(Upd- 21/2) FF// Prescribed Insanity, Chapter 14, Pg. 89 - Page 10

How soon is too soon to update? 😆

As you guys can see, I'm in an update monster mode. Years of writing sabbatical channeling out all at once :P Someone please take the keyboard away from me now.

Originally posted by: saucechips

How soon is too soon to update? 😆

As you guys can see, I'm in an update monster mode. Years of writing sabbatical channeling out all at once :P Someone please take the keyboard away from me now.

We will take it away after Sunday's dinner. Pukka promise!

Jokes apart, please make sure you get a break between each chapter and each story.

Cheers.....

Dinner ready ? Should be served while its hot 😳

it is never too soon to update 😉

but no pressure 😊

Originally posted by: saucechips

How soon is too soon to update? 😆

As you guys can see, I'm in an update monster mode. Years of writing sabbatical channeling out all at once :P Someone please take the keyboard away from me now.

I have to admit the only Fevicol song that had come to mind was "Mere photo ko mere photo ko seene se yaar Chipka le saiyan Fevicol se"!!!! Aiyyoooo😳😆

🤣

Nani is super cool .. Waiting for Sunday to arrive !!

Read both the chapters, sabi.

Another hilarious story from you 😆👏

Kushi is a dentist and arnav has a dental problem. Great.

Both are families are friends and planned a dinner on Sunday evening.

I loved this nani.

Waiting to read how the dinner turns out.

Thanks for the PM, dear 😊

Originally posted by: saucechips

Wonderful research 😆

Although I can't help but feel like I've heard 'Rishton ka atoot bandhan' that Sanjika mentioned somewhere. Was it Cadbury Celebrations? Hmm...guess I'll never know.

Your guess may be right. I could not find anything which relates this tagline with any of the Indian products.

Apart from being associated with Raksha bandhan, it looks more like a tagline for a TV serial.

But in my search I found something very interesting.

Under the title "If Hindi TV serials had honest taglines, this is what they would be", I found only one serial which was actually praised and that is IPKKND.

It was written that "The only Hindi show that every guy can relate to" and the Tagline is Friend Zone.😊

Cheers.......

Originally posted by: Savera84

Your guess may be right. I could not find anything which relates this tagline with any of the Indian products.

Apart from being associated with Raksha bandhan, it looks more like a tagline for a TV serial.

But in my search I found something very interesting.

Under the title "If Hindi TV serials had honest taglines, this is what they would be", I found only one serial which was actually praised and that is IPKKND.

It was written that "The only Hindi show that every guy can relate to" and the Tagline is Friend Zone.😊

Cheers.......

😆 *taliyan*

Chapter 3: Meet and Greet

"Chotte, when Ashish and Garima are here, you will touch their feet like Anjali does. Don't make me glare at you to do it."

"Nani you know I don't believe in touching feet. I find it incredibly stupid."

"Then you will feel incredibly stupid while doing it, but you will do it. Let them not think that I did not raise you two right."

"Nani it's 2019. Literally no one cares."

"I care in 2019 and I will care in 2029 if I am alive. And one day when you have a little son or daughter of your own and they refuse to touch your feet, then you will realize."

"I would be profoundly pleased if they don't Nani. Trust me."

"At least you just agreed to having kids in the future. I consider that one battle won."

"What the-! DI, if I end up saying something now don't you Chotte Chotte me."

"Nani, Chotte, if you two are done, I can hear a car outside. Can we please not scare our guests away at the very threshold of our house? Yes? Good."

Ashish and Garima Gupta were greeted with much vehemence at the main entrance of the Raizada mansion, their two daughters following in tow, the younger one literally dragging her feet to the threshold. The girls walked forward and touched Devyani Raizada's feet who gave lengthy blessings and hugged them both. Nani then nudged an elbow into Arnav's sides and he grimaced, before joining his hands in a quick gesture of traditional salutation and got a solid glare from Devyani Raizada. While he chose to ignore the glare, the real shock for him, however, was yet to come.

