The Dilemma

Another story, Samhita and I wrote for the contest in our office.

A young couple enters the café, laughing.

“There, let’s get that table at the back” Shriya said.

“Whatever you say, madam”, said Rishabh (doing a bow, getting a loving hit back from her and lots of giggling).

“What would you have, Shrii? The Irish one or the Jamaican one?”

“I think Irish. And a blueberry muffin. Yes. That is it. What about you?”

“My usual, your boring, cappuccino.”

“Try something different sometime!”

“Woh kya hai na, I prefer sticking to things that I like, for a long time.” Rishabh pulls Shriya closer to him as he says this. Shriya blushes, pushes him away.

“Okay, I will just come from the washroom. You order.” She leaves after giving him a flying kiss.

As she turns the corner to get into the loo, Rishabh very comfortably takes her handbag, pulls out her wallet, and takes out two notes of 1000 rupees.

He then walks to the cashier, starts coughing, takes extra tissues from the counter, and after coughing, throws the tissues and the wallet hidden within the tissues into the dustbin near the billing counter.

He come back and sits at the table nonchalantly, like this is the most normal thing for him to do.

Shriya comes back and continues her excited talk.

“Today is 1st April na, so I had been planning this prank and I played it on Aliya.”

“You girls will never grow up!”

“You should have seen her face after the entire incident. She was so upset.” She kept laughing till the coffee arrived.

They sipped their coffee and savoured it for a moment.

“I have got something for you. A surprise! Yay!” said Shriya.

“Don’t pull a trick on me now. I know it is 1st April.”

“No baba. I am serious. You would be sooo happy. It's in my bag.”

She started searching in her bag. But looked worried and irritated, and started mumbling.

“Not again, Shriya!” Rishabh said in exasperation.

“I can’t find my wallet.”

“I am sure you must have dropped it somewhere. How can you be so careless all the time ya? It is like a habit for you now. Almost every time you do this. You should have some sense of responsibility. Thank goodness I am with you to pay for the bills. Otherwise imagine!”

She started sobbing.

“How could I do it? I had been saving it for today. I had clicked its pic and showed it to Aliya. And now it is gone. I just don’t know when I could have dropped it.”

“It’s okay. I know you love me. Why do you have to buy me gifts? I am there for you na. Now have the coffee.”

She kept searching. She went to the loo to check. Asked the cashier if she had seen anything.

“It’s okay, Shrii. Just tell me what it was. We will go out and get it again. And we will also get you one nice gift. Just to cheer you up. Okay?”

She sat quietly for some time. Everyone at the café look at her with sympathy.

She just opened her phone’s photo album and gave it to him. He looked at it for a bit, and gave a confused look.

“What are these?”

“These are the VVIP passes to the Cricket World Cup tomorrow. I thought we will see it together only if India is in the finals. So I never spoke about it, else it would have gotten jinxed and you would have shouted at me the way you did when we lost to South Africa. I had also got coupons to buy India’s jerseys for ourselves.”

...

...

She was sobbing softly in the background.

He wasn't listening anymore. His eyes couldn't move away from the dustbin at the billing counter.

Could he say what he had done? Or would he miss the chance to watch the finals?