My Wife'S Colleague

“Murthy is the most reliable man on earth!” I concluded. At least, that’s the impression Sneha gave by narrating stories of his bravado. 'Was I getting jealous of this man in my wife’s life? But then he was just a reliable colleague and nothing more,' I convinced myself. And nobody would match me when it came to reliability at workplace.

“What are you thinking?” Sneha asked, as I took a sharp curve enroute to her office. The car narrowly missed hitting a divider.

I remained silent.

“I have hectic work today,” she remarked. Sneha worked in a MNC and their product release was due in the coming days.

“Why worry when Murthy is there to share the load?” I taunted.

She smiled.

I failed to understand why the effervescent smile appeared, on her face, at the mere mention of his name. 'Was I being a doubting Tom?'

The wheels came to a screeching halt as we reached her office gates.

“Bye dear, see you in the evening,” she said.

I acknowledged her and headed towards my work place. I worked in the Computer Science Department of a reputed engineering college in Bangalore. Soon after reaching college, I was scheduled to have a meeting with the Head of the Department. The neatly rehearsed lines had given me confidence to confront the lady boss, yet a tinge of nervousness had crept inside me. As my hatchback entered the compound, Work is worship, embossed in gold, greeted me. The security guard only greeted the HODs and the higher ups.

The nervousness in me had suddenly grown by manifolds as I recorded my fingerprint imprint in the biometric machine. It was finally time to face the inevitable. The lady boss would be waiting with a well chalked out agenda to vehemently put forth her observations and I had to defend myself without a shield. I wasn’t supposed to use the arrows in my armor either.

“Please be seated,” said Mrs. Miranda (a Doctorate in image mapping), in a soft spoken voice. She appeared to be an embodiment of Mother Teresa but looks can, sometimes, be deceptive.

“Thank you Ma’am,” I said and occupied the visitor’s seat.

“The situation is grave,” she said coldly, shaking her head in utter disappointment while staring at a sheet in her hands.

I remained silent. My rehearsed lines weren’t getting support from my dry vocal chords.

“Look at these students here,” she said, unpleasantly pointing her finger at the imagery statistic on the sheet. It was a detailed, colorful graphical representation of the first internal test result assessment of the sixth semester students. The area that she was pointing resembled the Andaman and Nicobar islands.

Every teacher in the department was assigned six handpicked students as mentees. The job of the mentor was to counsel the students and help improve their academic performance as well as assist in their personal growth.

“These students have certainly performed below par, Ma’am,” I said, staring at the dots.

She made a grim face and was frantically shaking her head.

“Is there any explanation for this dramatic failure of your mentorship skills?”

“I would certainly talk to them and extract the reasons and counsel them further,” I ensured her.

“Well, this lady has abstained from all the subjects, except one, and is missing since then,” she said, pointing at a black shaded area in the graph.

I quickly took out my cell phone and dialed the student’s number but the phone was not reachable.

“I would certainly contact and reprimand Ragini,” I said, while wiping the sweat off my brow.

This was followed by several minutes of silence during which Mrs. Miranda studied the sheet. She would definitely fit the shoes of an Intelligence Bureau agent, I thought, while waiting for her to respond.

“I need a detailed action taken report by tomorrow, Mr. Patil.”

“Surely ma’am,” I said, nodding my head, happy that the ordeal had finally ended. I was always curious to know if she carried the same demeanor in her home or was it the chair she occupied responsible for her authoritarian nature. While exiting the room, I was greeted by my colleague. It was his turn to face the music and he appeared all set to breakdown at the slightest of opportunity.

Once I was in my cabin, Yashodabai provided me the much needed water. She worked as a peon in the department. Even though her profile was low, the tasks she did for the faculties were worthy of all the praise. The caring manner in which she supplied water, served tea and lunch, deserved all the accolades. Every workplace deserved such down to earth ladies with motherly vibes, I believed.

“Mrs Miranda is in a terrible mood today,” she remarked, “But no need to worry professor, it’s all a part of life.”

“Thank you for your kind words Yashodabai,” I said with a smile. It was probably the first time I had smiled that day after entering the campus.

“Would you prefer a tea or a coffee?” she asked, “I don’t think you have classes in the morning session on Mondays.”

I appreciated her observatory skills. The time table pasted on my wall clearly indicated that I was free for the entire morning session and could easily afford a sip of hot coffee to relax my stressed mind. If these niceties continued then without a doubt Yashodabai would, one day, make it to the prestigious list of the influential women who shaped my career. I handed her a ten rupee note. As she left the cabin, the most important task of the day began playing on my mind. I had to somehow get in touch with the missing student, Ragini, counsel the remaining students and prepare a systematic report for the next day’s meeting.

