Chapter 2: What the F***
Chapter 2: What the F***
2 What the F***
It was a bad day for Raymond. Real bad day.
He had come to Singapore to sign an almost finalized deal. The contract and everything was charted out. It was just a formality for both the parties to sign the contract. It was big deal for him and his startup as the backing was coming from Infinion Inc, the largest gaming company in the world. He had reached Singapore that afternoon and was supposed to fly out the same night after signing the contract with the CEO of Infinion Mr. Pollard.
But the moment he landed and checked his emails he sensed something was wrong. He had received an e-mail from the secretary of Mr. Pollard that he had to leave the country due to some family emergency and that the contract signing would be delayed. He badly needed the funding and was devastated with this news. He called up Mike – 'the eyes and ears of the Gaming World and a childhood friend of his' and got to know that Infinion CEO was pressurized by some third party to cut off the deal.
He was jet-lagged after 21 hours flight journey which yielded nothing. He looked at his proposal papers again which he had put meticulously with the help of his team. He was irritated beyond limit as his new game product was an outcome of blood and sweat. His team had pulled many sleepless nights to get the work done. He then decided to call his PA.
"Jane, It didn't go through"
and disconnected the call. Jane had no courage to speak or call her boss as she knew how edgy and cold he was. And since the contract didn't go through she knew hell will break loose once he comes back.
He looked at his watch and sighed. He didn't want to go and check-in into his hotel. So he started towards the Premium Lounge area as this return flight was scheduled after 12 hours. He immediately dozed off on the Lazy boy as he hadn't slept well for last couple of days. He had literally maxed out his days and nights for his Gaming project. He had kept his anger at bay because he knew who the 'third party' was which led to the cancellation of the deal. He knew what was to be done so he set his alarm at 23:45 and decided to rest well and gather his nerves for the next battle.
23.45
Raymond woke up with the buzzing noise of his alarm. He had 15 minutes in hand so decided to freshen up. While he was resting he thought of another brilliant idea for a new game. So he decided the grab a cup of coffee and caffeine was his best creative friend. He ordered a coffee from Starbucks and decided to move towards his gate area. He had hardly taken two steps and someone just collided him, head-on with full force.
He was startled and his coffee spilled all over and all his proposal documents got scattered. Before he could curse his luck further he saw a frail figure bending down and gathering her papers.
"I am so sorry sir. I really didn't mean to."
"I just was in a rush. I am sorry again".
She has apologizing and was collecting his papers. Her voice was quivering and there was something so sincere about her that he couldn't say a word. The anger that had built up in his head was gone in seconds. And then she handed him his papers.
He saw tears rolling down her cheeks and fell on his papers. Probably she realized that and left immediately towards the washroom without even saying a word further.
Raymond, who was known as the man of few words somehow wanted to say, "It's OK" to her.
But words just fell short.