The next morning, Rishi wakes up to a sense of quiet desperation. He feels if he misses the opportunity to speak to Karim–Keshav, he’ll certainly miss out on a role of a lifetime. The script was meant for him, and there will only be regret later if he didn’t take action right away. So, even before brushing his teeth, he wakes up Prabhu and reminds him of their drunk conversation last night. Prabhu opens one bleary eye, squinting at Rishi.“What is your problem, man? Let me sleep! I have a narration with the Wicked Witch of Andheri West and I need my beauty sleep for that.”“Do you remember what you said to me last night?” said Rishi. “I don’t know man, last night is a blur. I’m never gonna have London Pilsner again!”“No, you idiot, I am talking about the promise you made to me.”“I don’t make promises,” says Prabhu. “I make bold statements and wild generalisations. Now let me sleep. Don’t you have an audition to prepare for?”Rishi grabs Prabhu’s T-shirt and yanks. Prabhu sits up, still half-asleep – jolted, frazzled and annoyed, but not angry. Prabhu is the only person Rishi has never seen angry.“What the fuck is your problem?!” says Prabhu.“Prabhu, I need you to arrange a meeting for me with Karim and Keshav! You promised last night. Now don’t go back on it.”Prabhu is massaging his forehead and rubbing his eyes now. He grabs a steel jug sitting beside his bed and drinks five gulps of water.Then, rubbing his eyes more, he fixes a red-eyed gaze at Rishi.“I told you it will take me some time,” he says.“Well, I don’t have time,” says Rishi.“What train do you have to catch? Is your dad sitting on your head? Does he want receipts that you’ve finally made it?”“No man, you know my dad is supportive,” says Rishi. Then, he tells him about his conversation with Manisha last night.About where they were in their relationship, and about his own insecurities. Rishi spills it all. Even while he’s talking, Rishi realises that an intense conversation like this shouldn’t happen before the morning coffee, but such is his desperation.“Did I really call you Rrish Kumar?” says Prabhu after Rishi finishes. “I must have been really drunk.”“That’s what you have to say after I spilled my heart out?”Prabhu is awake now. He has that manic look in his eyes, the one he gets when he has figured out the perfect over-the-top dialogue that his characters would utter during the Friday episode climax of the long-running soap opera he is writing.“That name has a ring to it.” Prabhu rubs his palms in excitement. “When you eventually meet those writers, introduce yourself as Rrish Kumar. Oh dude, I can see it on hoardings all across the tinsel town.”“Which means you’re thinking about it,” says Rishi. “C’mon, man. I need it. Just one meeting. I’ll owe you! No London Pilsner this time. We’ll get expensive scotch.”“Scotch you say? Macallan?”“Not in this lifetime,” says Rishi. “How about Black Label?”“That works. Let me make some calls.”Prabhu finally gets up. Rishi spends the next hour making tea, fixing breakfast and appeasing Prabhu, catering to his whims just to get him to make the right calls. But Prabhu also has an important meeting set up, so after a couple of unsuccessful calls, he sits at his desk and reads his script out loud, the way he would narrate it to a producer. Rishi observes him. Prabhu is a man who is driven. He is all about the cause – a writer’s writer, a hustler’s hustler. The guy is adamant like a stone. Unflinching. Unyielding. He could squeeze a writing gig out of a dead producer’s hand. Rishi has a lot to learn from him.Suddenly, Prabhu stops mid-dialogue and stares blankly.“Rishi, something tells me you should come to the narration with me today,” he says.“Your narration? To the Wicked Witch?”“Think about it. The script by Karim–Keshav reeks of iconoclasm. The writers have a point to prove. There’s no chance in hell the Wicked Witch would have accepted that script and made it into a movie, much less a show, under her banner.”“Come to the point, man,” says Rishi, getting impatient.“But she would certainly have heard of them. Writers like Karim–Keshav are both a rose and its thorns to her. She needs them, but she can’t make them write what she wants.”“So we just waltz into her office and ask about Karim–Keshav?”“Yes. If she likes my narration, she will tell us. If she hates my narration, she will kick us both out of her office.”“So, me finding where Karim–Keshav live depends on how great your narration goes?”“More or less.”“Yeah, I am not sure I like this plan. Do you have a better plan?”“Not at the moment. I have called people. No one knows about this writer duo.”Rishi has no choice but to accompany Prabhu to Andheri West.On the way, Rishi thinks Prabhu is playing an elaborate con on him. He has heard tales about the Wicked Witch of Andheri West.Sarika Bhatnagar was the head honcho of Jaiprakash Telefilms, the biggest television network of the country that broadcast some of the longest-running soap operas and propelled careers for many renowned TV stars, many of whom had since gravitatedto movies. But that was the rosy side that people who were not from the industry saw. The people who worked with her, under her, painted her as no less than the Pol Pot of Indian television.The woman swayed between extremes. One end was unhinged and chaotic. The other was serene. Prabhu claimed that not many people had seen her calmer side in the last ten years.“Remember, we have to remove our shoes when we enter her room,” says Prabhu.“Room?”“Yeah, we’re going to her place.”“Not the office? Not the studio?”“Sarika Bhatnagar doesn’t come to office. You should know this. Anyway, remember what I am telling you. Commit to heart, to memory, to the air you breathe. When we enter, we must touch the marble floor thrice, and when we sit on the sofa designated for us, we must only communicate in numbers with her assistant. One means we’re here for business. Two means pleasure. Three means introduction. And on and on. When she arrives, we must not speak unless spoken to. If she offers water, we don’t drink it. If she offers food, we don’t eat it. She doesn’t like that, at all. One time, a noob writer asked for water while narrating his script and she threw a hissy fit. The writer didn’t get a gig in the industry after that.”“Dude what the fuck are you talking about?” says Rishi in an alarmed voice.“All true tales, my friend. Swear to Sorkin.”Rishi doesn’t believe any of that bullshit. No person could be that unreasonable. Ending someone’s career because they asked for water was downright evil. But then, this was still not the craziest story he had heard about the industry.Excerpted with permission from Slow Burn, Amal Singh, Penguin India.