Garima Gupta was famously a little extra in life. She was known to express emotion, any emotion, with all enthusiasm her tiny frame could muster. Those who knew her, had either grown accustomed to her exuberance in emotional theatrics or had developed the prudence to meet her from a safe distance. Arnav Singh Raizada did not know her, and hence, had no such forewarning. Unmindful of his lapse in conventional etiquette, Garima Gupta walked forward and pinched his left cheek (which coincidentally happened to be on the side of the aching tooth), and then stretched it out till as far as human skin cells are biologically stretchable before releasing the cheek and then patting it not too gently for good measure, all the while with a grin on her face.

Arnav Singh Raizada could double over with pain in that instant. He shut his eyes, clenched his fists and winced.

Anjali, well aware of her brother's existing dental woes gasped and covered her mouth. Devyani Raizada felt sorry for her grandson but also sadistically made a mental note to remind him later that this is how karma worked and if he had just touched Garima's feet, he might have escaped his current agony. The dentist in Khushi didn't take two seconds to figure out from the wince what exactly had happened and no one in the room (except the victim himself of course) could have a better idea of what pain Arnav was in that moment. She almost winced with him, but then was reminded of their last meeting, and sniffled a little laugh. Arnav caught her doing that, and looked at her with an expression that usually precedes a homicide. Khushi caught his glare and immediately schooled her features back to normalcy, and pretended to dust something off her kurti.

Garima Gupta seemed to notice nothing. Grin on face still intact, she continued, "I cannot believe this is Arnav beta. So handsome, just like Shaurya bhaisahab. Eyes just like Nandini's, God bless her dear soul. And SO tall! When I saw you last beta, you were only this big", she demonstrated with her hands just how big, but then realizing her estimation could only be true for some specific species of rats, she widened it a little more till it looked reasonably believable. "And this is Anjali bitiya?," she turned towards Anjali, "come here bitiya, what a pretty young woman-"

Anjali, famously a quick learner of the family, swooped in towards Garima's feet before she could be subjected to an assault similar to the one inflicted earlier on her brother.

If Arnav had been unable to eat mutton stew at the start of the week, he couldn't so much as look at the dish at the moment. The left side of his face felt like it had caught fire, and the pain had now reached his head ushering in symptoms of a full blown migraine. His stoicism has certainly been strongly put to test in the last one hour and he now sat at the table with steady gaze fixed at the centerpiece, his plate empty, and only a glass of lukewarm water clutched tightly in his hand.

To his right, Ashish and Garima Gupta were busy discussing the many marvels of Lucknow with Devyani Raizada who was all too pleased to be engaged in a conversation around her favorite place on the planet. Payal was recounting another one of her school "incidents" to Anjali who was listening with rapt interest. Khushi was busy enjoying the mutton stew and occasionally would look at Arnav's face as if about to say something, then changed her mind each time and got back to the stew.

"I am so pleased to meet your girls. Such well-educated young beautiful women. Payal is a school teacher you say? Wonderful. They say little children are angels sent by God on Earth", Nani said fondly.

"Yes, sometimes I think that theory has killed the whole appeal of heaven and after-life for me" Payal said more to herself than anyone else.

"Did you say something beta?"

"No aunty, haha, thank you so much."

"Please call me Nani." Devyani corrected her with a smile. "You are like Nandini's children for me after all. And Khushi, a dentist. Wonderful. Couldn't we all do with a few more dentists in the world?" she smiled and looked meaningfully at her grandson who gave her back a non-amused deadpan expression.

"Thank you, that's very kind." Khushi smiled back. "And the mutton stew is delicious. It's my favorite dish."

"Is it now?" Nani beamed. "I will remember that bitiya. It is our Chotte's favorite too although right now his favorite dish seems to be lukewarm water."

"Nani-"

"Don't worry Chotte I'm not saying anything. You do you."

"Di, I am leaving." Arnav leaned to his side and whispered to Anjali, seated next to him.

"What? Where for?"

"I'm going for a long drive. I cannot just sit here."

"You mean the pain won't just let you sit here."

"Whatever Di. Just please handle Nani."

"Chotte, Khushi is sitting right here. Ask for help."

"Her mother has just helped quite enough."

"You won't be able to sleep tonight you know that right? The swelling is about to start. I can see it."

"I'll be fine. I just need a long drive."

It was somewhere in the midst of this conversation between brother and sister that Khushi received an SOS message from a friend on an emergency where the friend's six year old son, pretending to be Batman, had fallen off a shelf in the house and broken his front teeth and was now inconsolable making it literally a Dark Knight for them all.

