I'm The One You're Looking For
2222 Words
"I see, you're still so punctual," Onir said, sliding his hands in his trouser's pocket.
"What can I say? Old habits die hard," the visitor shrugged his shoulders.
The next moment, both friends erupted into cheery laughter as they did their bro hug.
Yes, the visitor was none other than Onir's best friend, the Royal Prince of Punjab— Neer.
"Come, I'll give you an office tour first," Onir said once they had sobered up. "After all, you're visiting my office for the first time."
"Okay," Neer agreed and they walked out of his cabin.
"There isn't much because we are a team of fifteen workers including me," Onir told Neer. "And as our job is quite creative in nature, I decided to go with a unique work place plan so that everyone feels at ease while working."
"I noticed that on my way to your cabin," Neer said.
"As we work as just a stepping stone for the budding authors, I didn't want to have many people onboard in the beginning. So, we just started with five basic departments in the beginning— the Editorial department, the Managing Editorial and Production department, the Creative department, the Sales Finance and Accounting department, and the legal department," Onir explained everything as he gave Neer the office tour.
"The central space is occupied by the Editorial team which of course is managed by Anna. The other four departments took the two corners and three walls to set-up their workplace while the conference room is right near the entrance that you must have seen on your way here."
Neer nodded his head in affirmation.
They strolled around the office premises but as Onir had said, there wasn't much to see. It was a moderately spaced workplace with a modern design. What made it different was the uncommon layout which enabled the employees to work comfortably.
"And that's the cafeteria, right between the creative department, and ME&P department because these people constantly need food to keep working as 'food keeps them calm and makes them more productive' so they wanted an easy access to food without moving much," Onir said with an eye roll which made Neer chuckle.
"These people are the laziest, I'm telling you."
Neer shook his head at his best friend. "You'll never change."
Neer observed his surroundings carefully and he was impressed by what he saw.
"By the way, you told me about everyone but didn't tell me anything about yourself," Neer said after a while.
"What do you mean? You know everything about me?" Onir asked, puzzled.
"What do 'you' do here?" Neer questioned, emphasising on 'you'.
"I'm the publisher of course," Onir replied in a matter-of-fact tone.
"Oh, this means you do nothing."
"Of course I do a lot of things," Onir said defiantly.
"Like?" Neer quirked up his eyebrow.
"Like I make the final calls about the books! Like I supervise the whole publishing process! Like I manage the marketing, promotion and advertising, along with the legal department because those guys don't have much work," he added the last part in a barely audible voice which made Neer laugh but he kept his face straight.
"Ohh, I see," Neer said in a mock serious voice which annoyed Onir.
"Excuse me, that's a lot to do!"
"Of course, it is! When did I deny that it isn't?" Neer said, suppressing his laughter.
"You can't just impress some people no matter what you do," Onir muttered not-so-subtly.
And this time, Neer didn't hide his smile.
They were walking back to Onir's cabin when Ishanvi came to them.
She looked straight at Onir. "Don't forget to check your email. I'm leaving now. Bye!" she said it in one breath and instantly turned away to leave.
"Okay. Be safe on your way," Onir yelled after her as she rushed out of the office.
Ishanvi didn't look at Neer, not even once because she felt peasants like her didn't have the right to look at the Royals directly. She knew it was silly but she couldn't forget her history lessons from school which taught that the common people needed to steer away from the Royals as much as possible and treat them with deference and one way of showing their deference was to look downwards while in front of the Royals and not stare them in the eyes.
"This girl is crazy!" Onir said with a smile.
"She doesn't work here?" Neer asked Onir once Ishanvi had disappeared behind the doors.
"She does but her working hours are slightly different from others."
"Why?"
"Because she's a research student at J University, she needs to attend classes in the morning. So, she comes to the office before and after her classes," Onir explained as they entered his cabin.
"J University? Only the best of students manage to get into the J University especially for research! It means she must be intelligent," Neer said thoughtfully.
"Of course, she is intelligent. Not only that, she's a mine of creative ideas as well," Onir said, taking a seat on the leather couch in his cabin.
"What do you mean?" Neer asked, sitting beside him on the couch.
"You know, she joined shortly after I opened this company. Although I had some ideas about what I wanted to do and how to achieve them, I was clueless about where to begin. That's where Ishi came into the picture. She brought with her the ideas that helped us get started," Onir said before he negan to narrate the whole incident.
FLASHBACK
It was a couple of weeks after I had established Écrits. I was still scouting for people to work with us but as it was a new start-up, not many people were interested in working with us. I knew it'd happen, that's why I was targeting young graduates freshly out of college with almost no experience of working before. But even that was proving to be a hard job.
During one such hunt, I was sitting in a café, waiting for one of the interviewee to turn up there.
As the interviewee hadn't arrived yet, I was observing the other people at the café and eavesdropping on their conversations although it was unintentional.
That's when I heard Ishanvi talking to her best friend –who works in New York– on the phone. Her words "we need a company that will give young writers a platform to showcase their talent, because all we need is a chance to prove our worth" caught my attention and instantly I knew that I have to have her onboard because we share the same vision.
