chapter 8

8 When I walked into the office the following morning, later than usual, everyone seemed quite busy already. As I sat down at my desk I noticed the Post-it on my monitor.Client meeting at 3I called Aanya to find out whom it was with. ‘Your insurance shoot,’ she replied.Shit! I hadn’t seen Cara’s edit yet. I walked over to the crew room to check the photos. Kunal wasn’t in and Aman, who usually sits next to him, said, ‘Cara was here in the morning, she’s approved the final cut and the images are ready. I believe the client is coming in at three.’I was surprised, but didn’t show it. ‘Okay.’When I stepped back into my room the empty pizza boxes sticking out of the bin reminded me of last night’s activities and involuntarily I looked down at my fingers; they’d loved where they had been. But I couldn’t linger on such pleasurable thoughts as the computer screen poppedup with a calendar reminder about the GoaFest planning meeting at four.Somebody else will have to sit in with the client then, I thought.The GoaFest always reminded me of Nat, because it was at one of its editions that I had first met her. I called Nat and asked her if she wanted to grab a bite and she said yes immediately. We went to our favourite Tibetan restaurant. Sitting across from her while she read the menu even though she knew it by heart, I remembered that day. CD and I had just signed on the dotted line and it was important that I be in Goa to touch base with everyone I knew, introduce Alpha and sign up some long-term projects. That year the festival was at Fort Aguada. I was hanging around at the back near the bar during the opening event because the two emcees on the stage were loud, driving everyone nuts, or at least me. CD was lost somewhere in the crowd and I had come away to get myself a much-needed refill. I turned around, drink in hand, and was scanning the crowd when this guy I knew from Ogilvy came over with Natasha. She was wearing a flowing off-the-shoulder cotton dress andlooked very pretty.‘Hey, Sid, how are you, man?’ he yelled. ‘Meet Natasha, she’s with JWT,’ and, leaning over, he whispered, ‘and is looking to move.’‘What’s wrong with you, Ram?!’ she objected. ‘Hi,’ she half smiled at me.‘Hi!’‘So what’s happening with you?’‘Nothing, Ram. I just broke out and started my own stock photos stroke ideas agency. It’s called Alpha.’‘Yeah, I know, I heard,’ and he clinked his glass against mine. ‘Cheers!’‘Congratulations,’ Natasha added.‘Thanks! I’m looking for work now. My numbers are the same, we should talk,’ I told him, and smiled at her.‘Of course, anything for you, my friend!’ he said and that reminded me why I hadn’t stayed in touch with him. I hated people who kept saying ‘my friend’, real friends don’t do that. Fortunately for me someone hollered his name and he slipped back into the crowd, leaving me alone with Natasha.I smiled uncomfortably, wondering what to say.‘It’s okay, Sid,’ she laughed gently. ‘You don’t have to be polite with me. If you came here to be alone I’ll go find somebody else to hang out with. I’m sorry we barged in on you like this. You know Ram!’‘Actually, because you said that, I want to be nice to you and if I may, I like you already,’ I said, with complete candour.It was her turn to smile.‘I like that we can hear the sea,’ she spoke again after a brief pause.‘Yeah, I love coming here. It’s the best place in the world for a late evening walk.’She nodded.‘Are you guys showing any work here?’ I asked, genuinely curious.‘Yes, of course, and we might win too. Have you heard of Ms Moonshine?’ she asked.‘It doesn’t ring a bell, but tell me.’‘You haven’t heard of Chandramukhi Chaurasia?’‘Of course! Who hasn’t!’ I had heard that name before but wasn’t sure about the connection.‘Right, so that’s Ms Moonshine. Everyone hates her.’ ‘And why is that? What does she do?’‘Well at the moment she is the chairperson and that means she can throw her weight around at JWT, and, most important, walk up and collect any award on our behalf. Have you seen her? Or met her?’‘No.’‘She’s around, let’s go find her,’ and, pointing her glass in the direction she was going to take, asked if I was coming. I said yes.Drinks in hand, we wove our way slowly through the crowd, past the swimming pool and into the lawn with the mock chessboard.‘There she is,’ Nat pointed out.Standing amongst a group of men, dressed in jeans, a red checkered shirt and boots, looking unfashionably burlesque, was a short and – no other way to say this – fat woman with salt-and-pepper hair worn in a severe military cut. THE Chandramukhi Chaurasia. She had a peculiar way of using both her hands while talking, waving them around in the air like she was conducting music.‘That’s some woman,’ I said, turning towards Nat.‘Yes. And have you noticed her hands are empty? That’s coz one of the men in that group will follow her all night carrying her drink for her, usually a large twelve-year-old Macallan on the rocks.’‘You’ve got to be kidding me!’ ‘No, really.’We stood there trying to figure out which man it was but it was difficult because almost everyone had a drink in their hands, until Natasha found this one guy, standing a few feet behind Ms Moonshine with two glasses. It was obvious his right hand was frozen stiff from holding her drink while he was using his left hand to gingerly sip his own. We both laughed.‘You know there are so many stories about her. She is married to a good man, who comes to the annual office parties, is very polite to everyone . . . overall Mr Nice Guy. But the way she treats him is just sad, making him fetch drinks and hand out her visiting cards as if she’s royalty. What’s funny is she always dresses in this jeans-and-shirt routine,’ Natasha said, pointing to Chandramukhi again. ‘The woman is a tartar, will pick up the phone when she sees an ad she doesn’t like and call the creative director – and this could be anyone in any agency – and give them an earful. She was asked if she wanted to sign off on the million-dollar plus accounts, and she gave them an earful saying it was not her job. She yells at new kids, reducing them to tears right there in front of the whole office – it’s sport for her.