Last week, I wrote how a pair of socks I had borrowed while playing badminton almost destroyed my marriage. Rekha found the socks in the pile of washed clothes and, since they were beige and white in colour, suspected that a second woman was involved.
To add fuel to the fire, a reader named Dr Chetna Tyagi left a comment on that post: “When are you going to return my anklets?”
Dr Chetna, some questions should not be asked publicly. But now that you have opened the cupboard, let the skeletons tumble – let me narrate the anklet story.
In the last quarter of 2020, Rekha and I decided to move from Gurgaon to Chennai to cut down our expenses. Our start-up wasn’t doing well, and financially, we were at the lowest point of our careers.
Since we had a house in Chennai, which we had bought in 2009, it seemed like a wise decision.
After loading our boxes onto Agarwal Packers & Movers’ truck, we boarded a flight to Madurai. Rekha and the children were going to stay with my family for fifteen days, while I would travel to Chennai to wait for our belongings and get the house ready.
For fifteen days, I was completely alone.
The house was empty, my family was in Madurai, our belongings were somewhere on a highway between Gurgaon and Chennai, and after two days of sweeping, supervising plumbers and inhaling a tonne of dust, I got bored.
A sensible married man would have read a book, gone for a walk or poured a peg of Old Monk. But you know that we Rajans are risk-takers – for us, taking risks is like eating rusk.
So, I installed Hinge.
This is one of the problems with us Rajans. When one start-up is already failing, instead of fixing it, we start another venture.
After some effort, I found a date.
We went out for dinner, had a nice conversation and, after dinner, she looked at me and asked, “Your place or mine?”
To cut a long story short, let’s just say that it was a long night.
And since my kids sometimes read what I write, I will not get into the details. Anyway, at my age, leaving some things to the imagination is better for my reputation.
The next morning, the truck carrying our belongings arrived from Gurgaon.
Within minutes, my romantic life was replaced by forty-seven cardboard boxes, which had to be dismantled and arranged as per my wife’s liking.
I called my cousin Balaji, who was working in Chennai, and the two of us spent the next couple of days setting up the entire house.
By the end of the third day, the house looked ready. That’s when I went to Madurai to bring back Rekha and the children.
In all the excitement of the truck’s arrival, I had completely forgotten about my Hinge date. As luck would have it, my Hinge date had also forgotten something.
On the second day after we moved into the house, Rekha was cleaning the master bedroom when she found an anklet in one corner.
It was lying perfectly straight against the wall, which is why I had missed it during my cleaning exercise.
Rekha picked up the anklet and called out, “Rajan?”
When I walked into the room, she held up the anklet and asked, “Whose is this, Rajan?”
Even though my brain had slowed down, I recognised the anklet and also remembered the owner.
Thankfully, before I could say anything, my brain started working again, and I uttered the safest possible reply under the circumstances: “I don’t know, Rekha.”
She looked at the anklet, looked at me and then looked at the anklet again.
“An anklet belonging to a woman is lying in our master bedroom, and you don’t know whose it is?”
When a wife repeats your answer slowly, it just means she is giving you one more opportunity to replace your stupid lie with the truth. Or, if a Rajan is involved, an even better lie.
I knew “I don’t know” wasn’t going to survive more than thirty seconds.
So, my brain did what the male brain does under extreme pressure – it lied once again.
“I think it belongs to the ghost,” I said.
Rekha stared at me.
“What ghost?” she asked.
“The lady ghost who lives in this block.” I looked around the room as if I was searching for someone. We Rajans are method actors and can get into the skin of the character.
Our block had sixteen houses, and we lived on the second floor. Until that moment, it had contained sixteen families, 15+ kids and four security guards.
Now, thanks to me, it also had a lady ghost.
“I forgot to tell you,” I continued. “One of the security guards mentioned her when he first saw me moving our things into the house.”
“What did he say?” Rekha enquired. From the way she asked, I could tell that she wasn’t convinced.
Both my wife and I are scared of watching horror movies, but we don’t believe in ghosts.
I had invented the ghost only 14 seconds earlier, so I didn’t have a backstory yet.
