Dil Beparwah | ✔

two

||CHAPTER 2||

《¤》

┊V A R U N┊

Office politics were a pain in the fuçking ass. I never got the hang of it- though it had more to do with the fact that in spite of being the Editor-in-chief of the imprint my friends and I built from scratch, I had superiors who kept track of the funding that helped run the trade-journalism magazine. I wasn't born into this devious world I now explored, and that wasn't very convenient to begin with. And that was probably why I tried finding out what made the world of business so cunning.

-which was not what the article in front of me communicated effectively. Tilting my head to the side to observe the newly hired intern of BizNest, I fanned a pencil between my fingers. "This is sweet. Did you find out which night club Ishaan Merchant likes to go as well?"

Esha pursed her lips, a layer of confidence glazing over her features as she leaned forward, raising her eyebrows. "I can, if you want. A friend of mine is a close friend of his."

Which explained why she had drafted this article in the first place. One thing Esha Bhatt loved doing, was boasting about her connections. Belonging to the family of yet another close friend of one of the investors of BizNest had given her the access as an intern to my Trade Journalism Company. Yet another reason why Office politics was a pain in the fuçking aşs.

"While you're at it, why don't you open up a fan club for him?" I shifted my eyes back to the screen in front of me. "Because what I am reading here, appears to be a hastily written fan fiction."

Esha rolled her lips in, and I assume there was a hint of frustration on her face. However, before she could give me yet another thread of her close connections, my phone began to ring. Trying to locate it beneath the piled up mess of files on my desk, I dismissed her. "Don't bang the door on your way out. Your close friends won't be paying for fixing it again."

She muttered something indistinguishable under her breath, following my instructions nonetheless. Retrieving my phone that was making up for a page marker that I had run out of, I got up from my chair, turning off the computer.

"Where the fuçk have you been? Ek ghante se call kiye jaa raha hoon!"

I cradled my phone between my ear and shoulder, stuffing a few sheets and a file into my bag, "You don't sound very pleasant. Rhidima Bagchi ki pitch pasand nahi aayi kya?"

"She rescheduled. She'll swing by the office tomorrow- but that's not why I'm calling, Varun." I could imagine Mikesh Rastogi pinching the bridge of his nose out of frustration. Apart from being one of my juniors from college days, the rich fuçker was also the publisher of my bimonthly. "You were supposed to be working on the Oberoi story!"

"And I am," I said, walking out of my small cabin, saluting the five employees who were intent on staying late on my way out. "Itna kyu restless ban raha hai? The research takes time when it comes to industrialists like him, you know that."

"Then fuçking speed it up! PoppinUp has got a story that you were supposed to be covering!"

"PoppinUp?!" I scoffed. "You're comparing BizNest to a gossip site?"

"Well, it doesn't look like gossip to me. It's about some marriage contract that Maanyata Yatis is now trying to cover up."

I scoffed. "Contract marriages aren't shockers, Rastogi. I'd be amused if businessmen like Oberoi were under the faux influence of love."