‘And the joke is that when she summons the guys, they usually say, time to pull the pants down and bend over!’Natasha went on in this vein, and I kept looking at her. We were standing near a coconut palm which had garden lights at its base and her long, dark hair was backlit by the glow. She was talking animatedly and laughing in between her own anecdotes; clearly Chandramukhi provided plenty of entertainment to everyone in JWT. Natasha was an extremely attractive woman, full bodied (there I go again – you might think I am sizeist, but it doesn’t matter, I mean size does matter in my case!) and about as tall as me, if I could be called tall. Just about. Which, for that evening, I attributed to the heels she was wearing. I noticed the rock on her finger. Married? Engaged? Or, dare I hope, single? (Can one tell that just by looking at someone?) She leaned towards me often, touching my forearm or elbow when making a point or sharing a particularly funny moment. What I liked most about her was the fact that she was incredibly pleasant and spoke in a voice that could never be confrontational.‘Isn’t that funny?’ she said.I hadn’t heard a word of what she had said.‘It is, especially the way you tell stories,’ I recovered. ‘Oh! Look at me, gossiping with a complete stranger, likea schoolgirl. Please don’t repeat these stories, because I will know where they came from,’ she said, slightly embarrassed but smiling, and poked me in the side.‘But tell me, why this Texan Cowboy look? Surelysomeone told her she looks like a man, like a farm hand to be precise.’‘That is something no one has figured out yet. You won’t believe this last story.‘So, the whole senior management team from Ford North America is over for the launch of the Endeavor. These guys, a bunch of Americans, sit quietly while the whole campaign is presented, shout lines, text for print, mock images, video storyboard, everything. Everyone is silent. I was in the room too. No one can figure out if those guys like the campaign or not.‘Then this American guy leans forward slowly and says, “Hmm, I don’t know how to say this, but, I don’t think this makes the cut.”‘Moonshine was pretty surprised to hear this; she hates it if clients disagree when she is around. “Go on,” she says bluntly.‘“It doesn’t seem like something that men will connect with,” he says and looks pointedly around the room. Besides Moonshine and me, our team of six had two other women, whereas they were all men.‘“What exactly are you saying, Mr Nolan,” she asks him.’ By this time Nat was so engrossed in the story, something that had impacted all of them deeply, that she had begundramatizing.‘He hesitates, hems and haws and then says, “I think we need to redo this, the men won’t get this ad, and maybe . . .”‘“We think they will get it,” she cuts him short. “I love it!” she says emphatically.‘“That’s the point,” the idiot says, “you are not a Man, Ms Choorasia.”‘I think his mispronouncing her name, another of her pet peeves, was what set her off. She stands up, all five feet of her, and yells, “Mr Nolan, you are right, I don’t have balls, and I suggest you leave the room now if you like yours that much!”’‘She said that? To Ford?!’ ‘Yep,’ Natasha replied, smiling. ‘What happened then?’‘There’s a deathly silence in the room. The Ford India guys want to hide under the table; Nolan’s red in the face and looks like he’s going to have a stroke; and Moonshine leans back in her chair, coolly waiting for what she has said to sink in. I was mortified. Then, seeing that no one was saying anything, Nolan stood up and left the room quietly, and his team filed out after him. One of my colleagues saw them out.’‘No one said anything?’ I asked, surprised.‘No. We couldn’t even gossip about it! Can you imagine, asking Ford to fuck off!’‘Crazy, man!’ (I must admit here that I didn’t quite like hearing her using the F-word, strangely.) ‘What happened to the account?’ ‘Well, no one spoke about this for a week. And then we found out that the local guys pleaded with Nolan to forget the incident and they got to keep JWT. Nolan went back to the US and the rumour is he found Chandramukhi hot!’She burst out laughing. And I laughed with her.Both of us had finished our drinks by then so I asked her if she wanted to return to the bar. We ordered another round of drinks and as she began to say something, I interrupted her.‘Do you want to work with us?’‘What do you mean? Where?’ she asked, surprised.‘I have just broken out of a full-time job and started Alpha. It’s primarily a stock agency for advertising photography but we intend to do a lot of design stuff too, and pick up anything creative around photography and video, maybe even films . . .’‘And what do you want me to do there?’ ‘Bring in clients.’‘Hmm. Right.’And then she smiled. For a very small moment I wondered if she thought I was hitting on her. And figured I ought to clarify.‘Yeah, I must admit I don’t know your work or what you do but it will be a fun place. We are just beginning, so things can only go up, and you are great, I think, I’d love to work with you!’She had just about put her lips to her Martini glass, and she stopped and stared at me.That’s it, I thought, I’ve screwed up.‘Okay, let me think about this. I’ll find you.’I thought that was going to be the end of the conversation, but two weeks later she called, and a month after that she joined Alpha.Nat and I have continued to enjoy that ease right from the beginning. After joining us she methodically made changes to how we present and sell ourselves, rubbishing any and all creative quirks and idiosyncrasies, making it clear that we could break rules when we created stuff, but had to be disciplined and deliver what the client wanted. She taught the team to be practical and clinical when it came to charging clients while getting paid well themselves and, importantly, taught them to park their egos at the door when they walked into work.