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14
‘Oh my god!’ Hema Chandra screamed and clutched the hand of the girl sitting next to her, as their plane seemed to nosedive.
‘It will be fine,’ the girl replied in a voice so gentle and calm that Mrs Chandra, who had a phobia of flying, felt an immediate relief wash over her.
Something in the background was beeping ominously and the captain’s voice, asking everyone to stay calm, boomed through the aircraft.
A few more minutes of turbulence, during which Mrs Chandra refused to let go of the girl’s hand, and then the plane stabilized.
‘That was scary,’ Mrs Chandra exhaled.
The girl smiled sweetly but said nothing.
Mrs Chandra had been observing the girl since she entered the aircraft. She looked like a career-driven, modern girl but she had a quietness and a calmness around her that Mrs Chandra had liked instantly.
‘Are you going to London for a holiday?’
‘No,’ said the girl, smiling.
‘A work trip?’
‘No, I have taken up a new job, so I’ll be living in London.’
‘Oh, you will be working in London.’
‘Yes,’ came the reply.
‘If you don’t mind me asking, where do you work?’ Mrs Chandra asked.
‘SunSoft. I am taking up the role of senior product manager there.’
‘Wow,’ said Mrs Chandra, ‘that is a great post, fabulous company. Well done!’
The girl smiled and asked, ‘What do you do?’
‘I am a professor of marketing at London Business School,’ Mrs Chandra replied.
‘LBS!’ The awe in the girl’s voice was unmistakable as she looked at Mrs Chandra admiringly. ‘Maybe some day I’ll do another MBA from that institute.’
‘So you already have an MBA?’ Mrs Chandra asked. ‘From where?’
‘IIM-Banglore,’ she said.
‘That is excellent,’ Mrs Chandra said. ‘I am presuming you have worked for a bit since? SPM is a senior role…’
‘I took up a role at SunSoft at campus, and moved up the ladder…’ the girl replied.
Mrs Chandra, quick at reading young people after all the time she’d spent with students, noted the intelligence in the girl’s eyes.
‘And your family?’
A brief pause.
‘Just my father and brother,’ she said finally.
Mrs Chandra looked at the young girl.
‘Losing your mother is a wound that never quite heals,’ said Mrs Chandra, a faraway look in her eyes, thinking of her own mother, who she had lost a decade ago.
