Chapter 1: Welcome to Hell (a.k.a. Strategy Team, 12th Floor)
If Rhea Kapoor had a rupee for every time someone said “Don’t take it personally, it’s just work,” she could’ve quit this job two promotions ago and opened a beach café in Gokarna.
But here she was, standing outside the glass doors of the Strategy & Growth Division, clutching her laptop like a shield and wondering if it was too late to fake dengue.
“Breathe,” she whispered to herself. “It’s a team. Not a firing squad.”
The doors swooshed open, perfectly timed to mock her pep talk, and she stepped into the land of monochrome minimalism. Everything screamed corporate chic – matte black desks, chrome lamps, people who looked like they hadn’t smiled since FY22.
And then there was him.
Aarav Malhotra.
Her new manager.
The legend.
The menace.
The man who once allegedly made a senior analyst cry using only comments on a PowerPoint deck.
He sat at the head of the bay like a monarch who ruled over KPIs and the broken dreams of juniors. Black shirt, sleeves rolled up just enough to show forearms that looked like they lifted a lot more than just expectations. Headphones on. Eyes narrowed at his screen like it had personally insulted his intelligence.
Rhea swallowed. She hated intimidating men. They always reminded her of her engineering college professors and her ex-boyfriend, both of whom thought emotional intelligence was a scam.
Just then, Aarav looked up.
No smile. No nod. Just a curt, “You’re late.”
“I… It’s 9:58,” she stammered.
He glanced at his watch. “We start at 9:45.”
Cool. Great. Fantastic start.
Rhea forced a smile and marched to the empty desk someone gestured her to. It was directly opposite his. Ofcourse it was. The universe clearly loved poetic suffering.
“First task,” he said, without turning to her. “Deck for the Marstech pitch. You have two hours. It goes to the client at noon.”
That was it. No welcome. No “How was onboarding?” No “Do you need help accessing the team folder?”
Just an Excel file pinged over Teams with the message:
“Refer to last quarter’s template. Avoid fluffy language.”
And a little 🙂 emoji at the end.
She wasn’t sure what was worse – the passive-aggressive smile or the fact that it worked. She shut up and got to work.
An hour in, she realized two things:
- The team worked like a military operation. Everyone moved fast, spoke in acronyms, and nobody ever said “BRB.”
- Her manager was secretly watching everything. He didn’t hover, didn’t micromanage. But she knew. She felt it. Like a manager sixth sense.
At exactly 11:52 a.m., Aarav pinged her:
“Deck’s decent. You missed slide 12. Add competitor benchmarks.”
No one had said anything about slide 12.
No one had even mentioned a benchmark.
How the hell..?
She turned to ask him, but had moved to his cabin. Of course he got to change his sitting locations inside the department. Before she could move, he reappeared from his cocoon, slid a printed sheet across the desk toward her. It was a competitor matrix. Already highlighted. Already analyzed.
“I figured you’d miss it,” he said casually. “Most new folks do.”
She blinked. “So you let me?”
He looked up. His eyes were tired, not in a sleepy way but in a life has been too much kind of way.
“You learn more when you miss things. Consider it a gift.”
And just like that, he returned to his chair that looked extra comfy.
Rhea wanted to be mad. She wanted to roll her eyes and text her friend “He’s the worsttt.” But… she also didn’t hate it.
There was something oddly satisfying about earning a correction.
It made her feel like she was actually being seen.
She hated that.
By 7:00 p.m., most of the team had left.
Rhea stayed back, organizing her notes, re-checking her tasks on Asana. Aarav was still there too. Typing furiously, brow furrowed, occasionally muttering things like “Why is everyone allergic to clarity?”
She stood up, stretched, and dared to speak. “Do you..want coffee? I was gonna head down.”
He didn’t look up. “I don’t do coffee after 6.”
Rhea gave a mock salute. “Right. Apologies to your circadian rhythm.”
Her own courage surprised her.
That also earned her a tiny twitch of a smile.
Progress.
She walked away grinning, feeling like she’d just cracked the first layer of a very tightly sealed Tupperware of emotions.
Maybe this wouldn’t be hell after all. Maybe it’d be… an inferno with perks.
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