Coffee Table Crimes Part 1.1

It was tiring, I had heard too many wholesalers' woes for the day....i guess the next time I go to the market, its better to carry feedback forms with drop boxes...atleast I couldve saved the ubiquitous BCs and MCs crowning their tales of woe.... as my subordinate looked at me with a sigh of relief that the day had come to an end, I gave him the chutti to go home and postpone the meeting...the last thing I wanted was to have my distributor also complaining of stock-outs...as i called it a day, Kamal, my faithful driver zoomed his filthy Indica into the Hotel Sarovar Portico - the one on top of a mall called the Treasure Hunt in the city of Indore...two years back I was impressed with the place..not any more..it was like a graveyard where two tiny tots guarded the entrance and gave me an instant recall of Kabristan Ke Chowkidar courtesy Jaspal Bhatti ...their arms would move automatically and open the doors while the heads would bend ~ 18 degrees while they stood in a trance looking at something far away as if blessed with clairvoyance...this was perhaps the 20th time I was staying in the hotel and I couldnt help noticing the sheer repetition of the act ..perhaps they were trying to give me a message from Satan..or just trying to crap me out...I was now trained to aviod their eyes and rush into the lift...A quick change into a kurta and jeans saw me out of the hotel and into the mall...it was the most happening mall in Indore...they were kids jumping on Ronald McDonald..a crowd trying to get their cones of softserves while it was still at ten bucks...there was a huge chunk of school guys in sweaters generally loitering around and in the process ensuring the mall owners getting a more than 100% return on investment on the escalators...as i moved om, a girl quietly giggled to see my patch goatie...atleast thats what I thought she was finding funny...I gave her a slight stare and the girl would giggle some more...I felt I could be looking like a butcher... I stopped.. enough insult for starters...



...while I closed onto my destination on the 3rd floor...I could catch a glimpse of a bunch of gals...more like school kids in embroidered jeans laughing while they walked past and while they breezed past filled with some strange cologne ( it might be called Dolly - the cologne I mean), and then something unexpected happened... I heard the words .."ya ofcourse, Im not a virgin"...I froze..not that I havent heard the word before and nor am I used to seeing virgins everywhere....but perhaps my job had left me listening to more about stock delivery times and damaged goods than generally eavesdropping on the youth talk...on second thoughts .. I might have just imagined it.....maybe she had siad something like "ya ofcourse, Im not gonna barge in"..but how the hell can I imagine it just like that...maybe I was turning deaf...I have heard rockstars go deaf after a while...well..I wasnt a rockstar..just an amateur musician at best...and Beethoven had turned deaf as well.....but he was surely no Phil Collins...that was that...I turned to see the face of lost childhood...all I could see was a head vanishing down the escalator.... (to be continued)