You can’t do much. About bonuses. They did not arrive during Ganesh Chaturthi. The word spread around that the bosses in Gurgaon were looking at a national festival to announce the bonuses. You half-expected it during the Dassera. Both you and your reliable other person, the VP, were left staring at the door through the four days of the Dassera. Word filtered that some HR guy in Gurgaon has danced a bit in the semi-arid environment of his cubicle at 4.07 pm yesterday, the day before Diwali.
The bonus maybe happening, after all.
You went home. Aai was the first one to meet you at the door as she’d been busy with the Rangoli. She saw your inscrutable face and seeing the entire traffic lines of Aundh on your face, left off any topic about the bonus. The children accosted you. They have all the naivety at hand and can accost you when and where possible. It could be for a videogame, for a box of chocolates or for a top that has been seen but not bought. It’s for you to think through the bonus predicament and answer them suitably. It’s why you are the mard of the house.
Spouse is a different kettle of fish. Discussion will start ever so amiably. Are we going out tomorrow? You know you have put off buying anything till now as the bank account is standing on borrowed legs. The credit cards just seem to be standing. On thin air perhaps. You don’t want to look. You don’t want to know. So going out shall always be a difficult subject. But you nod. You can’t say no in the first round itself. She’s immediately onto the second question. Has the bonus come? You don’t know, you say. It can only be known tomorrow. Then you lapse into silence. Telling anything more is overcommitment. You don’t want to do that!
Spouse shall have none of it. She asks a series of questions about how it all went in the office. What did VP say? How did unit HR behave when he met you this morning? Did he shake your hand strongly or weakly? Did the Head of Commercial ignore you or meet your eye? So on and so forth. She knows all about the company people. More than I do. Even if she didn’t meet them everyday. She was psychic. Well, she always was. Immediately after marriage she told me that you don’t know how to handle money. How did she know that? You never showed any of your known weaknesses till then. But she had nailed the truth.
Diwali day came along. Morning trundled towards afternoon. You kept yourself partially busy with sales follow ups. At least you had something to do. Others didn’t even have that much. Peeking over their cubicle barriers, everyone seemed to wait. Eternally. Even the particles in the air seem to be suspended for too long at one place. Some checked their mail incessantly as if the news of the bonus would arrive only at their mailboxes.
Afternoon wore on. Your sales follow ups were all done. The chin-scratching was also over. The rubbing of the temples beside the forehead was also completed. Nope. Nothing coming through the mail. General disappointment started to seep through the office. A couple of them went off towards the tapri down the street. Some nicotine was better than none. A couple of women decided to call it a day. After all, it was Diwali and work had to be done at home too. It was a holiday the next day at the office.
You are among the last to leave. You were still among the half=hopers. You packed off the laptop but still looked at your Blackberry in some forlorn hope.
The family went out in the evening. The credit card took some more beating. Diwali happened. The spouse looked to be happy and so did the children.
You just silently prayed that the new job you were prospecting could come through. Nothing much would happen here anymore.
A month later, one wintry Pune day, it happened. A mail did come in. You forgot about a missing bonus as soon as you saw that the next job gave you a 35% hike. You smiled.
A shift and another grind started. You had dealt with non-bonuses. Your way!
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