The Corporate Monster ✅

K I N D R E D

It stopped raining when they got the their first destination: the registry. For the rest of the day, they spent their time in the market and waiting in a line for the registrars' signature. Aniket thanked the heavens above that the registrar was a good man. If he had asked for a bribe, Krithi would have definitely made a scene and probably taken action to file a complaint against him.

The market was another case in itself. Krithi, the cheapest person he knew, didn't bargain for anything at the market. When he had interrogated her, she simply replied, "Do you bargain at a supermarket?"

"No." He replied.

"They're hard workers, and they already have more on their shoulders and we only bargain because they're poor and easily tricked. They aren't fattened pigs, also known as corporation companies looking for a market." Aniket winced. "No offense."

"None taken." Aniket lied. "Although, I don't look like a fat pig."

Krithi smiled at him without commenting, and moved onto the next booth to purchase a bag of onions. And that was the end of that conversation. 

After walking through the market to find a priest, Krithi stopped at a clothing store. She sat on the stairs of the steps, heaving for breath. "Do you want me to call for a auto?" He asked.

"The market is too narrow for a auto to navigate through." She wailed. "And I'm too hungry to move an inch."

"Okay." He said, lending a hand. "C'mon. Let's go get some lunch. I know a good hotel here."

"I don't like hotels." She said, waving off his hand.

"I know." He scratched his head, looking around him. He spotted a man selling sugarcane juice.

He left Krithi at the stairs, crossing the road to buy it. He patted his pockets, pulling out his wallet from the back. He pulled out a few bills and handed it to the vendor, who took it without complaint. "Keep it coming." He said, receiving the two glasses of juice in the plastic cups. He ran across the road again, looking both ways before crossing. He reached his wife, handing it to her.

"Here." He gasped. Her eyes widened in surprise, but she didn't complain. She chugged both of the cups in one big gulp, looking up at him shyly.

"One more?"

She put three fingers up.

Aniket shook his head, smiling at her. "Wait here." He said, running across the road again.

Krithi rapped on her cheeks, waiting for him impatiently. He arrived a few minutes later with two more. "Here you go." He said, handing the cups to her and sitting beside her.

She wiped her mouth on the sleeves of her wet dress,
Scrunching her nose. "Good?" Aniket asked.

Krithi jumped up on her toes, refreshed. "Great!" She exclaimed.

"Your happiness lies in your stomach, Krithi." He joked. "Not in your heart."

Krithi skipped towards the street with the grocery bags in her hands. "Krithi! Wait up!" He yelled, running after his wife. He grabbed the bags from her arms but she shrugged him off, glaring at him.

"I can carry them." She argued.

"I know you can carry them. Let me carry them for a while."

Krithi looked down at the bags and then up at him. "Fine." She scowled, dumping the heavy bags into his hands.

It took them another hour to hunt down a good priest for the pooja. Krithi drove a hard bargain with the man, and the priest, exhausted after another hour of arguing with her, the man looked at Aniket as if he sympathized with him: 'you have to suffer this everyday? Oh, you Poor man.'