"Er..I think I'm going to have to take leave" Khushi said hesitantly as she checked her phone, "I'm so sorry".

Ashish Gupta glared at her.

"Khushi I think we discussed this", he said in a soft voice.

"Baba trust me I'm not making this up. Rudra was playing Batman and broke his tooth. Sneha Di is sending me panic messages." she whispered back.

Ahish Gupta tch-tch-ed. "That is one strange child. Okay, but take Devyani Ji's leave first."

Khushi nodded.

"Naniji I am so sorry I hope you don't mind. It's about a very dear friend. I hate to leave, but you all can please continue. Jiji will drive Maa and Baba home. I'll book an Uber."

"Not at all bitiya, not at all. I understand what emergencies a doctor has to be prepared for," Devyani nodded understandingly, "But no Uber. Our Chotte will drop you in his car. In fact he was just telling Anjali bitiya that he needed to head out himself."

Khushi widened her eyes in alarm.

Arnav threw Anjali a shocked 'how sharp are her ears?' expression. Anjali gave him a sympathetic shake of the head.

"No Naniji there's absolutely no need for that. It's only nine. I will manage, honestly." Khushi protested.

"Nonsense. I know you will manage bitiya but you are our guest right now. No guest of ours should have to take a cab back when there are perfectly functional cars in the house. Don't you worry. I know he makes it hard to believe but Chotte is actually a decent driver."

"Nani- but"

"Khushi if Naniji insists you must not refuse her," Garima said. "Hurry along, and call us once you're done at the hospital. We'll pick you from our way back."

"Yes Maa", Khushi said with a disgruntled sigh and looked at Payal, the sisters exchanging a look of shared empathy.

They had been inside the car for some fifteen minutes now, in the middle of considerable Delhi traffic. Arnav had his eyes straight on the road and Khushi could see how the muscle in his jaw would tick every now and then. When they would halt at a signal, he would shut his eyes for a few seconds, and at times rest his head back on the headrest of his seat. These were symptoms of excruciating toothache that often triggered a migraine episode that she could easily identify.

"Are you scared? Is that what this is about?" she asked finally, when she couldn't take it anymore after minutes of stretched silence.

"Excuse me?" Arnav asked.

"Well you obviously are in pain, and obviously have done nothing about it. So I'm asking, are you scared of dentists?"

"What nonse-"

"See because if you are, I want you to know that it is okay. It's called Dentophobia. Research says that of the topmost three places people are scared to visit, a dentist's clinic features on the list." She said, rummaging through her handbag and taking out a leaf of pills from it. She extended it towards Arnav. "These are painkillers. They'll help. And should you change your mind, you can get an appointment at my clinic- don't worry, I will be very gentle."

Her words, said with the best of intentions, shot like a bullet through about five hundred layers of Arnav Singh Raizada's ego. A petite young girl assuring him that he needn't be scared of her and that she would be gentle with him was the cherry on top of the whole infected enamel cake that was his life at the moment.

Pain would be addressed later, self-respect had to be salvaged first.

"What pain?" he asked as casually as possible.

"Seriously?" Khushi replied in disbelief.

"I have no idea what you are going on about."

"Oh don't you? So you mean if I were to poke your cheek with a finger right now, you would have no problem?"

"I would, but it would have nothing to do with pain. Also, can you please take these pills away from under my face? They're blocking my view."

"Unbelievable. Fine, be a baby. It was my professional duty to offer help and I did. But like they say, even God helps those who help themselves."

"Touching."

"You know this is the problem with men. oH LoOk I'm A mAn, nOthiNg eVeR hUrtS and mY sWeAt iS oNlY bLoOd and TeStoSterOne" she said in her best mock impression of a male voice.

"This, Miss Gupta, is actually a problem with Dentists. You just can't accept that nobody really needs your help and your kind only makes matters worse than they are because half of the times you don't know what you are doing, and painkiller is the only cure you know of."

"You know what? I'm starting to believe your toothache is actually a karmic manifestation. Fine. Suffer in peace. My offer stands retracted."

"I'll live."

"Good"

"Great"

At the next red light, a man with a pile of potato papads wrapped in plastic wrappers, came running to their car and stopped outside Arnav's side of the rolled down window.

