Chapter 3: Betrayal in the Blood

When Amit Bhaiya called, I was driving, taking a client up the hill. Amit Bhaiya was clearly drunk, his words slurred.

The road wound upwards, flanked by thorny bushes and the distant shimmer of heat on tarmac. My phone vibrated with Amit Bhaiya's name flashing on the cracked screen. The way he slurred my name—"Rohannn, sun na, mat bhool, main tera bhai hoon, ek mauka de raha hoon..."—made my blood boil. Somewhere behind the forced affection, I could hear the malice, like the hiss of a pressure cooker just before the whistle blows.

“Rohan, don’t be ungrateful. I’m your brother, giving you a way out—”

“Go to hell,” I said, hanging up and immediately blocking his number.

No use talking to him. I pressed the 'block' button with a finality that felt like closing a door in his face. My hands gripped the steering wheel harder, knuckles white. A bead of sweat trickled down my temple, the AC struggling against the afternoon heat. The hills outside blurred by, monkeys leaping across the branches. For a second, I wanted to hurl the phone out the window, but controlled myself.

In the rearview mirror, the mother and daughter in the back seat looked nervous. I could only nod apologetically. It wasn’t their fault for being afraid—I look intimidating, much taller and bigger than most people. Since I was young, people said I looked like Bhima or Hanuman. Lately, I haven’t bothered with my appearance; my face is covered in stubble, making the resemblance even stronger.

My shirt was rumpled, the collar stained with sweat and the scent of last night’s samosas clinging to my breath. I tried to soften my expression, but sometimes it’s hard to change the face the world has given you. I caught the daughter’s eyes in the mirror—she quickly looked away, clutching her mother’s hand tighter. It stung a little, but I just nodded and drove on, the radio playing some old Kishore Kumar song to fill the silence.