The Love Reverberations

Friday!!! Its 6.30 am on the clock. The alarm rings and Smita gets up!

Whoa! Big day! What’s the day? - An interview scheduled with the business stakeholders today.

She sits on the bed for ten minutes and glazes up the sky through her window. Bright sunny day, she murmurs to herself. She thinks of preparing her schedule and the approach to keep for her day. She turns her head and sees her baby sleeping. She had a 3.5 year old child. She named her Natasha. She was wrapped in the cozy baby blue blanket which had Mickey and Minnie Mouse prints on it. Looking at her she felt like an angel was beside her with her cutest wraps and a smile emerged in the mother’s face.

Smita was a single and a working mother. Her everyday life comprised of pretty little challenges of keeping of a steady routine of being a mother and a professional but she was happy. She had her own ways of dealing with this now in her life.

Rani will be here soon. He thought to herself. Rani was her maid and the best babysitter she could ever imagine for Natasha. Smita was close to Rani because she knew she loves Natasha as much as she does and ultimately everyday she was the one who was actually taking care of her wholeheartedly. She paid her well. There were also days she took time off to spend time with Rani so that she feels the comfort of being at home.

Smita comes out finally from the bed and heads for the kitchen to grab a cup of tea and her breakfast. She always made her breakfast herself. She was a tea lover!

Out from a shower, she dresses up with a grey blazer and seems quite prepared for her session today. She marches towards the parking area and puts herself into the driving seat. Keeping her finger crossed she puts her navigation towards ABC company for her scheduled interview at 9 AM.

She reached on time. She was sitting on the brown couch. The couch was quite low and was bit uncomfortable or this was another weird feeling of her. No idea! Forget it! She murmured again. She was somewhat nervous.

A lady from the HR department came to her and asked her to join the conference room which was towards the right of the corridor. The panel will join her in the next 10 minutes. She rightly nodded and greeted and went ahead. She sat nervous, excited and futuristic about the new job.

A group of 3 gentlemen entered the room with a couple of papers in hand and a file.

Smita turned her seat and got up to greet them. She saw him.

The eyes met after a span of 6 years. The handshakes got exchanged, firm handshakes exchanged. After clearing her tone, she spoke “A very good morning to you, Sir!”

The panel took their seats and made themselves comfortable. Smita also sat on the opposite chair.

“Hey, Smita! Welcome to the interview, it’s great meeting you after the initial discussion we had on the marketing profile. It seems we need to discuss some more points before we can come up to the final decision. So they are my fellow colleagues, he is Mr.Raghunath and Mr. Venugopal. They both are in the strategic division and alignment and looks over the overall finance and business collaborations with our clients. Gentlemen, this is Smita, she has over 9 years of experience in the strategic collaborations with business partners and has worked with three companies before and has remarkable vendor relations. Quite a virtue to the company if on the right approach”- Rajendran, the other interviewer spoke.

“Raghu, do you have your questions?”- Venu aligned to Raghu.

“Yes, I do have”- spoke Raghu.

“So Smita how was your professional journey for the last 6 years? What were the challenges you faced? Whom did you approach when you were in your deepest clashes? Brief me about it. I would really like to know.”

The heart pumped. She stared at him for a period of six seconds and cleared her tone.

“Well, as you mentioned there were a lot of challenges faced on the vendor relations and budget alignment. There were scenarios where the contracts elapsed and vendors were not ready to renew them. There were lengthy meetings and discussions which led to negotiations and we had to partner with third party sometimes to clear off the debts and keep the relations smooth. There was a bit of up and down in the finances but we had come up with good investment plans to curve out the debts and keep the stocks smooth for the company.”- Smita replied.

“Seems, so right!”- spoke Raghu.

“How about the project teams and their appraisals? Was that compromised? “-asked Raghu.

“It would be incorrect of me to say that the teams were very satisfied with appraisals, but a significant percentage of employers were patient enough to continue with the sin-cos wave of the financial crisis. They were compensated well enough in the following pay-scale ultimately.”- Smita uttered.

“I see. You seem so right again. Nevertheless, Venu you can continue with your questions on your front.”- spoke Raghu.

“I really don’t have much questions, just like if you have any issues on the personal front and the compensation related queries, we can do that on the call itself”- Venu added on the conversation.

“Sure, gentlemen! Looking forward to this! Thank you for the time and the discussions.”- Smita spoke.

She got up, held the handshakes high with all three and came out from the conference room.

What was this? She thought to herself! Why now in life? What’s coming next? Should I have left the interview knowing that he was there in the panel? Why didn’t I inquire to the HR about the panel before coming for this interview? - Thoughts ran in her mind as she kept her file and her purse in the brown, low, uncomfortable couch of in the lobby area.

She needs to go home. All she thought was this!

She gets her bag and marks towards the parking lot. She drove her car back to home.

Rani opened the door and she saw her darling Natasha munching snacks. She ran to her holding her in her arms and pouring kisses all over her.

“Didi, what happened?”- Rani inquired.

“Nothing much, I was just missing her. Sometimes emotions roll up to minds instead of being in the heart. I want to take a nap. Will you make her sleep as usual? I will catch you up in the evening”- spoke Smita.

“Yes. I will make some tea for you and keep in room.”- Rani added.

Smita went inside her room and thoughts pondered.

Raghu and she were the couple around 6 years back. They were in love. They lived a time. Crazy nights, fun-filled parties, drives. Oh, they did it almost all. They were not to be seen after office hours.

They were night-riders’. Both had two Enfields and curved their time in visiting the city-the slums and the rural, the pubs and the villages, the street food and the posh restaurants, the live music and the bands. Every date, every meet was flowing in front of her eyes. She was zooming somewhere!

But hell yes! They were not together today. It was not meant to be. Maybe every relationship doesn’t really be in marriage and family planning. She was having hard time thinking and sorting out this.

Round about being in relationship for about 4 years they parted ways. They were broken. Broken is an understatement. They had to live but in different places with different lives.

How was life after that? She never spoke of it. She remembered she hid all her tears in the pillows.

After a span of two years, she decided to adopt a baby. She felt the need of it. She knew she needs love and that love from a baby could be the most genuine gift to her at that time. She went for it. From being a heart broken lady, to climbing the corporate ladder, to becoming a single parent, to not keeping relations with her love – she showed her strength of becoming a very strong woman she could ever imagine.

She called up her mother after sometime. She told she will be meeting her soon. Reverberations can be so alarming sometimes. She fell asleep.

She opened her eyes after two hours and saw Natasha sleeping beside her. It was 6.50 PM on the clock. She assumed Rani would have left for the day. She remembered her entire day. It was magical. It was like a story painted on the life journey, from the start of the day to the time she got up in the evening. She smiled at Natasha again. She called up her mom again and they spoke long. She planned to meet her in weekend. The day was over.

Couple of days over, she received positive news on the selection process. She was given an elegant role to join the company. She read the mail when she was at her mother’s place. She smiled.

And with the mail was a small text on her phone from Raghu. “Are you willing to join the company?”

Smita texted as “You knew, it was me?”

“Yes, very well. I always knew.”- replied Raghu on the text.

“Your papers are arranged, hope to see you soon, have a great weekend”- replied Raghu on a second message.

“Very well, Sir. Good weekend to you too“- replied Smita.

The broken story begins. Relationships reinvented.