He was watching her, in fact, he had been watching her for quite sometime now… a week… like with every other ‘contract’ he had in the past, he studied his victim… but this one was not just another victim, this one was the retirement plan.. he was suddenly reminded of the character made famous by Forsyth, in fact, that character had been one of his inspirations to get into this trade… the sheer excitement of having control over someone’s future, and the someone not even having a clue about it… but he quickly pulled his thoughts back, for Forsyth’s character had messed up his own retirement plan..
the person he was watching…. a pretty middle aged woman, who balanced a successful professional life and a stable personal life… her husband was also an extremely successful professional in his chosen field… and the kids were doing very well in college…if his line of work hadnt made him so cold and unemotional, he would have really not wanted to harm this family in any way…but it had…
and so it was , that after intense scrutiny for a week, he had finally spotted the chink in her schedule which would help him make the clean hit, without anyone knowing it, until it was too late… as he waited in the small dark room opposite the building she would be entering in a short while, he thought about success… her success was exactly what was working against her now… she was the key decision maker in a multi billion contract, and the people who had paid him didnt exactly like the way her decisions were going… so they had paid him to make sure that she was removed from her position, forever..
she entered the building, without as much as a glance around, and as he knew she would, went straight to the fourth floor, first apartment on the left… her lover was waiting for her, and they went straight to the master bedroom… again, he knew that and was waiting with his sights fixed on the window.. he wondered how they could be so stupid as to not close the windows.. strange, but that was not his business, and besides, it made things easier for him…
the first shot happened while the last bit of undressing was going on.. and was followed by around 20 shots…… he wanted to make sure…no one saw the tiny sparks of light during each shot… and blissfully unaware of all this, they were on a roll, in more ways than one…
his paymasters were happy with the results.. the woman resigned from her job because she couldnt allow photos of her affair going out in public…and therefore she couldnt take any decisions on the billion dollar contract…the lover was a high profile guy himself and was silent on the whole issue..
and he was happy, he could retire in style… as the best’ contract killer’ in the corporate world…..
until next time, who says shots in the dark dont work??

P.S: happy birthday, wifey…

absolutely an out of the world experience, he thought, that was what he was having here.. peace was the first word that came to mind when he thought of his current lifestyle…he was comfortable with the routine and the rules..and the food, they didnt give you pizzas or chopsuey, they gave you what they thought, and you knew, was good for you… and there was freedom all around, so long as you didnt harm others- in word or deed.
but he wouldnt have thought, even in his wildest of dreams that he would be landing up here, at the zenith of his professional life… all the targets, launches, conferences, hirings and firings, wild parties, wilder women.. all seemed such a long time ago..that was the professional life…
on another front, there was a loving wife, who understood him.. though in their final days together, their communication was nil…. he somehow felt that it had something to do with her affair with their common friend, the doc…all those secret meetings and phone conversations and the secret glances (even when he was around) seemed to suggest that.. hell, towards the end, he even felt that she was trying to flush him out of her life, like the shit she considered him to be…
sometimes he felt that his friends and relatives knew long before him that he would be giving up his ‘wild’ life and coming here.. they hadnt mentioned it to him… but they all seemed to agree with his wife when she suggested it to them..thats what one of his friends had told him, when he also landed up here… he had known she was behind it, but he had played along, even when the place didnt turn out to be what she claimed it to be ..
she was happy now, well, so was he, for he was far from the madding crowd…. he wouldnt change a thing, but somewhere deep inside, , he knew there was some little thing that had gone wrong somewhere, because he had brief patches of missing moments, and yeah, he hated those shock treatments, he wondered what they did that for…
until next time, dont get mad, get odd…