I just pretended to look around the bedroom with a little bit of fear on my face. Method actors, you see.
Rekha came closer, looked into my face and then asked, “So, this ghost entered our bedroom and left one anklet against the wall?”
“Maybe she is claiming her territory because we have come back after twelve years.”
Rekha continued looking at me. From her expression, I could see that my ghost story was dying before it had even been properly launched.
“If you don’t believe me, ask the security guard,” I said.
The moment I said that, a surge of fear ran through me. What if Rekha stepped out immediately to check on my story?
Thankfully, she didn’t. She only said, “I will speak to him in the evening,” and dropped the interrogation.
After lunch, as soon as Rekha went inside the bedroom for her siesta, I walked down to the entrance of our block and called the security guard aside.
I gave him ₹500.
“Listen carefully,” I said. “I have told my wife that a lady ghost moves around this block. If she asks you about it, just nod your head and confirm the story.”
The guard looked at the ₹500 note and then at me.
He didn’t ask why I had invented a ghost but said that, in three hours, another guard would be manning the gate and we might have to include him in the plan as well.
That cost me yet another ₹500.
After getting up, Rekha picked up the anklet once again and said, “Looks like somebody came here.”
I felt my remaining life expectancy reduce by five years.
So, I casually suggested, “Why don’t we ask the guard?”
We walked downstairs.
“Anna,” I said, pretending we had never discussed anything recently, “you once mentioned something about a lady ghost in this block, right?”
The guard looked at me, remembered the ₹500 and nodded enthusiastically.
“Yes, sir. Lady ghost.”
“See?” I told Rekha.
Rekha turned towards him. “What does she do?”
I hadn’t trained the security guard for this question. But then, I realised he hadn’t been trained for his job either, but he was doing a decent job.
For a few moments, the guard and I looked at each other and communicated entirely through fear.
“She walks,” he finally said.
“Where?” Rekha asked.
“Everywhere,” the guard replied confidently.
“When?” Rekha was a master interrogator.
“Sometimes,” the guard replied, looking straight into Rekha’s eyes.
I made a mental note to hand him another ₹500 later for successfully confirming the existence of the ghost.
After that, Rekha rested a little easier, but she did have occasional doubts.
A month passed peacefully. The anklet remained in one of Rekha’s drawers, the ghost made no further appearances, and I slowly started believing that the crisis was over.
Then, one morning, while we were having tea, Rekha asked, “Whatever happened to that ghost?”
I stopped in the middle of a sip and looked up.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“It has been a month, and there have been no incidents. Was it really a ghost, Rajan?”
I couldn’t afford to let Rekha discover that a woman had entered our house while she was in Madurai. So, that afternoon, I went to Tanishq and bought two pairs of silver anklets.
Remember, we had moved from Gurgaon to Chennai because our start-up wasn’t doing well. And here I was inside Tanishq buying silver jewellery for a ghost I had invented. Yet another proof that financial planning has never been one of my strengths.
Over the next month, I strategically left two anklets in different parts of the house for Rekha to find – one near the washing machine and another under the sofa.
Each time she found one, she would call me, “Rajan!”
And each time, I would act surprised. “Again?”
After finding the third anklet, Rekha placed all of them on the table and said, “This is a very benevolent ghost.”
Rekha was excited that the ones she found under the washing machine and the sofa were a matching pair and she could wear them.
Then, Rekha held up the original anklet she had found in the master bedroom and said, “But she still hasn’t given me the matching anklet for this one.”
Finding an exact match was going to be difficult. So, I didn’t give Rekha any hope.
Over the next two months, I bought more anklets and left them in different corners of the house. One appeared inside a cupboard, another on the balcony, and a third was hanging along with our half-marathon medals.
That one Hinge date was becoming very expensive.
Just when I thought I had finally convinced Rekha, she asked another dangerous question.
“The watchman says this ghost haunts all sixteen houses in our block, right?”
“Yes,” I replied timidly.
“Then why is she leaving anklets only in our house? Why is nobody else finding them?”
Thankfully, I had an answer ready.
“Maybe the neighbours are greedy. They are finding anklets but not announcing it in the WhatsApp group.”