As I was searching Ragini’s datasheet for an alternate phone number, her words began playing loudly in my ears. It was ten days ago, just before the start of tests. I had had an hour long interaction with her in one of those intense mentoring sessions, where she had spilled the beans. Ragini belonged to a well fed family. Though she was a little conservative and hesitant to open up in the beginning, gradually she spoke her mind that day. The timid, young woman of 21 was carrying an active volcano inside her. She was the only daughter of her parents. Her mother worked in a bank and her father worked in an IT company. Though he cared for his family and showered love on Ragini, only recently had he been spotted roaming in a mall with a lady. This had only validated her mother’s claims that he was having an affair with a colleague at his workplace and led to tension at home. A distraught Ragini confessed that she was going through the most traumatic phase of her life and wasn’t prepared for the internal tests.

I found myself helpless on listening to her story. Though I was playing the role of a mentor, I had no solution to the critical personal problem destroying her peace.

 “I simply can’t concentrate,” she kept on repeating.

“I would soon have an interaction with your parents,” I told her.

“No sir, please don’t reveal this to anyone. My parents would never tolerate me discussing family matters with a third person,” she pleaded.

Her repeated pleading left me with no choice but to heed to her request. Our discussion had to be a secret! I was in a fix. Had I been her family friend then it would have been easy to handle the matter. It was an irony that Ragini’s personal problem was strictly a part of my professional assignment.

The next moment, I was staring at the sheet containing her details but this search, instead of relaxing a bit, appeared to have landed me in a complex mesh. Though the number was legible, my eyes simply didn’t leave the field marked father’s name. The name mentioned next to it was Mr. Rama Murthy. Was he the same Reliable Murthy? My wife’s colleague!

“You don’t seem to have recovered from the early morning shock!” Yashodabai commented, while pouring the hot coffee from the flask into the cup. She had returned quickly.

I was dumbstruck to speak anything.

“I am sure this special coffee will rejuvenate you,” she said, handing me the cup and moving on.

I thanked her for the sweet gesture. Was he the same Reliable Murthy? The thought came back to haunt me again. Never once had my wife mentioned his first name nor did I ever bother to ask her during our routine conversations, involving him, over breakfast and dinner. The coffee was definitely the need of the hour. I sipped it slowly while contemplating my next course of action.

“Excuse me Professor,” I heard someone say. It was Rupali, a colleague of mine. Rupali was one of those women in the d

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epartment, who at best, could be described efficient, disciplined and more importantly, sensible. Until and unless it was really important, she refrained from visiting anybody’s cabin. This quality of hers was liked by many.

The young lady was recently adjudged the best teacher by the students, leaving the other female staff jealous. Ragini had skipped all the tests except the first one, Computer Organization. No wonder that subject was handled by Rupali.

“Please come in.”

“I need to talk to you urgently.” She appeared to be in haste and her voice was panic stricken.

“What is it?”

“Look at this!” she said, handing over an answer booklet and insisting me to read a particular answer. My eyes were now scrutinizing every word in detail.

A computer is DEAD without a power supply. Computer software can be MURDERED BY INJECTING a virus. A computer commits SUICIDE without its input and output devices. A virus is nothing but a POISON. A computer can be programmed to enter into an infinite LOOP and HANG itself……….

It was all too confusing to make any sense, the answer appeared amateurish.

“At first, I took it lightly. But don’t you think the highlighted words are conveying a completely different meaning?” she said, “And Ragini has been missing since writing this test. Her phone is also switched off! I thought you being her mentor must be informed about the same.”

If Rupali’s apprehensions were true, Ragini was long dead. Was she really contemplating suicide? I immediately dialed Rama Murthy’s number.

“Hello,” a croaky voice responded after a few rings.

“Is this Mr. Rama Murthy?”

“Yes, speaking.”

“Sir, this is Mr. Patil from RRIT College,” I introduced myself.

“Yes, please?”

“I wanted to inquire about Ms. Ragini,”

“Yes?”

He was responding coolly as if everything in his life was perfectly alright.

“She is not attending classes off late. Is she alright?”

“She’s perfectly alright,” he said after a few seconds. He appeared to be completely ignorant of his daughter’s state of mind. But the fact that she was alive and kicking relieved me.

“She is required to meet me urgently,” I said.

“I would convey it to her,” he said.

“Why is her phone switched off?” I added.

“I said I would convey it to her, professor!”

His unconvincing replies were driving me impatient.

