he explained about his family to them.

"And Abhay?" Vishal asked and Abhay suddenly felt uneasy. He wasn't comfortable in talking about his family but he knew that the question can't be avoided.

"My aunt is a lovely lady. She has conquered business world with her skills and she always takes good care of me." He said and wished that they don't ask about his parents.

Smita looked at Vishal accusingly as if scolding him for asking that question whereas Sanaa just kept her hand over Abhay's and smiled at him which he returned.

"You forgot to mention your brother." Rehan simply said and Abhay looked at him questioningly as for a second he thought that Rehan was talking about Arjun.

But he was proved wrong when Rehan opened his mouth and said, "Uncle he is my brother just like Vaish is Angel's sister."

Smita and Sanaa grinned at him proudly while Abhay muttered a small thanks to him in his heart and Vishal's eyes fleshed with a look of proud.

"So Shenu, how is Vaish doing in Mumbai? I mean I know that she got successful in her project but what about her personal life? That girl stopped me from introducing her to all my friend's sons! Any specific reason for that?" Smita said and Abhay immediately choked his water and Sanaa rubbed his back while Rehan felt like murdering his friend for being so obvious.

"Are you alright son?" Smita asked in a concerned tone but her eyes were filled with amusement.

"Yeah Aunty. I'm okay. Just some water entered the wrong pipe." Abhay replied after a while and Smita nodded.

"Aunty, Vaish is Vaish. She will do things when time will come. She was busy in past three months with her project. Her work is the reason she came here. You know that right?" Sanaa tried to keep her answer minimum as she didn't want to lie but also can't say the truth.

Rehan wanted to help her wife so he said, "Vaishali is very dedicated to her work and her recent presentation was appreciated by all. She is a very good businesswoman."

"Yeah! She is so dedicated to her work. When she works she forgets everything around her but that doesn't mean she is workaholic. She knows how to keep her personal and professional life separate. She has all the capabilities to achieve success both the spheres of life. Her work is her passion but her love knows no boundaries." Abhay said with a dreamy look in his eyes. He was imagining his Fireball's face while describing her forgetting where he was.

It was only after Rehan kicked his leg, he returned back to the table to see her parent's looking at him strangely. Well mostly Vishal was looking at him annoyingly while Smita was just having that smile on her face that she had since she saw him.

"Looks like you know her very well." Smita said.

Too well for my liking. Vishal muttered.

"I worked with her for her recent project. She changed my perspective about so many things." Abhay answered truthfully. One thing he that he had full confidence on was his Fireball and their work.

"Yeah Uncle, Aunty. He is the software designer for whom she came to Mumbai." Sanaa added.

"Good. Now that her work is over here, our Princess can come back to Delhi." Vishal said in a smug tone.

"NO" Abhay immediately screamed but then realised that he just shouted in front of his father in law and closed his eyes to calm himself before opening them again.

"Uncle, She has got great opportunities in Mumbai which she will not get in Delhi. Also, the market here is offering her a lot of exposure which has great scope for expansion of V&S Group of Companies. Being related to JP Industries she will have to be in frequent contact with the MD Pooja Jindal which will be a lot easier if she is in Mumbai. She needs to stay here." Abhay explained his point and Vishal's eyes gleamed with something but he didn't say anything and just nodded.

There was silence around the table for few minutes before Vishal and Smita excused them to rest for a while before meeting Vaish.

As Vishal stood up to shake hand with Rehan and then Abhay, Abhay lost his balance due to some water that was spilled on the floor and tightly clutched the table for support which resulted in table being shaken up and the glass of water lying on the opposite side falling on Vishal's coat.

Sanaa and Rehan stood rooted to their places thinking how in the hell did that mishap happened and Smita just looked at them wide eyed for she knew that Vishal doesn't like his suit getting spoiled.

As for Abhay, he was shocked at first but then immediately started speaking, "Sorry... Sorry... Sorry... I'm so sorry Uncle. I don't know how I happened. I'm really very sorry."

Vishal looked at him and closed his eyes before muttering something under his breath and shook his head. He turned to Sanaa and said, "Take care Shenu. See you soon."

He then started walking away with Smita hurriedly following him. Abhay ran after him and said, "I'm really sorry uncle. I didn't mean to..."

Vishal looked at him and gave him a hard stare before saying loudly, "I'm not your Uncle. Don't call me that!" and with that he left the room with a worried Smita following him.

***
Oops!

How did you manage to make things this much worse, Abhay?!

How will he impress his inlaws now or is it too late? What do you guys think...

Drama King really messed up big time!

And what will be Vaishali's reaction to  this big disaster? As she clearly trusted Abhay too much ! Will she be able to forgive him now?

Well keep on guessing as the next chapter, coming on Friday; will definitely blow up your mind (;

Prepare yourself for the most dramatic scenario that is coming ahead (;

Secrets are going to be revealed...

Remember there is a story behind every story and a picture so bigger that no one has seen yet (;

Till then keep on voting and commenting (: