Opportunity

The train was late by only five minutes, yet long enough for Shrini to contemplate the rejection he had just faced. His sick mother’s pension was now falling short of what was required to get two weeks’ worth of medicine. The rest of the month had been named ‘adjustment’ ever since his father passed away.

He touched his mustache and stroked it outward with his index finger and thumb. He then looked up at the sky and sighed.

“You take care of your mother so well! Nobody can stop you. God takes care of good men, son,” his mother would say, hoping her son found a job as quickly as he could. 

A strong gust of wind swept the platform, announcing the arrival of the train. Shrini sat on one of the empty seats – bent forward holding onto his bag and looking down at the floor of the train. A couple of stations before his, a pungent smell drifted in through the windows. The man sitting right next to him seemed indifferent to the smell, talking over his cellphone just like he had been throughout the journey. 

“Is this what failure smells like then?” Shrini thought to himself.

As the man adjusted himself in his seat, a wad of notes slid out of his pocket and fell right next to Shrini’s feet. The man remained unaware.

Shrini, almost instinctively moved his feet away, before he noticed the man’s indifference. He touched his mustache and stroked it outward with his index finger and thumb. The thought of months’ worth of medicine, his mother’s face, the rejection all flashed through his mind.

He slowly reached out with his right hand – a bead of sweat trickled down his forehead, and now hung from the tip of his nose. 

“God takes care of good men, son.”

Shrini picked up the bundle and handed it over to its rightful owner. The rest of the journey he continued looking down, hugging tightly onto his bag.

“God does give us opportunities in different disguises. You should have taken the chance when you had one”, his friend said over a call.

“You mean how you steal from your boss every month and call it an opportunity?” Shrini asked, his voice calm.

“Whatever Shrini! Good night!”

Shrini could still smell that pungent odour as he lay in his bed, questioning whether paying the cost of being a poor man was worth being a good one. Late in the night however, he received a notification. The voice note played:

“First task completed successfully. We’ll get in touch soon”

Shrini touched his mustache and stroked it outward with his index finger and thumb.