THOSE PRICEY THAKUR GIRLS

Author: Chauhan, Anuja

• ‘And you think, just because you’ve taken psychology in class eleven, you know everything,’

• ‘She’ll wait too long and finally end up with nothing, like people at weddings who don’t join the buffet queue till really late to show how non-desperate they are, and then get only raw onion rings and rice to eat.’

• Ten years on, he is a master player, an accomplished flirt, wary of commitment, and the only kind of ‘protecting’ he is into comes from the chemist and costs ten rupees for a pack of three.

• ‘Stupid people always say hence and etcetera etcetera when they wanna come across smart,’

• She organizes her life around the object of her disaffection the way other people organize their living-room furniture around their TV set.

• Binni declared. ‘Vickyji says you need balls to do business.’ ‘As your twins made their appearance barely ten months into your marriage, I am well aware that Vickyji’s testicles are ISI-mark-approved,’ her father replied testily.

• ‘He missed three card sessions in the last year. Obviously he was gravely unwell.’

• Is this harami tomcat behaviour, she wonders, confused, or just plain niceness?

• She is so transparent, Dylan thinks, amused. Her thoughts might as well appear in neon across her forehead for everyone to read.

• One moment you’re flirting with a tall dark handsome man who wants to know if you’re engaged, and the next you’re being solicited to make intimate contact with your short cousin’s thick black chest hairs. Such is life. Gross. Grim. Avoidable.

• ‘Just a bit,’ Debjani cautions. ‘Just a bit? Or just a butt?’

• Dylan, trained journalist that he is, knows that statements are questions. But he doesn’t want to answer this one.

• If only the class eight chicks with brand-new tits could see him now. They’d get over crushing on him instantly.

• ‘You girls think south Indians can’t think of anything but that.’

• ‘You girls think south Indians can’t think of anything but that.’ ‘Don’t lump half the country with your personal randiness,’

• They spend entire evenings in front of Dylan’s Apple Mac, bathed in a ghostly, tubelighty glow, taking turns at chasing and gobbling up Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde, the four foul Japanese ghosts who have taken the civilized world by storm.

• They are also nicely spaced – like modern housing – with a half-inch gap between each tooth.

• Add to that his short stature, wispy curls and sing-song nasal voice, and one can understand why his wife avers that looks are nothing, it is character that is of supreme importance.

• ‘I’ve seen beyond your smoke-screen of oxidized silver and carbon monoxide. I know you’re worthy of deep emotion.’

• Mrs Mamta doesn’t usually subscribe to the Khabardaar school of mothering. Things must be serious.

• can tell, beta Varun, ki today there will be no sitting about and singing hymns on the pot! Aaj mujhe fatafat, bahut hi pyari tatti aayegi – I am going to finish my big job like this.’ He snaps his fingers. ‘Like this!’

• ‘And for heaven’s sake, wear a slip under your uniform today. All the boys will write on your shirt – and you know that’s just an excuse to grope.’

• So that on that distant day, when we finally hook up, you’ll be fully satishfied with my prowess. Satish-fied, get it, get it?’

• ‘Madarchod, sadak pe tambu laga rakha hai!’ fumes a man on a scooter.

• ‘You have kept my nose from being cut.’ ‘Yes yes,’ the Judge says, looking rather cornered, and not wanting to talk about the cutting up of any body parts.