Cold Wars - a Lawyer-Cop Romance

Author’s Note: This story is happening in a fictitious state of ‘Samraju’ in the nation of India. Samraju state laws are more or less fictitious and some of them have been inspired from laws of other states of India. This place is purely an imaginative place, it has a mild climate and lots of scenery. Since it is a fictitious place, it also has progressive laws at a highly optimistic level. This story revolves around an over achiever IPS officer and a backbencher who barely passed exams, turned lawyer. Enjoy. A double bell alarm started ringing at exactly 5am on a Monday morning. The only one pleased to hear a metal hammer hitting two metal hemispheres in the entire universe was Vishwanath Kumar IPS, Commissioner Idu district. He immediately woke up, got out of bed and started his body stretching exercises. After 15 minutes of stretching, he took the jug of water he kept on his night stand and poured a tall glass of water. He walked towards his closet and took out his neatly folded track pants and fresh socks, changed into them and left his room. He took out jogging shoes, clean and laces tied perfectly for his morning jog. He was a machine when it came to everything. He was the best in the whole police department of Samraju state, he was a national level athelete, front runner in extracurricular and, most important of all, he was one of the youngest IPS officers to join the force at the tender age of 22. When his friends spent time wondering what next to do with their careers, Vishwa was already posted to Samraju Cader, where only top scorers are appointed. Now at 26, he is Deputy Commissioner, in charge of half of Idu district. After his morning jog, he came back home, which was to his government accorded residence. The government assigned help had already reached his house and started doing chores. He sat down at the dining table where a hot mug of tea and the day’s newspaper waited for him. He took the mug and the paper to the living area where he sipped tea and read his newspaper on the recliner. After that, he took a shower, changed into his police uniform and walked towards the dining table. His breakfast of choice was at the table – healthy and heavy – so that he didn’t get tired at his job. As a police officer he always maintained his physique and stamina. He didn’t want to be like those old cops with a pot belly who can’t even walk upstairs the moment they turn 40 years old. He wanted to be healthy enough to run after bad guys even when he was in his 50s. His routine was the same every single day, although his work was always unpredictable. His recent posting to the Excise and Anti-Narcotics department always kept him busy. Drug busts were a common occurrence and a meticulous officer like Vishwanath ensured the law was enforced properly in each and every case. Of course, he had to sacrifice his personal life for it, but he always considered it worth the trouble. He rarely visited his parents anymore because of his work, but his parents always understood. His parents always boasted about him to others, about his competency and how he had an exemplary track record. They were so proud of him and, of course, his parents showed off his success to the point where it annoyed the people around them. ‘Every parent would want a child like you’ his parents say all the time, with no regard to Vishwa’s younger brother. His police jeep and driver were waiting for him as usual and he left for work at sharp 7:30 am in his official vehicle and would reach his station by 7:45 am. All officers were to report at 8 am but Vishwa always arrived at 7:45. ‘Better early than late’ was his policy. He was never late for anything in his life, and he never intended nor was he interested in being late. ___________________________ While Vishwanath was being a model police officer a few kilometres away, the laziest lawyer in town woke up cursing at the sun for rising so early. “Oh Monday! Its not working out between us. We have to break up.” She said to herself. Shankaree didn’t get up right away after hearing her alarm. She never did. She was a deep sleeper and hence kept at least ten alarms with a ten minute interval before the time she intended to wake up. Shankaree checked the time on her phone; it was just 7:50 am. She had a good ten minutes more to sleep. ‘Why wake up so early? Court is not till 11 o’clock.’ She thought to herself. She snoozed her alarm and threw her phone to the other side of her bed. Shankaree dozed off with a smile on her face. ‘The satisfaction of sleeping five more minutes’ was universal and no one enjoyed it more than Shankaree. Her ten minutes of sleep lasted half an hour. She opened her eyes and checked the time. “Shoot! I’m gonna be late”. The next half an hour was commotions inside Shankaree’s studio apartment, if she could call it an apartment. There were two duplexes in the same compound and she lived on the ground floor of one of the duplexes. She was all over the place looking for her bra, uniform, her advocate’s band, hairbrush, hair tie and what not. She managed to find everything, well, almost everything and ran out of the apartment without even bothering about breakfast. She hastily took her scooter and left for work. On her way, as usual, she stopped by Chanda’s street shop. She was riding quite fast but she didn’t bother to slow down even as she neared the store. Instead, she pressed the breaks extra hard to make a sudden stop. She has been going to Chanda uncle’s stall almost every day for the past 4 years, ever since she moved to her present apartment. “You really shouldn’t drive this fast sweetie.” Chanda uncle said out of concern. “Aah.. no time uncle.” Shankaree didn’t bother to keep her scooter on