Pretty Woman came out in Regal Cinema in the 1990s and ran for a year. She went to see the movie with a cute chubby boy from Hill Road. During the interval, as they fed each other butter popcorn, someone, who unfortunately wasn’t Richard Gere, pulled her aside and asked her to go upstairs where a photoshoot was in progress. There were ten other girls up there. They took her pictures and sent her home. Six months later, she got a call saying she had won the Pretty Woman Contest in India. She didn’t even know she had taken part in it but was thrilled because the prize was a modelling contract for a store called Pink Panther in Bandra and they would give her clothes worth Rs 5000 from the store. She was over the moon! Clothes from Pink Panther! What else could a 16-year-old girl ask for? All the diets were finally paying off!

So far, she had been cutting up her mom’s clothes from the 1970s and trying to look like Gwen Stefani of the 1990s. One top every three months from Fashion Street was all she could afford on her pocket money. Pink Panther was Versace for her 16-year-old self. She was determined to not mess this up.

The shoot clashed with a trip that her dad had booked for the family in Goa.

“The hotel I’ve booked costs much more than Rs 5000. Experiences matter more than clothes,” lamented Dad. “But this will be an experience.”

She begged and pleaded and finally, her parents agreed to leave her behind in Bombay with Silu Granny.

Meanwhile, the boy from Hill Road had become obsessed after that one movie date. He kept calling and calling. She finally agreed to go for a drive with him.

He took her to Bandstand and parked his car. And while she was talking, he unzipped his pants and flashed his dick at her. OMG!

She was horrified. It was the first dick she had ever seen, and it looked scary – like a thin, red, throbbing one-eyed snake. She stopped meeting him. But then Brinjal Boy wrote letters, buried them under her home and told her friend Sonia to ask her to dig them out and read them. He would wait for her to leave home and then follow her in his red Maruti.

She was scared and overwhelmed by his stalker behaviour. So, finally, she decided to set things straight.

She agreed to meet him. They went for a drive on a wet monsoon afternoon in his Maruti along the sea at Bandstand.

She fidgeted. “I don’t like you. I don’t want to be your girlfriend. That thing you flashed at me was disgusting. It looks like a snake. Please leave me alone.”

Silence reigned for three minutes. She was relieved. He had finally understood. He had got the picture.

The silence broke with the sound of a hard slap. It was her cheek. He stopped the car and glared at her, his face turning red. Humiliated, she jumped out of the car in the pouring rain. How dare he! She marched off, trying to look as elegant as she could as the Mumbai monsoon drenched her.

Brinjal Boy screamed after her, “You little bitch, you think you’re so cool because of Pink Panther? You think you are a big model now? Look what I got you.” He threw a bag out of the car. “You don’t need to model, I just bought you the clothes.” She stopped and thought for a minute. She was tempted to look in the bag, but good sense prevailed over her 16-year-old self. “I am no Julia Roberts, you are no Richard Gere. I don’t need your charity. I will earn my Pink Panther clothes. Goodbye!” she yelled, walking away with dignity and drenched hair.

The sound of a car accelerating made her turn back around. Brinjal Boy was headed straight for her. Brinjal Boy from Hill Road had slapped her and was now trying to run her over! There was something surreal about this entire situation. This taught her something about men and their egos but there was no time to stop and take that lesson in.

He came after her at full speed. She was running in the middle of a heavy downpour on Bandstand, a red Maruti chasing her. She couldn’t believe this was happening. She dodged stray cows, jumped over a stray dog but he was still in hot pursuit.

She tried to scream but nothing came out of her mouth. This felt like a bad dream. Her sandal flew off her foot to the other side of the road as she ran. But there was no way of retrieving it, she realized, as she turned back and found the bumper of his car in close proximity. She jumped off the parapet onto the rocks and ran, not turning back. She hid among the rocks with the smell of poo, her clothes sticky, her hair worse than the wet dog’s that was licking her ankles.

An hour later, she slowly emerged from behind the rocks, took a rickshaw and fled home with one shoe, fully drenched.

She gave Granny a big hug as soon as she stepped in. She was soaking wet, her mascara smudged all over her face. Silu Granny looked at her suspiciously with one eye.

“Did you eat my cutlet?”

Excerpted with permission from All He Left Me Was a Recipe: Lessons From My Breakups, Shenaz Treasury, Penguin India.