We trooped into the sunlit terrace restaurant from which the enticing aroma of paneer and gobhi pakora wafted out, beckoning us into its warm embrace. The resort had organized a fantastic spread in our honour and the food was awesome, but I noticed that Vijay, who was normally a great foodie, was barely picking at the food, a distant look on his face.

‘What’s up, Tau?’ I asked him, concerned.

‘Stress on the Dinky Chips film, dude.’ Vijay’s brow creased as he stabbed moodily at a stuffed cauliflower on his plate. ‘Honestly, I don’t know what’s wrong with that Suketu guy! He’s screwing up big time on this project. To make matters worse, he and Yudi don’t see eye-to-eye on anything! And now Puru is involved too with his fancy ideas on film-making! He’s written a script for Dinky Chips—can you believe it? A script! And he wants us to make a film out of it!’

‘Hey, I was with Yudi sometime back and Puru descended on us all excited about some ideas for Dinky Chips!’ I said, recalling the look on Yudi’s face when I’d left him with Puru. ‘Do you think it was for the same script?’ I broke off suddenly as I spotted Yudi and Suketu walk into the restaurant. They were in the middle of what looked like a fierce argument; Yudi had a terrible scowl on his face and Suketu was gesticulating wildly.

‘Oh no, not another argument,’ wailed Vijay who had spotted them too. He rose from his chair, ostensibly to intervene but Yudi suddenly turned on his heel and walked out of the room, leaving Suketu standing there with a thunderous look his face. With an anguished yelp Vijay bolted after Yudi and, after hesitating for a little while, Suketu followed suit.

I couldn’t spot any of them in the meeting that followed lunch either, and I was getting pretty worried when they remained absent at the team-building activities that kicked off soon after the meeting. After some banal tugs-of-war and team quizzes we were finally allowed to head for the beach to enjoy the various water-sports activities the Park Splenda had on offer. With delighted whoops of glee the adventure-lovers among the crowd made a beeline for the parasailing and jet skiing stalls while the more staid lot began constructing sand castles on the beach with quiet determination.

I hired a bicycle from the bright yellow biking stall under one of the many palm trees lining the beach and hoisted myself on to the rusty and creaking contraption. There was nothing I loved more than the feel of cycling along the shore, on the smooth bits where the sand merged with the sea to create a silvery path, the waves lapping at my ankles and the salty sea wind blowing hard against my face. I cycled fiercely along the shore, willing the sea breeze whipping around my hair to clear some of the uneasiness I had been feeling ever since I’d seen Suketu and Yudi arguing. While I knew the argument probably had nothing to do with me or the Bright Biscuits project, I couldn’t help wondering whether I had just added to the angst by insisting on being involved in the creative work on Bright Biscuits. My interference couldn’t possibly have helped improve relations between them anyway.