The talk in the cafateria had scared him slightly… everyone was wondering how long this would last.. here they were, just out of college, earning at the start of their careers, more than what their parents did at the end of theirs, enjoying a lifestyle that their parents couldnt have dreamed of, and generally living life to the fullest…
those were the good bits…but the flip side of it was you became a nocturnal creature ( well, depending on the country the client’s audience resided in, the hours varied).. he had heard there were even some local outfits that worked during the day, who dealt with an indian audience, but the pay was pretty bad and besides, they didn’t get free language training, which was a perk he enjoyed… and in case he decided to go there, he would have to unlearn …uhuh, no way, he thought!! besides, he would never get to play the characters he got here… wasnt that what he did everyday, assuming a character who matched the expectations of the audience he was talking to… maintaining a conversation with people he hadn’t seen and would perhaps never see.. pretending to look outside the window and seeing the snow falling( hell, he had never seen snow) or autumn leaves or the colors of the spring.. and generally being someone he wasnt, and would perhaps, never be…he knew most of the people who he dealt with realised all this, but so long as he put up a good front, they were cool with it….
but he wondered how soon all this would start reflecting on his persona.. his language was already a problem with his friends and parents…sometimes he felt frustrated, writing about stuff he had no interest in, replying to comments made by the clients’ audience… maintaining conversations in shoutboxes and tagboards…
he wondered whether the second wave of BPOs would have happened at all – if blogging hadnt become a craze, and once people started, it hadn’t become so addicitive, and after sometime there wasnt a burnout, and in spite of the burnout, people didnt want their blogs to go on.. but all this, did happen, thats why he had a job…
Blogs & Posts Outsourcing, he wondered if this had a future at all!!
until next time, ride the wave….

He sat looking at the cake, a part of his 70th birthday celebrations… a once in a lifetime event… and wondered how he loved and looked forward to these once in a while events… from the simple stuff to the really ‘once in a lifetime’ events…he allowed himself a brief flashback of his life so far…
he loved his birthdays from the time he could remember.. he was the centre of attraction on that day, and would be flooded with presents…. on the birthday that came once a year…
but he loved the simple things too… sleep, for example, because he was awake all day and slept only once, at night… he liked sundays, because all the other days he had to go to school, and later, work… he used to love saturdays too, because that was the only day he dined out…
he had looked forward to his marriage, because he knew he would be married only once.. yes, an old school thought, but thats the way he was… he used to look forward to anniversaries, the day in the year when everything would be special.. he cherished the day his only son was born, because they were sure there wouldnt be a another..he also had fond memories of the day he retired from work, it was the end of a big chapter in his life……
lately he had started to cherish all moments, because he felt he would be wasting his life otherwise, because each moment of life was special…but these days, there was a contradiction…. he wasn’t looking forward for a moment that was soon to come, a moment that came only once in life… the moment he would die…. no, he wasnt looking forwarded to it, though life happened all the while and death happened only once, but he wondered why…. because he didnt have a choice? because he didnt know what happened after it??…
until next time, live another day…

He was not very comfortable getting into the meeting. he had played around with the numbers and done a last minute damage control exercise, which , though helped him to meet his targets, was not going to go down well with the others in the meeting. Not that he hadnt done it before, but each time he had done something like it, he had faced a lot of flak. he was,understandably nervous.
the meeting began, and as all the other guys mechanically began describing achievements/development work and other parameters in the overall appraisal, he wondered how bad he would look in front of his peers and superiors. finally it was his turn.
as he was explaining his facts and figures, he could feel they were in no way convinced. finally one of the top guys held up a hand. “there are a lot of things that we require clarifications on, that wont be covered in your presentation. it would be better if you answered a few questions.”
“okay”, he said, closing his laptop.
“it has been seen that you are trying to hard sell yourself, when our policy has always been for our target audience to get comfortable with our concept and therefore make decisions accordingly.”
” that has been primarily because i feel now, that it would take too long for them to arrive at a conclusion in favour of us, and during that while, there might be a whole bunch of losses,which i feel is avoidable.”, he replied.
” i think we can afford the delay, and the losses cant be greater than what your actions seem to be achieving now”
he kept silent.
” also, it has been seen that you have a preferential treatment for a particular niche within our target population.”
” i feel they are intellectually much more advanced and therefore would relate to our concept much faster than others”, he said.
” your judgements of intellectual capacity leave a lot to be desired”
he was silent again. he felt the tones of a distinct powerplay to oust him from his position.
“and how could you come up with an idea of using natural disasters to achieve targets. i am referring specifically to the recent geo activity in the asian region. do you know the kind of negative impact it could have?”
“with all due respect, sir, i have met my targets and created a distinct recall phenomenon for our concept”, he replied.
” the means are also important. by the way what is with this fancy name you have gotten your niche audience to call you?”
” i felt that for the value proposition we give, a name would make the audience connect better with me and therefore the concept”
” let me assure you that a concept like ours does not need a name to back it up. we are not pleased with your performance and the next review will be your last chance. and meanwhile, stop getting your favourite audience to call you God. the concept, of faith in a greater power,is quite strong by itself”
until next time, never play god..