The Second Chance

Rama was eight or nine years of age. Life wasn’t easy for him. Money was tight at home, as his father was in a very modest job. Their resources in the family was very limited.

Since, his family had little resources to buy him toys and games, he would spent most of his time during the day drawing in his notebook, from the things he sees around him. He would sketch on paper whatever he used to observe around him. His parents and people surrounding him, observed his habit of sketching. They tried to deviate him and divert his attention to studies and other household works, which would make him viable for a successful career in future. They aimed for making him an engineer, so that he can solve his family’s status of deficiency.

They would say to Rama, “Son, do not spend your time in sketching. This will not give you enough money in your life. Try to study hard. By doing so you will gain knowledge to get a good job, which will give you money to survive in your life, in future.”

Time passed by… Rama would still keep sketching, whenever he used to get time from his daily chores and studies. He grew up slowly in this environment of limited resources and boundaries to pursue his passion. He did not like to study. He would just sit in his academic classes to dream of sketching, about whatever his eyes could see. He would observe the trees and birds and people walking on the streets outside the school window and draw them in his notebook. He would hardly devote any time to study, but somehow, he used to pass his exams. After his 10th he has to decide now which stream of studies to pursue. Although his family wanted him to take up science stream, but his scores in his board exam forced him to take up Arts and humanities. Deep down in his heart, he was secretly happy and content with the turn of events. He never wanted to take up Science and go into engineering stream to become an Engineer, as his family wanted him to do.

However, life went on and Rama somehow passed his 12th and then to his graduation in Arts and humanities. He wished to study Fine Arts in his graduation, but due to family and peer pressure, he did not take up fine arts and ended up studying history.

During his 12th standard he met with a girl, Diksha, whom he liked and they would spent considerable time together, apart from their common classes. But as they passed their 12th, and moved to college for graduation, the girl took up different subjects, as she aspired for public service exams. Now they would meet less during the week, as she got busy with her own life, classes and college friends, which was different from Rama’s. Diksha started to spend more time away and detached from Rama, which made him sad and depressed. He started to miss her and miss spending time with her. She was the only source of joy in his hard and depressing life.

As upset Rama was, he then thought of focusing on his studies and his daily chores in his house, to move on in his life from his current circumstances. Just when he was doing so, life has a new setback ready for him. Rama’s father lost his job, due to his physical disability. Rama’s father had one palm with paralysis. With this, the only source of income in his family is gone. Now Rama and his brother cannot stay idle, neither her mother. Since his brother, Shambhu, was too young to start working at that time, Rama and his mother, Supriya, decided to find work. They thought that they have to find a job to survive and feed their family… They thought to themselves, they have to find some job- any job will do, it does not matter what type of job they come across. If it is something that is paying them to get food for their family, it’s good enough. So now, Rama and Supriya, set off to find work for themselves, to earn something… So now, every morning, Rama and his mother Supriya, will go out and come back late at night, after searching jobs for themselves. For the first few weeks, they could only get disappointment and rejection, as no one gave them any work that they could earn something. It was bad days running through the week for them, where they would set off in the morning and return home late at night with empty handed. Slowly as the days passed by all their savings got exhausted, as during that time no one in their family had a job or any earning. So they have to support themselves only through the savings that they had saved for their bad times like this, or some health emergencies. So now, Rama’s family is entering into phase of frustrations and anxiety, thinking how they will survive further after their savings get completely drained out. The only work left now, for their entire family to survive this hard phase, is to pray and try harder everyday…

Somehow, they could see some sunshine when, Rama and his mother got a job at different places. Supriya got a job of sewing in a tailoring shop, while Rama got a job of a clerk in a small office. It brought them hope and joy into their family, during those dark days.

Rama continued his studies from home at night, as he could not manage to attend his classes in college during the day. His little brother Shambhu, continued his studies in school. Days passed by… Every day Rama would go to his job during the day and after coming back from office and completing his dinner, he would study. He is now in college and must focus on his studies to get a graduation certificate. Meanwhile, just to avoid his boredom of his tough and mundane daily routine, he started to take lessons on his old passion – i.e. sketching. On his weekends, Rama would go to this art class in his neighborhood, where he would learn professional sketching skills. And after his dinner time every day, or in some free time he would try his hands in sketching. This continued for some time, and he started to gain professional skills into sketching - from being a beginner, to an expert sketching artist. He made many sketches out of hobby and passion for the art, and this was the only joy he used to have in his tough and mundane life. However, Rama never knew that another shocking turn of event was lying around the corner, for him.

Things were going this way, until one day, Rama’s mother Supriya, suddenly felt a jolt in her head, followed by an epileptic attack in her body. She fell unconscious. It was a brain hemorrhage attack. Rama and his brother had to rush Supriya to the hospital. More so, Rama’s final exams of his graduation was beginning the next day, and he was waiting in the hospital lobby for doctor’s update.

The hospital, to which Supriya was admitted immediately after her attack, could not do much. His mother was referred to a specialist hospital which was for such emergencies and ailments. He had to then take her to the other hospital for immediate damage control. Although he did not get much chances to study for his graduation exams, however, he gathered enough courage to appear for the exams, somehow. He would go for the exams during the day and would rush back to the hospital straight from the exam hall. This went on for few weeks until his exams got over.

However, his exams for life began… he had to continue his office too. For days he would run to and fro from hospital to office and then, from hospital to home. He had to take all the responsibilities of coordinating with doctors and hospital staffs for her mother’s best possible treatment that he could provide her. However, he was running out of funds for her treatment. So now he has to manage funds for furthering his mother’s treatment. He would run from his acquaintances to colleagues, from his office seniors to his relatives, borrowing money for his mother’s treatment. He could manage to collect the entire amount of money by such borrowings and some amount through loan, as well. He has to get the funds somehow to save Supriya’s life, as the doctors prescribed for an early stage major surgery to be done, which was expensive. So now Rama was sitting on heavy debt of liabilities in such a small age. His life is getting tougher. Every day he has to go to the office and then to the hospital for seeing her mother and getting her necessary things and clearing payments for her treatment. Then coming back, he had to do household chores and continue his study somehow. Rama’s own health was getting deteriorated. This routine continued for some time until Supriya was recovered and was discharged from the hospital. However, she did not recover fully. She could barely move and was bed ridden. So now she has to be treated and taken care of at home for the rest of her life. His life seemed to get darker and darker and he was at dismay as to what to do…? Now, Rama was the only earning member in his family. However, he now, has to keep a nurse at his home to take care of Supriya, as Rama will be out in office for the whole day and his brother, Shambhu, is too young to take the responsibility. So, Rama decided to take up some more work to earn some more money to support Supriya’s treatment and also feed his family. He thought of sketching again, with the hope that people would buy his sketches and he could manage to earn some extra cash for resolving his problems and circumstances. He would keep sketching one after the other. He would sketch anyone and everyone’s portrait that he would see or even get the picture of. He would sketch them with his hands and show it to people. He would upload all those portraits over the internet for people to give him orders. It would take him to work at a continuous stretch of hours at a time. He would keep sketching for eight to ten hours at a stretch. His back would hurt, his eyes would be red, and his hands would swell up in pain. But he would ignore all of this problems and keep sketching. He would work in office during the day and would sketch at night time. He would hardly manage to get sleep. So his weeks and months went by without much sleep or rest. This habits kept manifesting in his physical body as it started to look frail and tired. His health was getting deteriorated.

So, now for Rama, life was going on like a fleeting wind. It was a daily routine and everything was tied up in time, right from the beginning of the day until the end of the night. He was getting accustomed with the hardships of his life and slowly he came to terms with them. Earlier, he would complain and whine about his circumstances, but slowly he became silent, and started to go with the flow.

Now Rama would explore opportunities and avenues to get extra income and earnings, which would help him to ease out his burden of debts and liabilities. So, he explored for opportunities over the internet to make some extra cash. While doing so, one day, Rama came across a video in YouTube, where he learnt that making online videos could get the creators earn a decent amount of money. So he started to explore the same in details and learned about making YouTube music videos. He would take the music of well-known music directors and singers in the industry during that time, and would mix it with some motion videos, which he would collect from other websites, and edit and sync them to make music videos of his own. He then would release them on YouTube for his subscribers and viewers to appreciate them, like them and comment on them. In response, he would also collect some criticism and ugly comments too, along with the appreciations and praises, as a part and parcel of the business. But he kept on doing his work, ignoring them all. He would keep taking the latest music videos and blend them with different motion videos or picture videos and release them on YouTube platform. He would also release the same on other social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, etc. for more reach and coverage.

Things went on like this for quite a while… Until, one evening he made a video on a latest music release and uploaded it in the online platforms, and went on to sleep at night. His video cracked the records to have more than a lakh views in one night. The video went viral! There was a buzz all around. He woke up next morning to a new day of beginning… it was the beginning of a bright light – the brightest ray of hope he has seen in his entire life, until then. He was happy! He checked his video stats for his video performance, online. The graphs are on the rise every time he looked at them, in all the platforms, over the internet. He would check his video status every five to ten minutes during that day, and each time he looked at them, he got goosebumps and his heart kept racing. He could not believe that day, such a breakthrough could come to him, and that it has already arrived! On that day he decided that he would keep making more and more music videos and posts. He would do every possible hard work and efforts that is required for him to achieve more such breakthroughs and feats. He was highly motivated since then, to put in all his efforts, energy and time into making more and more such music videos.

So now, Rama continued to sketch and sell them online and offline; and made more and more such online videos for YouTube and other social media platforms. He would make even videos of his live sketches with music, hoping his viewers would enjoy seeing him making the sketches and creating such beautiful and wonderful portraits. His sketches was also giving him a decent amount of revenue. This earnings, made him to think about quitting his job. He has gained a hefty amount of subscribers and followers in his social media accounts and his contents are doing pretty well amongst his viewers. So, Rama finally decided to quit his full time job, which was of a nominal salary that took most of his time during the day, which he believed could be devoted in creating more videos and sketches. So, did he…

By now, he has acquired a whopping 2 million followers in his Instagram account and equivalent subscribers in his other social media accounts, as well. He is getting good return from his videos and sketches, in terms of revenue, for him to earn a good living for his family now. Rama now stayed at home after quitting his job to make more videos and sketches, while taking care of his ailing mother and also doing all the household chores. Now his little brother Shambhu, would go out to school to complete his disrupted education, due to their family circumstances. His brother started to go to high school to complete his remaining studies. So now, things were going well enough for Rama.

He was motivated and made more and more videos and sketches, which was appreciated across all social platforms. However, now he started to observe the market trends and study the social media market behavior. Now each and every minute of his time, during the twenty for hours was precious and important for him. He would work for almost eighteen to twenty hours a day making videos and sketches. Thus, now he must analyze which would be the most profitable work for him to spend most of his time during the day, so that he can fetch maximum return out of his efforts and time, and then work accordingly. He observed that, he was reaping maximum online traffic and engagement of his subscribers and followers in his music videos, than compared to his sketches and portraits. Thus, he started to focus more on music videos, and spend more time on creating them, than his sketches. He would not spend much time on sketches now, as before, and would only sketch portraits if he could get pre-booked orders, that would give him deserving money on his time and efforts spent on making those sketches. He would get good returns from his YouTube music videos and his sketching was slowly taking a backseat.

Things went on like this for a while until one day, during the weekends Rama got connected with a lady, named Jinia. She was in her late Thirties. Jinia sent Rama, a message on his Instagram account and he replied to it. Jinia could not stop appreciating his sketches and his talent of the art that he has. She wanted to talk to him. So she requested for his phone number and Rama gladly shared it with her. Jinia had been following Rama’s work for quite a while, and wanted to connect with him. During that weekend, Jinia called him up and had a long chat. She wanted to know about Rama’s past and his life experiences, as to how he became the artist that he is now? Jinia was fascinated to hear about his story and his journey to become the artist that he is and about his gift of God, that Rama had in him. They talked for a long time and developed a good rapport with each other soon, which developed into a bond of friendship… They would usually connect over the weekends and talk for long hours to discuss on their lives, their work and the projects that they are working on. Later, Rama found out that Jinia also had a difficult life in the past, like him. He also came to know that Jinia was an orphan and an aspiring amateur film maker at that time, and was working towards making her own movie, when she got connected with Rama. She was in her late thirties and had a career change in her life to pursue her passion for film making. Jinia was previously in a promising corporate career, which she left to become a Film maker and a writer for movie scripts. Her story fascinated Rama, as well. Thus they slowly developed a friendship, which was mutual and free. Quite often, Jinia would ask Rama, “What is your goal or aim in life?” Rama would immediately and confidently reply, “To become very rich and wealthy!” They would then both, laugh out loud.

One such weekend when they were talking to each other, Jinia gave Rama an offer of working together. She suggested to create a movie together, where she wants Rama to do all the sketching for storyboarding. For every film making, the director needs to provide sketches of the scenes, planned and scripted, to the entire cast and crew to convey the expectations of the director to the team, enabling best output of performance from all. This was storyboarding, which Jinia thought Rama would do perfectly well. However, since Jinia was beginning her career into films, she will not be able to pay him for his work. However, she suggested that the work would be a great opportunity to explore new avenues of earning eventually, where he can earn and profit from his sketches, rather than making music videos, where everything is uncertain. Also that would keep him less occupied and give him more free time for himself and his personal life. He can utilize that time to do what he likes to do for himself and his wellbeing. Although in the initial stage there would not be much earning, however, after few projects, he would be able to get a good income from sketching for storyboards. She reminded him that it is sketching that was his passion and not making videos, which he was avoiding in the recent times. So, he must pursue a career in sketching than making online videos, taking others’ music compositions.

At this Rama got very upset and turned down Jinia’s offer with anger and disappointment. Rama took everything in a wrong way thinking that Jinia was trying to criticize him and demotivate him for what he does. He fought with her and disconnected her call. After that Rama never spoke to Jinia or taken her calls, although Jinia tried to call him multiple times to explain herself and resolve the misunderstanding. They both fell apart. After the incident, he was silent throughout the day and never spoke to anyone.

On the next day, he went to his friend’s house in the neighborhood and shared with him the whole story. Rama met Vinod, his neighborhood friend, in the art school during his high school days, when he was taking art classes outside his academic education. They connected with each other and became good friends over the years, as they shared the same passion for sketching, and the same neighborhood too. He was amongst the only few friends that Rama had during that time, with whom he can talk to and share his life and experiences. Vinod was also from a similar background and social status. He and his family were also struggling to make ends meet to earn their livelihood. Even though, he also used to make sketches very well, but not as artistic or appealing as Rama.

Vinod heard the whole story and tried to console Rama and make him understand that Jinia was not wrong in her suggestion and her intentions were pure and unconditional. Vinod tried to explain that Jinia was just trying to help him get a good career utilizing his talent for sketch. At this, Rama explained how he disliked the way anyone criticizes his music videos, as those were giving him his earnings and livelihood, with which he was sustaining his life and his family. So he never likes if anyone criticizes or looks down upon them. Seeing that Rama was not in a mental condition to understand neither Vinod’s perspective nor Jinia’s, he decided to let go of the whole situation and silently listened to Rama, pour out his agony and grudges to him about Jinia. After sometime Rama came back home and went to sleep, not feeling like doing anything else for that remaining night.

From the next day, he went on to his usual daily routine work of making videos, and household chores and executing his other responsibilities. He never thought of Jinia again and he hated to remember about the incident, and moved on in his life with his work and errands. He never spoke with Jinia or about her to anyone, after that.

Things went on like this for a while, until one day there was a restraint in one of Rama’s music videos from one of the social media platform. After that, many of his music videos were blocked consecutively, on the grounds of violation of intellectual property rights of the creators, composing those music, and restraint orders were issued for publishing them online without rights. He was shattered and devastated! His life depended on it and now its blur in front of his eyes. He was thinking how would he earn his living? How would he support his family? All this thoughts ran in his head and he was feeling sick. He became silent and still. He would not speak to anyone for days and kept on doing his usual work, because he has to. Although the restraint was on few prominent videos, which were doing well in the current market. The others were free and there was no restraint on them. So he kept working on those music which were not so much viral or trending in the market, during that time. However, his earnings came down drastically and he lost considerable amount of subscribers and followers. The traffic to his videos and Social media accounts also reduced and got limited. He lost his breakthrough moment and came back to his previous times of struggle. Now he must think of something innovative with his videos, which would make them trending and few of them viral again, so as to get back his charm in his videos to draw more attention and footfall of his viewers. He was working hard to get back the previous appeal and attention. He kept on thinking new ideas to make those music videos work like magic. He started to work over time again to make his videos and also continue with his orders of delivering sketches to his customers, for extra money. He again came back to his old circumstances of making both ends meet to earn his livelihood and support his family. It was disappointing, depressing and tiring to fall back on the same tunnel of pitfalls and struggles. He had no one to share this with, as his friend, Vinod, also left his home for a job and relocated to some other city.

Days went by and rolled on to months and years. Rama kept on doing the same work over and over again, but nothing improved. His earnings came to a minimum and he exhausted all his savings as well. He was tired and felt very weak fighting with his life’s circumstances over again.

Things went on like this, and Rama was carrying on with his mundane and difficult life again. Until one evening, peering through his small window Rama saw a big car, which was quite expensive, came outside his small house and stopped. He heard the sound of the car, and was wondering, who could it be? Until now, he never had any of his friends or acquaintances who had such an expensive car. Although few of his relatives had cars, but they are mostly living in other cities and kept no relations or connections with him or his family. Besides, he has no friends or acquaintances now, who would possibly be visiting him to his house. Although he had one friend, Vinod from his art school in his neighborhood, but he went to some other city two years back, after getting some job. After that Vinod kept no connection with him and neither Rama had ever tried to connect with him again. So while he kept thinking who it could be? He heard footsteps approaching his doorway, and there was a ring on the doorbell.

He got up and opened the door, and he saw a tall figure standing in front of him. He was wearing the finest suit in jet navy blue colour that Rama has ever laid his eyes on. It was shining as his shoes. His face was glowing with glory of his wellbeing and affluence. His hair and attitude was both meticulously trimmed and neat. He wore a perfume, the essence of which smelled like money and wealth. Rama knows this guy standing in front of him, holding a big box of sweets and bouquet of flowers.

Rama invited his old friend Vinod, from his art school, to come and sit inside his room. It’s been almost more than two years, he has not seen his friend. He was curiously surprised to see him this way. He made some tea for Vinod and they started to talk. Vinod asked Rama how he has been and listened to his story quietly like before, with lots of patience and calmness. He heard about Rama’s videos and the restraint orders and how he again fell into the pitfall of hardships and struggle. After Rama narrated his whole story to Vinod, Rama was very curious and eager to know and learn about his friend’s success and growth. What made him to change his circumstances, so much? But he would control his anxiousness and showed calm composure from outside.

Looking at his friends face, filled with questions and curiosity, Vinod started to fill the silence. He now started with his own story…

“Did you not wonder why I have brought the sweets and flowers for you?” asked Vinod to Rama.

Thinking for a while, “Well, I thought you wanted to show a good gesture by gifting sweets and flowers, since we are meeting after a very long time, with no contact in between, all these years… isn’t it?”, replied Rama .

His friend smiled, “Well that too. But the main reason for this is to apologize to you!”

Rama was surprised to hear that. “Why exactly?” he asked very quietly, but his voice was overflowing with curiousness and wonder.

At this, his friend started, “Do you remember that lady, Jinia, and your fight with her?”

Rama remained silent.

His friend continued, “Well on that night when you left after narrating your story of your friendship with Jinia and how you two had a big fight over the offer that Jinia made to you… I could not stop thinking about it. I thought it was a brilliant suggestion from Jinia which would have changed your life. But I was not able to understand why you could not see that nor understand her intentions? That night after you left, I kept thinking about it all night and I could not sleep at all. Next day in the morning, I searched her name over the Instagram through your account and connected with her. Since we both are connected through you, it was very easy to find her and share my number with her. Jinia was kind enough to call me, when she heard that I am connecting with her through your reference. She is a very nice lady with a lot of talent and insight into film making and storytelling. I discussed with her the whole story and our discussion that night and I asked her if I can work with her instead, if she needed me? I showed her some of my work samples, and she gladly welcomed me into her team. We started working together on her new project, the script of which she wrote during that time. Although, she already told me that since they are all starting up that time, and that they are very new in the industry, she will not be able to pay me and compensate for the work I do in their project, but they will be taking care of my expenses that I incur, working on the project. I thankfully agreed with the terms and conditions and started to work with her on the project. I made elaborate and extensive storyboard sketches for them, sheets after sheets and they would make copies of those to distribute amongst the entire cast and crew. It helped them in execution of the script perfectly and they could wrap up every shoot very fast and in less time, reducing production cost. The storyboarding helped them plan in advance and think in the right direction, before actual shoot.” Rama kept listening with utter silence and intensity.

Vinod continued, “Although the film did not generate much revenue. But it was a learning experience for all of us, since the entire cast and crew was new and fresh, except for the senior makers. We all did enjoy and learnt to grow. That project kicked started all of our career and never looked back. We then worked in different projects. Although, our cast and crew changed with the projects, but I never stopped working with Jinia. I sticked with her in all her projects till now and we both developed together to grow in our careers. Yet to go a long way, but we have come a long way too. After that project, we did few series and another movie together. We also completed one animation movie together, where I was the lead animation sketch-artist. We were working day and nights without any break or holidays. Although, we would do two projects simultaneously, but we would make sure to make it perfect, for it to do well in the market. We had also made good fortune out of it. Luckily, the movie and the series we made, did extremely well. By now, you must be knowing which movie I meant? You must have seen it in the theatre or online. Isn’t it?”