its stand. She didn’t bother to get off it either. She moved her scooter while still mounting it. “Uncle, Get me my usual lime juice, please” Shankaree said politely. That was her breakfast for most days, a tall glass of lemon juice with sugar and salt. It helped her manage when she went without breakfast or when she was too busy to have lunch. She reached the office a little after 9 am. Thankfully, she lived quite near to her office and her commute took just below 5 minutes via her Vespa. She rushed into her office and before entering she caught her breath and calmed herself. She entered the office and saw her colleagues look up from their files onto her. She smiled at everyone and was glad that not many people arrived. It was Monday after all. Many visited their hometowns, went on trips or did whatever they wanted on weekends, which made them late on Mondays. ‘Not even judges like Monday sitting. You cant blame lawyers for being late’, Shankaree thought to herself. She entered the office and went to sit in her cubicle. Her immediate senior, Ahmad, popped his head out of his cubicle into hers and said “You look homeless.” She looked up at him from her chair and said “At least I’m not late.” “That, you are not.” They both smiled at each other. “I’ll go tie my hair in the washroom now. Barely had time to brush it nice.” Shankaree stood up and asked Ahamad. “We don’t have a lot of cases today, right?” Ahmad shook his head ‘no’. Shankare walked out of her cubicle and headed to the washroom. ‘Today is a good day’ she whispered to herself. ____________________________ Shankaree messed up badly later that day. She had told herself it would be a good day. Maybe she jinxed it. Just like her, several others hated Mondays, so, naturally, her colleagues, clerks, stenographers and some senior lawyers came late to the office. Maybe she also should’ve come late. She thought and rolled her eyes. A law firm is dead when there is a shortage of staff, especially advocates' clerks. When clerks don’t show up, things fall apart in a law office. And that’s exactly what happened at Richard George Associates today. One of their clerks fell ill over the weekend (yeah sure) and the other said she would be late for no damn reason. Monday Blues. RG Associates had 2 clerks because of the work load and now both were AWOL. A junior lawyer messed up the firm’s cases for hearing today. The list the newbie wrote had not one but two mistakes. Because of Shankaree’s bad luck or because of everyone else’s amazing luck, those two cases were managed by her. She missed one of the cases when it was called. Just before the court rose for the afternoon recess, she had to beg the judge to lend her an ear. She messed up a simple bail petition because a newbie couldn’t write numbers well? ‘This is so embarrassing.’ She thought to herself. The judge was already snippy because she missed the case when it was called and that definitely contributed to the hearing. Result? Bail denied. Resultant? Client still in jail on remand. Not so surprisingly, her senior, Advocate Richard George yelled at her for screwing it up. “Haven’t you learned anything in all these years of practicing law?” he asked. “Sorry Sir, I have put in an urgent memo to grant a hearing once more tomorrow. I’ll look into the matter properly this time.” She said with her head down, feeling miserable. “What for? So that you can miss the case again?” Adv. Richard’s statement made Shankaree look up. She felt guilty, but now she felt guilty and a little bit angry. “Sir, it wasn’t even my fault to begin with. There were no clerks around and Ram made a mistake when he took the list.” She said in a defensive tone. “And?” her senior asked. Shankaree was silent for a minute, he then continued, “you should’ve checked, especially since it's your case. Ram is new, he made a mistake, just like you and me when we started out.” Shankaree lowered her head once more. “Anyway, it’s a relief that you already submitted an urgent memo. I’ll have to personally appear to get the bail now.” Shankaree shook her head, understanding the situation. High Court judges, or judges in general, value their pride and an advocate absent when a case is called is a hit to their pride they can never take. “Yes sir.” is all what she had left to say. She politely said that and went back to her cubicle. That’s when she saw her phone constantly vibrating on her desk. All advocates put their phones on silent or vibrate during court and many simply forget to change it. She took her phone and saw that Chanda uncle was calling her. The call before she could attend and her screen displayed 18 missed calls, all from Chanda uncle. ‘What would’ve possibly happened?’ she wondered. She called him back but the person who spoke was his wife, Bhanumati aunty. ‘Hello. Uncle?” she said “No, this is his Bhanumati” his wife said. “Oh Bhanu aunty, what’s the matter? I was in court and my phone was on silent” Shankaree said “I saw so many missed calls. "What’s the matter, aunty?” The next thing she heard was Bhanu aunty’s sobs through the phone. That made her worried. ‘What if something happened to Chanda uncle?’ he thought to herself. “Aunty, don’t cry, please tell me what happened.” She said pleadingly “My husband was arrested by the police.” She said in between sobs. “What? Why?” Shankaree was now confused. Why would the police arrest a humble street vendor. “He was arrested by Anti-Narcotics police 2 hours ago. I didn’t know what to do. They didn’t even properly say anything during his arrest.” Bhanu was heaving in between her words. The lawyer in Shankaree woke up ‘He’ll need a lawyer. Bloody narcotics police.’ she thought. ‘Aunty, wait 5 minutes, I’ll be there right now” she said, and cut the call.