The Pizza Party

 PART ONE

12 May 2010, 6 AM Somewhere near GOA. 

An SUV rammed into the roadside parking space in front of the tea shop. There is a railway crossing nearby. Three guys came out talking loudly and laughing which suddenly changed the entire ambience at that place which was quite silent and had the morning whispers until they arrived.

“Hey Nikhil… Get up man! We reached our TEA shop!”  Shouted Bharat…

“Good Morning Uncle… Do you remember us?” Ravi asked the man who was busy making TEA at the stall…

The man looked at the boys and just nodded his head in confusion.

“Arre chod na yaar! Tub hi kya!”  Zaheer looked at Ravi sarcastically as Ravi was trying hard to convince the TEA man about his identity.

“4 chai… aur khane mei kya hai?” Bharat asked the Tea vendor grabbing a crisp, fresh Marathi newspaper that was lying nearby.

“Biscoot hai”… the man replied...  “Vadapav ban-ne mei abhi time lagega” he said.

While they thought he was sleeping as they were busy enjoying the ambience and sipping their cup of hot tea, Nikhil was awake and was still deep inside his thoughts…

He remembered how different his life was, last time when he had come to this place. He was rich and had lots of money with him and had no worries about the concept of ‘getting serious in life’ as they say. He was full of himself and life was full of celebrations. Every day was Sunday and every night was as good as ever. And now… what happened suddenly? Why me? What went wrong? He asked himself!

Till last year he never allowed any of his friends pay Restaurant bills and moreover the petrol expense and every other expense used to be borne by Nikhil. He was the one who used to make instant plans for night-outs and holidays… But this time the story was quite different. He didn’t want to come to GOA with his empty wallet. It was Bharat who forced him to join them and it was him who wanted Nikhil to forget about everything that happened.

“Hey dude! Come out… Tera chai Thanda ho raha hai” Bharat shouted looking at the car! 

“Arre… usko soneka hai to sone dena! Tere-ko kya farak pata hai?” Zaheer said sarcastically looking at Bharat and smiled towards Ravi expecting Ravi to support his point of view.

Nikhil came out and started having his share of biscuits and tea. The TEA man looked at him as he recollected his face! He walked out slowly, holding his cup of tea as he was staring at the never ending railway tracks behind the tea shop… He again fell back to his thoughts!

 to be continued...