Rama was wondering and is confused. He was so engrossed in his personal life these days and his work tussles, that he never bothered to see and check out the recent film market. He has not seen a movie for the past few years and had no idea, which movie came in the theatres, did well in the market and which ones did not. He was devoid of any news or worldly affairs whatsoever, as he was too engrossed and occupied with his own life circumstances and problems. Although, Rama dealt with film music extensively, he never bothered to check out about the film makers or its cast and crew.

Seeing the confusion on his friends face, Vinod suggested, “You should go and watch the movie ‘Sara Ka Sara’, if you still have not seen it yet. It did very well in the market and public and fraternity appreciated it a lot. Did you really not hear about the movie? It’s pretty well-known by now. Have you heard the song called… “Lambi sadak, halki si barish, baht sari batein…?” Vinod went on saying all in one go, with intensity and excitement.

Now, Rama got a sudden jerk in his mind. He has not only heard the song, “Lambi sadak, halki si barish…”, but has also made a music video with the song and uploaded it in his social media channels recently. However, he has never bothered to, nor could make out some time to check the name of the movie, or its makers! He just picked up the song and made the video, as he does for years.

Rama kept silent and still, on Vinod’s query. He was speechless and stunned, at the turn of events.

After spending some more time with Rama and after having dinner with him, Vinod went back home. They both felt like before, although none of their circumstances are like before. They both have changed differently, in their individual lives and their circumstances have changed along.

That night Rama could not sleep. He was awake for the whole night and kept thinking. His mind was racing with thoughts. He kept reminiscing his past years. He then thought about Jinia and how he met her. He can’t stop thinking about how he fought with Jinia on her suggestion of working with her. He felt himself to be stupid and foolish. Rama’s heart suddenly filled with remorse and regret, not for his friend’s success though, which he was entitled to on the first place, had he accepted Jinia’s offer like his friend did. But he was repentful for his behavior with Jinia that day, on her suggestion and offer. He kept thinking about all these, while there was morning light. It’s almost dawn with the sky getting clearer with each passing moment. The birds were chirping and it’s a new day standing at the doorstep.

Rama got up and made some tea for himself… Sipping his tea, he still can’t stop thinking about the whole incident that happened last night, and the turn of events in his life. He now wanted to speak to Jinia once again. Could she forgive him for what he did? He then thought to himself, can life give him a second chance? Does life give anyone, a ‘Second Chance’…?

While he had all those piercing thoughts racing in his mind, he decided to give Jinia a call that day. Rama kept thinking, ‘should I call her in such an early morning hours or should I wait for the day to begin?’ But he could not wait to talk to her and tell her so much. But, would she talk to him and would she forgive him…? Rama kept thinking… Until, he finally gathered courage to find out Jinia’s number from his previous chats on Instagram. He had deleted Jinia’s number from his phone after that day’s fight, two and half years back. Finally he dialed her number. Rama’s heart was pounding with inquisitiveness and questions… ‘Is she going to talk to me at all? Will she pick up my call? Jinia is now so successful and popular. Will she talk to me like before?’ while this questions kept racing in his mind, his phone call went on to her number. Jinia’s phone kept on ringing. It rang for couple of minutes, until it stopped and went unanswered.

Rama was quiet and still. He knew well enough that this is the obvious probability that, she will not pick up his call and talk to him again, after what he did and how he behaved with her that day. However, he now understood her side and blamed himself for it, as this is the most obvious and expected response from her, and that he must come to terms with the fact that she will never speak to him, again.

Rama kept his phone on the side and sat on the sofa, burying his face in both of his palm. He remained silent and still, for some time. He tried to console himself and make himself understand. Until suddenly, his phone started to ring…

“Hey, Buddy, how have you been…? I can’t believe you called! It’s me Jinia! It’s been so long…”

Rama could not believe she called him.

He replied… “Hey!...”

They started to talk… and went on talking for some time.

Then she suggested, “Hey listen, Rama, are you ready to work for one of my project in animation? I am thinking of creating something for children. I need someone to do the sketches for me to complete the illustration work. I wanted a pro to work on it, and who can be more appropriate than you?” She chuckled with joy. “So as you’ve said, you are ready for sketch-work now, thought you might be interested… The work is strenuous but the money is good. What do you say?”

Rama was utterly surprised. He could not keep himself from smiling.

Is this my Second Chances…?!

They continued to talk…