Wednesday, February 08, 2006

Story 2 - A Second chance for me...

It was 4pm and it was time to go to work. I stepped outside and walked down the busy road that leads to more busier Tnagar. It was the best time of year for my line of work: the festive season when all of the people would come there to surrender their money to the more richies.
I saw a white man in his late 30's. Guessed he looked kind of lost. 'Perfect, customer'(?) I thought to myself. I calmly and confidently stepped up to the man.
"Hello, sir. Can I help you?"
"Yes. I am looking for the Hotel Sithara."
"Yes, yes... Oh, okay. Go ahead five buildings. It will be on your left. You can't miss it"
"Thank you."
"You're welcome. Have a good day sir."
I walked away with not only a smile on my face, but with the man's wallet in my pocket. I opened it up to see 200 rupees, a visa and a MasterCard. A couple of hours and 4 wallets later, I decided to get lunch. So far, I had acquired 6 credit cards, 1726 reupees and 4 leather branded wallets. I decided to go to my favorite hotel Saravana bhavan. I had the unlimited meals full upto my throat. But then, I saw a man 6 feet tall, with a dark chocolate complexion. My next perfect customer!. I cautiously approached him, like a lion stalking his pray.
"Hello, sir. Can I help you?"
"Yes. Do you, by any chance, know where the Nagesh movie theater is?"
"Ah, yes. No problem. Go round by panagal park, take a right by pondi bazzar, walk straight to Mount Road and
in the mid you would find it on your right side. You can't miss it."
"Thank you, so much."
"No problem, sir. My pleasure."
I was practically bouncing up the street as I opened up the mans wallet. I found 1345 rupees and three credit cards. I glanced at the name on one of the cards. 'Janaki Raman,' I thought. 'Thank you very much, Janu.' I saw the watch, to be 9.30 pm.I decided I was done for the day, and started on my way home.
Little did I know, something was about to happen that would change my life forever. On my way back, I passed through a small lane where I saw my customer Janu. A little white girl had fallen down, and janu was kindly helping her up. The mother saw what was going on, and started to scream and yell for help. The mother started to hit Janu with her bag and continued to scream. The man tried to explain to her that he was just trying to help. But she did not listen.A few men heard the noise, and came barreling out of a nearby shop carrying a couple metal rods. The 3 men, who were all like gundas and each about 5 or 6 feet, started scolding at my poor customer. One of the men hit him across the face. I wanted to scream: "Stop! Stop! What are you doing?" But I could not. I just stood there, frozen, and was unable to say anything. He was only trying to help - only trying to help a little girl up off of the street. Then, one of the men pulled out a knife and started to stab Mr. Johnson several times.
Then, the 3 men ran away, dropping the rods as they ran. There, he was the man I had stole from, laying dead in his own pool of blood - alone in the dark lane. It was unfair I had stole from this man and when he was looking for my help, I could not even help him the least and because of this, he is dead. Then it hit me: I killed him. He probably was looking for me when he was killed. I was responsible. I ran and I ran. I just ran. I realized that I had not only stole his wallet - I had stolen his life.
Tears streamed down my face as I ran. God had given me a second chance to realize what I had done.
Yes, God had given me a second chance, and Mr. Janakiraman had paid for it.