I looked in her direction and found it was a girl –in her early twenties– sitting in the corner booth near the huge window that overlooked the road outside. On her table was spread out her notepad, pens and a book along with a glass of half drank berries smoothie.
I got up from my chair and walked up to her table. She had finished her call when I went to her.
"Excuse me! Do you mind if I sit here for a while?" I asked her.
She studied me for a moment before nodding her head.
"I usually don't trust strangers but you seem harmless," she said putting her book and pens back in her bag. "And I'm just leaving, so I don't mind you sitting here. You can sit here for as long as you want," she said before taking a long sip of her smoothie.
When I heard that she's about to leave, I knew I had no time to waste and jumped to the matter at hand instantly.
"Could you please spare me a few minutes of your time?" I requested. "I promise I won't take more than twenty minutes."
She looked at me skeptically as if I have grown another head with a tail instead of hair.
"I don't even know you. You could be a cold-blooded murderer for all I know," she said
"Rest assured, I'm definitely not a cold-blooded murderer," I assured her. "Actually I overheard your conversation on the phone just now."
She raised her eyebrows.
"I know I shouldn't have and I apologise for that. Oh wait, I'm not sorry that I heard your earlier conversation otherwise I wouldn't have found you."
"Now you're confusing me," she said.
"Okay, I'll come straight to the point. I'm the one you have been looking for," I told her.
"What??" her expression was murderous.
I hurried to explain. "Sorry, it came out wrong. What I meant is I have just established a start-up which provides young or novice writers a chance to get published."
Now it caught her attention and her eyes sparkled.
"I'm listening," she motioned me to continue.
"My start-up Écrits has just opened a couple of weeks ago with a motive to give all those writers a chance who were denied to get published irrespective of their age, gender, race and ethnicity, but only if their story has what it takes to grab a reader's attention." I then told her all about Écrits and my link to Pennac Publishing House.
I could tell that she was interested now, so I further said, "That's why I'm hiring people to work with us. And from what I have heard earlier, I believe you'll an important asset for our company because we have the same vision."
She scanned my face to see if I was lying while I sat there confidently.
"But why me?" she asked after a pause.
"Because I feel you have ideas that can help us get started. And to be honest, I'm really clueless about where to begin," I whispered the last part sheepishly.
"Don't worry, I can understand. It happens with us writers all the time that we begin writing a story with excitement but after the initial chapters we don't know what to do with the book anymore," she said wisely.
"You write too?" I asked her, surprised.
"Of course, I write. I have been writing since I was a teenager," she informed me, with pride.
"That's wonderful!"
"Now, coming to your problem, I think I have a perfect solution for you!"
My eyes lit up at her words.
"What is it?" I asked eagerly.
"As your company is relatively new, instead of waiting for amateur writers to walk up to us, we should approach them first," she told me.
"And how can we do this?"
"I'm sure you've heard about various online writing platforms available on the internet nowadays?"
I nodded my head in affirmation. "I have. But what about it?"
"There is a plethora of novice writers on these online platforms who want to be noticed by big publishers and get a chance to be published."
"I'm still lost because I already told you we've just started."
"Be patient, I'm coming to it," she chided in irritation. "Now, listen carefully. What we have to do is target the good stories available on these platforms and ask them to work with us. We will need to create an online platform first where we can publish those stories and there we will put the stories for a stipulated period of time and if they do well, we will publish those books through Pennac. These online stories won't be free to read of course, the readers would have to pay some money to read these stories and the authors will get some share of this income. This way, they'll be interested in associating with us and they'll earn as well."
"That's a mighty impressive idea," I told her as soon as she finished speaking.
"I know right!"
A seed of doubt crept in my heart instantly. "But do you think it will work?"
"I know that it'll work," she told me confidently. "After all, I'm one of those online writers. So, I know what we want. And if I get such opportunity where I'm benefitted, I for sure won't hesitate to grab this chance."
Her confidence gave me boost as well.
She then went on to elaborate her idea some more and we discussed it at length and before we realised, we had already come to an understanding that we have to work together to achieve this seemingly impossible goal that we have set for us.
I instantly offered her to work with us and after some initial contemplation and conditions, she agreed. And within a week, she was onboard.
FLASHBACK ENDS
"She's really smart for her age," Neer commented once Onir was done narrating the whole story.
"She indeed is," Onir agreed with his best friend. "That's why I say she's our lucky charm."
The two friends talked some more before Neer had to leave.
Onir had gone downstairs to see him off. His car and chauffeur was already waiting for Neer.
Bidding Onir bye, Neer got into the car and the car pulled out of the lane and sped towards the hotel the Oberois were staying at.
After settling into the car, Neer had sent out three words to his parents: knowledgeable and thoughtful.
And then put his phone back into his trouser's pocket and leaned back on the seat to rest before they reached the hotel.
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I really hope you're enjoying the story so far!
- Writer
