He wasn’t sure what unsettled him more. The efficiency. Or the fact that she seemed completely unaware she had just outplayed his test again.
“Fine,” he said finally. “Tell my driver we leave at 11:30.”
“Already done.” She glanced at her watch. “You have forty minutes before you need to change. The black suit is being steamed now.”
She walked away, settling into a corner chair with her notebook. As the lighting crew adjusted for the next scene, Vikram found himself watching her instead of reviewing his lines.
That was when he heard it. A soft humming. Slightly off-key. Then very off-key.
He frowned.
It took him a second to recognise the tune. An old Hindi song his mother used to play on Sunday mornings. A classic. Emotional. Melodic.
In Divya’s version, it sounded like the melody had taken a wrong turn and refused to return home.
It was… jarring. Like finding a scratch on a perfect surface. This hyper-efficient assistant who anticipated his every need apparently couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket. And didn’t seem to care if anyone noticed.
The next day, it was a different song. Equally inaccurate. The day after that, another one.
By week three, the humming had become part of the background noise of his day. Sometimes he caught himself waiting for it, that moment when she’d drop her professional guard just enough to reveal a human flaw.
Meanwhile, his professional life had shifted in ways he hadn’t fully acknowledged.
His schedule, once chaotic, now moved fluently. Meetings had breathing space between them. Scripts arrived pre-marked with notes on character arcs. Interviews were grouped intelligently to avoid pointless travel across Mumbai.
His protein shake appeared before he realised he wanted it. His preferred mints found their way into his pocket before press conferences. Lunch arrived exactly when he needed it, not after, not before.
Small changes, practical improvements, that made everything smoother.
On Wednesday of the third week, he arrived at a magazine photoshoot and paused.
The lighting was already set to favour his left profile. His preferred photographer’s assistant, Hassan, stood ready.
“How did you know Hassan is the only assistant I work with?” he asked during a short break.
Divya glanced up from her notebook.
“You mentioned it at the set last week,” she said. “You said Hassan understands your left-side lighting.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“You were discussing camera angles with the director.”
He hadn’t been speaking to her. He hadn’t even realised she was listening.
“You remember everything I say?” he asked, sharper than intended.
“Only the relevant parts.” No smile. No attempt to soften the statement. Just that steady gaze behind wire-rimmed glasses.
That week, something else changed.
He stopped testing her. The impossible requests disappeared. The deliberate complications ended. There was no point. She handled everything.
Instead, he found himself noticing different things.
The small line between her eyebrows appeared exactly forty-three seconds before she solved a problem. She pushed her glasses up with her knuckle, never her fingertip, always theknuckle, and that too approximately forty times daily. When writing quickly, she held her breath, releasing it only when she finished the sentence. The way she rubbed her ear absentmindedly after tucking her hair back.
And the humming. Always the humming.