“Look Mr Murthy, you don’t realize the gravity of the situation,” I said in a stern voice and continued without waiting for his answer. “Your daughter has given only one test in which she has specifically highlighted words like poison, murder, suicide, hang etc. Given her state of mind, it’s imperative that she be counseled and cared.”

There was a long silence after which he responded with a thank you.

“May I know in which company you work?”

The line was already dead. None of my calls, later on, were entertained by Rama Murthy. I finally gave up after a few attempts.

We took solace from the fact that Ragini was very much alive. Rupali was happy to hear the news. Her genuine concern for the student moved me.

“Ok sir, I shall leave now.” Without speaking a single irrelevant word she left.

That day, I counseled the remaining five students and got an assurance of an improved performance in the coming test. All of them also shared happenings in their personal life; thankfully, none of them was facing any major upheaval.  By the end of the day I had enough ammunition to prepare a decent report for the next day’s meeting.

I encountered the HoD once again while recording my OUT time in the biometric device. She was staring at me with a triumphant expression on her face. What pleasure she derived by scoring brownie points over her own colleagues was an issue to be debated. If only I failed to give satisfactory explanation for Ragini’s absence, the next day, then there was every possibility of me being served a MEMO by Mrs. Miranda. 

As I reached for my car, my cell phone began ringing. The call was from Ragini.

“Hello sir,” she spoke excitedly.

“Is everything alright?” I asked anxiously.

“Sir, I must thank you. My parents’ were planning to file divorce but suddenly my father showed signs of reconciliation today, after receiving a call from you. He insisted that I call you at the earliest. I am so happy,” she said.

“I am glad that things are back on the right track.” I tried to be modest.

“And sorry for missing classes’ Sir, I will be attending them regularly from tomorrow.”

“That’s like my student.” I cheered her up.

“You are the best mentor,” she said affectionately and disconnected the call. I had missed another chance to find out the company in which Mr. Murthy worked. Was he the same Reliable Murthy? I would have to soon find out!

The anxiety driven soul of mine speeded the vehicle through the evening traffic to reach my wife’s office, Connexions Ltd. The fact that my personal life appeared to be in tatters was turning me insecure. I gave her a call informing about my arrival. Sneha walked in after exactly one and a half hours and occupied the seat beside me, this only added to my growing anxiety. She appeared distressed and tired.

“Is everything alright?” I asked.

She remained silent. I could sense that something was terribly wrong.

“Why don’t you leave this IT Company and join a college?” I asked as the car gained momentum.

“I like challenges,” she said tauntingly.

“You think teaching is not a challenging job?”

She was silent.

“Unfortunately, there are no reliable people like Mr. Rama Murthy to assist me in my profession,” I said brashly. This intended taunt offended her immensely. For the first time I had taken his full name.

“Don’t you dare drag the traitor Murthy into our discussion,” she warned. From her words it was very evident that Rama Murthy and the Murthy in her office were one and the same. My heart suddenly broke into pieces. Since how long was she having this secret affair with Mr. Reliable? As per Ragini, her father was having an affair with a colleague which led to tension at home.

“Vent your anger on your Reliable Rama Murthy and not me!” I taunted her further.

“Who the hell told you he is reliable? He is the most unreliable person I’ve ever met.” Could her terrible mood be attributed to the fact that he had shown signs of reconciliation with his family after my phone call? Only in the morning, Sneha was all smiles at the mere mention of his name and now there was a drastic change in her behavior. Just because he ditched her, he became unreliable?

“Is Rama Murthy more unreliable than me?”

“He abandoned me when I needed him the most,” she said. How could she speak out so shamelessly?

My heart was broken into tiny, untraceable pieces that very moment. For the next few minutes there was complete silence. The car swiftly made its way through the nasty traffic. I waited for her to confess her love for him.

“I am sorry for being rude. He skipped work today and I had to do most of his job as well. Unreliable idiot,” she remarked.

“How could Rama Murthy be so inconsiderate to his female admirer?” My sarcasm was at its best and I was beginning to lose control over my emotions. It was only due to my phone call that he decided to skip work! But the next sentence she spoke nearly shook me out of my reverie. “Stop repeating Rama Murthy in every sentence. His first name is Krishna,” she said irritably.

“What?”

“Yes, you heard it right! It’s Krishna Murthy.”

 Bubbles of excitement suddenly began bursting inside every cell of my body. Her next comment added more bubbles to my excitedly swollen cells.

“And you know the reason for his skipping work during such a crucial product release period?”

“No!”

“He went to see a girl for marriage! Couldn’t he wait till the product release?”

"Yes, he should have waited," I said emphatically, trying hard to control a smile. 

The next moment I powered the steering and headed towards a five star hotel for a lavish treat.

THE END