Rain tapped the window like someone hesitant to come in. Kavya sat in her cubicle at 4 a.m., Whitefield tech park half asleep. Her laptop light looked harsh against her eyes. A cold chai cup smelled of regret.
She’d typed the email too fast. Safetree_Data_Harvest.pdf. Meant for her lawyer, Priya Iyer. Her finger hit “send,” and her heart leapt.
Wrong inbox.
Vikram Shah.
The CEO.
Her palms went sweaty. She typed again: “Sorry, sorry wrong person” and hit send. Her fingers trembled.
Her Slack blinked red.
Vikram:
We need to talk. 9 a.m. My office.
She wanted to run. Didn’t.
At her desk earlier, she had felt safe. She had filed whispers away, held her tongue. Especially after Ishita.
Ishita, whom she had let down in 2018. Reported their manager. Kavya stayed quiet. And Ishita left.
“I thought you were like me,” Ishita had said, before walking away.
A memory stuck in her throat.
Don’t cry, she told herself.
She poured chai. It tasted like regret.
Amma’s missed call blinked on her phone. When are you coming home for Ayudha Puja, beta? She swiped away the guilt.
At 9, Vikram’s office smelled like coffee and polished wood.
“Kavya … you’re sharp. Loyalty matters.”
He slid a folder.
Senior Cybersecurity Lead. 40 percent raise.
They said, “Think about it.” Like a trap.
She left. The exit gate wouldn’t let her out. “System glitch,” the guard said. Too polite. Too scripted.
She walked to a cab and called Sunita—her mentor and the only ally she trusted.
“Beta, come to my office. This will get sorted,” Sunita said. Always calm, like she had answers.
Sunita’s office was comfortable. A jute bag with a red stitch lay next to her feet.
“You’re safe,” Sunita said, “but they watch everything. You must be careful now.”
Kavya nodded. But she felt naked.
She remembered something. Years ago, Sunita had exposed a data breach. They had praised her too.
Survived, they said, look at her now.
Back at her desk, she noticed her Slack box suggested a message she hadn’t typed: “Shall I accept the promotion?”
She stared.
Camera blinking. She taped it shut.
Rohan walked by. He didn’t look at her. Last Friday he quipped, “Kavya takes her job too seriously … people notice.”
In the WhatsApp group, no women admins. No places for her kind of woman.
She opened the PDF one more time. Girls in low-income neighbourhoods used Safetree. They thought it kept them safe.
It didn’t.
It stole location, voice, personal data—and sold it.
Let loose on data vendors.
She had hit send. To the boss.
Her phone buzzed again.
Vikram:
Looking forward to your decision.
She started typing. Then deleted. She couldn’t send.
Evening came. She met Sunita at a MG Road café. The air smelled of rain and filter coffee.
Sunita said, “I was where you are. They gave me a promotion then too.”
Kavya asked gently, “And?”
Sunita took a deep breath. “I took it.”
It landed like a stone in her stomach. She stared at her chai, cold now.
No answer.
Back home, her flat was quiet. The fan squeaked. Another missed call from Amma. She didn’t pick up.
She scrolled down and found the email from Ishita. “Why did you stay quiet?”
Tears threatened. She drafted an email to Priya, jpg attached—but hesitated.
She didn’t send it.
Next morning, her ID card worked.
But on her screen, a new folder glared: Performance Review
Inside it—Slack logs, Google doc snapshots, timestamps. Every move tracked.
Someone was watching.
She called Sunita. “They’re watching me.”
Sunita’s voice was even. “They watch everyone. Sign the offer.”
Kavya nodded. But her bones shook.
After work, in her flat, she pulled up company servers. It shouldn’t be so easy.
She found a tracker—metadata logs, keystroke captures, even draft messages she never hit send.
Flags next to female names:
Anjali 2017
Priya 2019
Sunita Menon—2015
All women who spoke up. All promoted.
Sunita hadn’t exposed anything.
She built the trap.
…
She tried calling Priya again. The call rang once, then cut. Flat tone.
The rain outside was heavier now. Deepavali lanterns flickered outside her apartment.
She opened the Safetree report on her laptop, tried to print it.
Access Denied.
She opened Slack. Typed quickly: “I recieved your file. Can we talk?”
A typo. Fingers shaking.
No reply.
Just blue ticks.
At the office, Rohan appeared at her desk, voice low. “Not the first time someone tried, Kavya.”
She didn’t respond.
Later that day, she overheard him laughing with someone near the water cooler. “Those slum girls using Safetree? They don’t even know their data’s gold.”
Her skin crawled.
Safetree wasn’t just unethical.
It was predatory.
She checked her Slack again.
Vikram:
Decision by 6. Loyalty looks good on you.
The message made her feel like someone had touched the back of her neck.
She needed to see Sunita. In person.
She bought a box of coconut barfi and drove through Deepavali traffic.
Sunita opened the door in a simple kurta, bindi already faded.
“You didn’t have to come,” she said. “You remind me of me. Too honest.”
Something flickered behind her smile.
On the coffee table, an open folder. One page poked out.
Internal Referral: Sunita Menon. Data Breach 2015. Promoted to VP.
“You knew,” Kavya said. “You knew about the Safetree app.”
Sunita’s expression didn’t change.
“I built a life here,” she said. “One you’re risking for an email. You should’ve taken the offer.”
Kavya didn’t answer. The barfi box slipped from her fingers onto the floor.
She went home and locked the door. Drew the curtains. The ceiling fan kept spinning. Relentless.
She opened her voicemail archive.
An old message from Ishita, dated three years ago.
“I tried, Kavya. Maybe you will too.”
The words landed like gravel in her throat.
Kavya opened a browser. Logged into an anonymous platform. She uploaded the report. Her hand hovered.
Was this worth it?
She clicked submit.
Upload complete.
The next day, she arrived at the office. The guard nodded too quickly.
Her inbox held a new message.
No subject. No sender. Just a PDF: Promotion Letter.
The subject line read: “We look forward to your leadership.”
The message below was one line:
Loyalty looks good on you.
That evening, her phone buzzed.
Unknown Number:
You’re too honest, beta. Stop looking.
She texted back: “Sunita?”
No reply.
Later that night, a courier envelope arrived.
Inside: the same promotion letter. And a silver safety pin.
Old. Scratched.
Ishita used to wear it on her dupatta. Always twisting it between her fingers when she spoke.
Kavya didn’t cry. She sat at the table and stared at the pin until the fan slowed above her.
A WhatsApp pinged.
Unknown Number:
Loyalty looks good on you, beta.
There were blue ticks.
She didn’t respond.
She turned to the window. The night outside looked blank. A jute bag sat by her front door.
The red stitch glinted in the streetlight.
She didn’t go to check.
Some women leak reports.
Others receive promotions.
And some, Kavya thought, just keep watching… even after the lights go out.
React