Rekha didn’t buy the explanation, so I had to buy more anklets.
Over the next few weeks, I bought ten pairs and began leaving them near the doorsteps of the other houses in our block.
Sometimes, when nobody was home and a window was open, I
tossed an anklet inside.
Normal thieves enter homes and take valuables, but I am a Rajan, remember? I was different. I was probably Chennai’s first reverse thief – I was secretly leaving silver jewellery behind.
Soon, messages started appearing in the residents’ WhatsApp group.
“Did anyone lose an anklet?”
“Found one near our doormat.”
“One anklet was lying in our kitchen. How did it get there?”
Within days, people across the block started finding anklets, and the ghost story gained credibility.
By now, I had spent almost a lakh buying ten pairs of anklets.
We had moved to Chennai to save money, but with the limited money we had, I was now personally funding the jewellery requirements of every woman in our apartment block.
For a few weeks, Rekha stopped asking questions.
Then, during morning tea, she said, “Something is strange.”
“What is strange?” I asked.
“Why would a lady ghost leave only anklets? Why are there no other signs that a woman is haunting the place?”
Thanks to her question, I had to expand the ghost’s product range.
That night, after Rekha fell asleep, I got out of bed, walked to the bathroom and strategically placed a stick – on bindi on the mirror.
The next morning, Rekha found it.
“Rajan! Come here!”
I rushed in and pretended to be shocked.
“A bindi!”
“The ghost is now leaving bindis,” Rekha said excitedly.
“Yes. Maybe anklets have become expensive,” I muttered under my breath.
For the next couple of months, I alternated between anklets and stick – on bindis.
We were now into the fourth month of Operation Anklets, and I had spent almost ₹2 lakh – it was turning into the costliest Hinge date ever.
Every morning, I woke up wondering how to end the ghost story.
Unfortunately, I got the right opportunity when I heard the tragic news – one of the security guards in our apartment block had been hit by a truck just outside the complex and killed.
I still feel ashamed admitting this, but while everyone else saw a tragedy, my frightened brain saw an exit strategy.
I told Rekha that I had witnessed the accident.
“The strangest thing happened,” I said. “The guard walked directly in front of the truck, almost as if he was possessed.”
Later that evening, I added another dimension to the story.
“The other guard told me something,” I said.
“What?”
“The lady ghost haunting our block was apparently in love with the guard who died. He had cheated her, and she had taken her own life.”
Rekha listened carefully.
“Now that she has taken revenge, I think she will finally rest in peace,” I followed up.
From looking at Rekha’s expressions, I couldn’t tell if she had bought my story. But it definitely was a good story – it had romance, betrayal, suicide, revenge and a tragic ending.
With the lady ghost retired, the anklets and the bindis slowly stopped appearing. With no evidence of the Hinge date, I could now sleep peacefully.
Or at least, that’s what I thought.
One evening, I returned from work and sat on the shoe rack outside our front door to remove my shoes.
From inside the house, I heard Rekha talking to one of her Gurgaon friends.
“After coming to Chennai, Rajan has completely embraced the city,” she said. “He has started wearing a veshti instead of shorts, and can you believe it…he has bought me six pairs of anklets.”
I smiled. Then, I heard her friend ask, “Why did he suddenly buy you so many anklets?”
Rekha laughed – it was her sinister laugh, the one she uses when she knows she is in command.
“He thinks I believe that a lady ghost has been leaving them around the house.”
My hands froze while untying my shoelaces.
“All I have to do is ask him one question,” Rekha continued, “and within a week, another anklet appears. I am thinking of asking him why the ghost never leaves diamond earrings.”
As I remained seated outside, I realised that Rekha had never believed in the ghost.
I may have been bad at making money, but Rekha had discovered the perfect business model – ask one doubtful question and get a piece of jewellery.
So, Dr Chetna Tyagi, to answer your question…no, I am not returning your anklet. It is the only one in this entire story that I got for free.
Note: There has been no Hinge date, Dr Chetna Tyagi and I have never met…and Rekha never found an anklet in our house. This is what it is – a story.