When I met my Ex

15- Ziana

5:15 p.m.,
INDORE HIGHWAY,

I stretch out my legs in the limited space of air between the two seats, the rough fabric of my socks contracting like ropes to my ankles. The taxi would not splurge back if I lift myself and sit properly, but my bottom keeps slipping down from the polythened seat. He should have atleast ripped off the cover of his taxi seats, if this is a new job to him. The seats anyway are to be ruined with the passage of time, but the injustice to first customers should not be done like this. I pull my dress down with frustration as they keep crawling up to my crotch, even my bare thighs under unable to maintain friction with the polished surface of the seat. I lift myself again and sit properly, being welcomed like thousand times here.

"Hey, look there! Would love a selfie with that waterfall", Maria points out to a giant waterfall by the side of the road, her voice filled with excitement. Maria is also an Instagram model and often posts vlog trips on her IGTV, with her fourty-six year old husband Zenith, currently based in the US.
It has been twenty minutes since we left the airport till the middle of the highway, Maria enjoying the scenes cheerfully while I struggle to lock my buttocks on the seat. I might have missed many beautiful views on the way, blurred with the frustration in my mind. She turns back at me and smiles.
"Yeah, should we stop it for you?", I ask to offer her some minutes to fulfill her desire. She simply denies it as we should not be getting late for the call. I lose a chance to make myself comfortable on the seat. Nevertheless, let's bear this for someone's sake with a helpless sigh. I will be getting a bigger bed than her in our hotel, I need to make sure of this.

□ □ □

6:28 p.m.,

We are much welcomed into a posh hotel with such warmth, the two men in their generous dark suits and prudently in their forties, looking way younger with the travels of freshness around the world. Work does keep you fit and fine both mentally and physically. It does not let you fall back to your anxieties or succumb to your laziness. I look at myself through the thick glass walls of the hotel lobby, all in a little grey shade but clear enough, and frown at the realization that I have gained few extra pounds that are hanging off the vales of my waist and making my hips look weary and ugly. All at once, a pang of jealousy hits me through my chest when I look at the lean and light Maria laughing with the men, her perfect white set without any tint of yellowishness. I better remain reserved and serious, for I should not be thinking anything that discourages my confidence in work. Maria has put her belief in me and approached me thinking that I am the best option for this. My envy should not dam our friendly bonding like this. We are then shown our respective rooms and as God sees every child of his equally, we both have gotten the same size of bed. At least He does not differentiate us, I am glad.

After a quick nap for an hour, in the evening, we all gather to release our fatigue under the chilling palm trees in the big green lawn at the back of the hotel. Jake has planned that we would not be doing any work today because, as he says, 'the two beautiful ladies should not be pressurized for giving their precious time in this'. I am happy they are being understanding, otherwise the last trip a few months ago was hectic as hell, full of mean and miser people. All the four long slender glasses clink in the air, with the red wine slightly jumping out of them and creating bloody spots on the ceramic table-cover. And her laugh ringing in our ears, Maria continues about a fiasco in one of her trips when she caught her clients wrapped together in her bedroom.
"They.....lmao....they freaked out in their naked selves looking at me. I took my heels away then", she coughs as the wine hits her in her nasal pathway. I give her a few gentle jolts at her back to ease her coughing, keeping the effect of the humour still with perky smiles on our faces.
"Seriously!", Jake cries. Maria smiles at him, her eyes a little watery with the sudden stuff. I feel familiar with them now, so I also share a funny stuff with them for the sake of the moment. Of course about the hilarious mismatch of my socks and their ruthlessness towards me in the car.