All these words are playing in his mind. Suddenly he heard a loud screech, he looked to his side, a car was speeding towards his way honking loud. He was so close that he can see the tense drivers face, the next second he hit floor and everything blacked out, he tried to open his eyes slowly, he couldn’t feel his body, Shouts of people and cars honks are slowly increasing, all he could see is a blurry image of someone asking if he was alright, slowly the noise waned. It was silent all over again. A loud voice yelled after a brief silence “It’s all your fault”
He woke up but he couldn’t see anyone around in his hospital room. He was sweating profusely. Hearing a sound he tilted his head towards the window, it was raining outside. His fractured hand was wrapped in a bandage and he could feel the pain surfacing. He was trying to remember how he got to the hospital, but all he could recollect were a few flashes of memory, people asking him if he was alright followed by the ambulance noise and then the blackout. But, he was unable to forget what had happened before the accident.
After opening a consultancy with two other partners, his life seemed to be sailing smoothly until he took a risk and gambled with a contract and landed the whole firm in trouble. He meant to consult his partners before he took this rather risky decision, but something inside him, probably the ego developed due to the past compromises he made with his partners lead to it. They blamed him for what he has done and disagreed to share the consequences. Blaming him for what he did and with no one on his side, dejected he stormed out of the office, he felt all his life was in tatters, his dreams collapsing before him. He stood at the gate looking at the road, he can hear the traffic speeding before him, and devoid of his pain life ruthlessly seems to rush. The noise slowly became unbearable, he stated walking down the road not caring about the traffic, suddenly he heard a screeching sound and turned to his head, a car was speeding towards his way honking, the next second he was down on the floor.
Lying on the hospital bed now, he was contemplating what had happened and how a decision messed things up. He was there now waking up to the real world, he felt worthless, he felt he has no reason to live, all his dreams were falling apart before him, the company; his dream was lying broken, tears slowly dripped from his eyes, he felt helpless. He lay back on his bed and said “life is not fair”. He knew that risks had to be taken in a business; he shook his head repeating again that life is not fair to him and why does only he have all the problems.
After watching the motionless ceiling for some time, he looked out of the window and saw a kid in the playing happily in the rain; he thought how happy that kid was and wished he was a kid again. He walked slowly to the door, limping and walking. A fresh breeze with a mist of water hit his face when he opened the door. He limped outside towards the balcony; he saw a bench close to the door and sat there. Looking into the rain, he wondered yet again, “Why isn’t life fair to me?” The kid who was playing in the rain came into the balcony, he looked at him with a beaming smile, the smile was such that even he who was misery drowned couldn’t do anything but smile back.
The kid came and sat beside him, the kid asked him rubbing the rain water off his face, “do you like rain?” Before he replied, the kid added “I love it, I like to play in the rain, I always do”. The kid then looked at his hand and asked, “What happened to your hand, did someone hit you?” He replied “Yeah, a car hit me, it was an accident”. The kid laughed and said “My mom always told me that you will be hit by a car if you are not careful”. The kid added mimicking what he was saying “you should look left first and then right and then cross”. The man replied “I was not careful I guess”. The kid asked again inquiringly “Why are you not careful?” The man replied “It’s a long story”. The kid quickly replied “Tell me, I like stories, I anyway have to wait till evening, I am going home today”. The man replied “that’s good, what happened to you, why were you here?” “I got a fever, but now I am feeling good, so they are sending me home, am going to play with my friends. I haven’t met them for a month because of my fever”. The kid without a pause added, “Tell me about your story, what happened to you?” The man replied “Well, you know what a consultancy is? What a tender is? what partnerships are?”. The kid had a puzzled expression on his face; he said “No, I don’t”. The man replied “well, then you won’t understand my story”. The kid replied “Yeah, but how does those things make you less careful”. The man smiled and replied “I don’t know things are not going well for me, life is not fair kid, you will know it when you grow up” The kid looked at him with another puzzled expression and said “I felt bad when I was here for a month, I cannot play and they did many painful tests on me, today am going home, they will let you go home too, you will be happy then”. He looked at the kid and smiled. Both of them sat silently and looked into the rain.
After being silent for some time, the kid slowly fell asleep on his shoulder. After a few minutes, the nurse came searching for the kid, “His parents are here, they were searching for him”. After a few minutes, he saw the kid walking away with his parents, elated. The doctor came out with them, kissed the kid on his cheek and asked him to be nice. There was something that was missing; the doctor’s expressions seemed unnatural. The kid walked away holding his parents hands, as if he someone had called him, the kid looked at him and waved, he waved back with a smile.
The doctor saw him waving back at the kid, he came to him and asked how his hand was, and he replied it hurts. The doctor advised him not to strain his hand too much for at least a month. He then asked the doctor about the kid and why he was here. The doctor began saying “the kid was brought in a month ago with serious abdominal pain, when we looked into it, he was detected with intestine cancer” the doctor looked away from him and said “he only has few days left, he is not responding to treatment, we thought it would be good to let him free the last few days” This hit him like a bolt, more impactful than the car.
The boys words came back to him, “I felt bad when I was here for a month as I cannot play and they did many tests on me, but see today am happy, you will be happy too”. He wondered “I was telling myself life was unfair to me, if it was unfair to me, then what is it to that kid”. Walking back into his room he wondered “The kid doesn’t even know what he has, he doesn’t know that he will die, he was living with a hope, a hope that he will play happily with his friends. He sat on his bed and started thinking “Life is unfair to everyone, no one said its going to be fair, others have bigger problems than us, losing hope is losing life”. That night brought a new dawn in his life.