"Bhaiyya Papad? Very crunchy Bhaiyya, not soft at all. I promise. Please buy" he implored.

Arnav shook his head in a no, thank you . Khushi giggled next to him. He glared at her.

"Bhaiyya I will have," she said sweetly to the vendor, "Crunchy you said? How much for two papads? Here, give me two", she extended her arm right in front of Arnav's face and handed a fifty to the vendor who grinned happily and immediately handed her two packets of papads.

Having procured the crispy crunchies, Khushi had happily torn the packet and begun munching on them. She had never been too fond of papads, but at the moment, crunching and munching on potato crisps loudly next to Arnav in his car filled her with an unholy degree of sadistic satisfaction.

Arnav looked at her with narrowed eyes. She was doing this just to spite him. The cheek of this woman!

"You want some Mr. Raizada?" she offered the packet to him in a voice dipped in honey, just confirming his suspicion.

"No thanks," he bit out from between teeth that would have been clenched together right now were they not paining so damn much. "Although clearly we failed as hosts in providing you with enough dinner."

"Are you food shaming me Mr. Raizada? Because you're trying it on the wrong person. My money, my mouth, my stomach. I will eat the whole of Delhi if I want to. Also, because unlike you I can. In fact, I also will now have an ice-cream while we are at it."

"Go ahead."

"I will."

Khushi rolled down her window with resolve and called out at a vendor with ice-creams ushering him near the car.

In five minutes, Khushi Kumari Gupta had potato crisps in one hand, and an orange ice lolly in another, and Arnav Singh Raizada had an increased headache.

The signal turned green, and the car sped along the road.

At the next signal, Khushi got a call from Sneha.

"Mr. Raizada hold my ice-cream."

"What?"

"My phone is ringing in my handbag and my hands are full. Hold my ice-cream."

"No way."

"Fine, take out my phone and hold it next to my ear while I hold the ice-cream."

"What the-!"

"Could you hurry up? Fine, don't do either, I'm keeping the ice-cream on your white seat cover. Don't cry if it gets staine-"

"Give me that ice-cream. And hurry the hell up. I won't keep holding this."

"I'm on it."

She fished the phone out of her bag and took the call.

"Yes Sneha Di....Yes, I'm on my way...Shouldn't take long now.... What?... Poor thing....Give him the phone, I'll talk to him."

"Yes baby, hiiiii this is Khushi mausi! Listen to me, Rudra is a brave boy! Rudra is Batman no? When does Batman cry? And sometimes Batman gets hurt so he needs help, and I'm coming to help you. Just like-", she faltered, then blocked the phone receiver with her palm and turned her head towards Arnav.

"Pst! Mr. Raizada! Pst!"

"What!"

"Who is Batman's bestie in the Batman series?"

"Who is what?!"

"Bestie Mr. Raizada. Best friend. Who is Batman's best friend? Quick!"

"How would I know?"

"Useless you are!"

"Excuse me?!"

She went back on the call. "-Just like Batman's best friend. We will help you like his best friend....han?.... ROBIN! Yes Robin! Exactly." She looked at Arnav and mouthed 'Robin' as if he had been holding his breath for that clarification.

"Okay baby, I'm just coming. Give the phone to your mumma for a minute, will you?... Yes, Sneha Di, I've texted a nurse to give him a local anesthetic till I reach. If he takes it then great, but don't push him too hard. He'll get scared and we can't have him more scared right now. I'll reach in five minutes and see it from there...Okay bye. See you."

Khushi kept her phone back in her bag.

"Yes you can give it back, thank you for the patience."

Arnav shook his head. Unbelievable.

They reached the dental hospital in another fifteen minutes. Khushi got off the car and dusted the potato papad remnants off her kurti.

"Thank you for the drive Mr. Raizada. Goodnight!" she said, and shut the door behind her.

" 'Night", Arnav replied, and began backing the car out of the parking lot.

Both headed in opposite directions, certain of not seeing each other again for a good while after. Little did they know, that fate had not yet ended the day of meet-and-greet for Arnav Singh Raizada and Khushi Kumari Gupta, and they would see each other sooner than either of them could have anticipated.

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Hope you had fun! The happy comments make my day and are honestly the only incentive to writing this craziness (apart from, of course, the real inspiration which is my own dental saga). Thank you so much ❤️