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‘Let bygones be bygones,’ he said, smiling. A huge weight seemed to have lifted off his shoulders and he hugged her tightly.
A few moments later, to change the topic to something lighter, but also because he really wanted to know, Atharv asked, ‘How did you turn your career around?’
‘The burning question, is it?’ she asked, laughing.
‘I am so amazed and so impressed.’
‘Like I said, I stole from Ma.’
Atharv rolled his eyes at her. ‘And?’
‘There I was, well, penniless, husband-less, degree-less, jobless,’ Koyal said, smiling, ‘but I knew I wanted to change things. Ma was … dying … but you know how she was.’
‘Full of beans,’ said Atharv and Koyal had to smile.
‘Yes, exactly. She told me to come to her room as soon as I knew she was dead, and when I got a moment, steal from her cupboard.’
‘What?’
‘Yes. A red box, containing forty gold bangles. She asked me to take all of them.’
‘Why did she ask you to steal and not just give it to you?’
‘My brother and father were both against me, Atharv. They would have never let her give all her jewellery to me. If they knew I had it, Ma was afraid, they would simply take it back. So she suggested I steal it just after her death when the house would be brimming with people and no one would think it was me.’
Atharv shook his head in disbelief. ‘What did she want you to do with the money?’
‘Use the money to sustain myself and prepare for CAT while I finished my long-distance BA. And then to pay for my MBA.’
‘Really?’
Koyal nodded. ‘She told me that life finds it tough to beat someone who does not give up. In return for the bangles, I was to never give up. I was to gun for all the medals at B-School and settle for nothing less than the best job on campus.’
‘And you got through CAT?’
Koyal smiled.
‘Yes, first attempt,’ she said, her pride unmistakable.
‘MBA from?’
‘IIM-Banglore.’
‘Wow!’
Koyal laughed.
‘And then the medals and the job? Did they happen?’
Koyal nodded and Atharv’s jaw dropped to the floor.
‘So you, Koyal Hansini Raje,’ said Atharv, narrowing his eyes at his friend, ‘the girl who spent more time in detention than anyone else in the history of our school – you are a medal
holder from IIM-B?’
Koyal giggled.
‘How did you do it?’ he asked, shaking his head in disbelief.
