What if?

The story of the world that we live in is pretty boring and bland. Although it was interesting when it all started with the big bang, it’s just been spinning since then. If you just see it as spinning, it’s pretty much that. If you think how it is spinning or what makes it spin is an entirely different story.

That’s interesting to listen to. What makes it interesting? What triggers that rush inside us when things are seen from a different perspective? The answers to these questions may vary widely depending upon each person’s thoughts and the way of understanding things.

Spinning of the earth triggers interest, a man or a cat spinning triggers laughter. Human mind works differently to different occasions. Coming to the point of how every person’s thoughts differ, it’s also interesting to note how different each person’s life is. It is unique, whether he is a scientist, an astronaut, an engineer or an average Joe like many of us.

Talking about average Joe’s makes me want to tell you the story of a guy named Matthew. People called him Matt, he worked five days a week in front of his computer, his fingers glued to the keyboard. He gets two days a week to think about what he’s doing with his life and continue doing the same thing for the next five days. You know how hard it is to get a girlfriend with such a life, no kidding. But a man’s got to try. He had a thing for this girl who works in a perfume shop at the mall.

“Hey, you sell perfume here?” asked Matt waving at Marla, the lady who sold perfumes. Even though he started with the most obvious dumb question, you got to give it to the man for trying.

“Yes sir, looks like it,” she replied glancing around her with a smile.

“You can call me Matt,” said Matt, inching forward.

“Okay Matt, you want to try one?” she asked as she took a golden perfume bottle on her hand.

Eyeing other products, Matt said, “It seems small, and cheap. Why don’t you get me a bigger one that’ll suit me?” still smiling wide.

“This one?” said Marla as she took the most expensive one and sprayed a bit on Matt’s chest.

Matt smelled the fragrance as he locked his eyes with Marla’s as he said, “I love it. Well, you have impeccable taste in perfume. I’ll take it.”

Marla’s face brightened as she just made a good sale and a probable free dinner. She smiled and gave the bill to Matt with her number on it.

Boring? Don’t blame me. Some stories are pretty normal and do end well, but I’m not going to end it there. Let’s see it from a different perspective, shall we?

What if Marla worked in the lingerie section of the same mall?

“Okay Matt, what are you looking for?” she said as she got behind the counter and pointing at a silver colored lingerie.

“No, it seems small, and cheap. Why don’t you get me a bigger one that’ll suit me?” said Matt, still smiling wide.

“This one?” said Marla as she took the most expensive one.

Matt locked his eyes with Marla’s and spoke, “I love it. Well, you have impeccable taste in lingerie. I’ll take it.”

Marla’s face brightened as she billed the product. She smiled and gave the bill to Matt and it read, “Proud of you Matt.”

Ouch! That’s got to hurt. But who’s desperate enough to buy a lingerie just to impress the sales girl? Anyway, that’s about Matt.

Interesting things always happen to interesting people. People who take risks, enjoy the experience. Such kind of an interesting character is Elisha. But why are we looking at Elisha now? You’ll get to know before this narration ends.

The twenty-four year old urban woman is a shopaholic, um, also an alcoholic. Saturday nights are her paradise. But the previous night, the party got cancelled and she had to stay home watching the late late shows on her TV which is very unusual to the character that she was. Early in the morning, she got a call from her friend Teresa to join her for shopping at the mall. In the excitement that she found an escape plan from the boredom, she ran straight to the mall without having a second thought.

That’s it. No, wait, that can’t be it.

What if the party had happened?

Elisha’s phone rang loudly with Teresa’s call which seemed deafening as she woke up to a pretty hung-over Sunday morning. She would’ve ignored any other call but it was her best friend who had called her for shopping. She can never say no if someone calls her to join them for shopping. Even if she is down to a dime of balance in the bank. She woke up, put on a pair of sunglasses and left for the mall.

The mall, being square shaped and huge, had entrances on three sides with remaining one side of closed wall. On entering through one of the glassed doors, it was written, “Enter through the door to your right” with a right-arrow sign pointing to it. Elisha figured that the door wasn’t working for some reason and she tried to enter through the next entrance. She found the same sign in the other door as well. She saw to her right, there was another entrance. She thought that must be it and rushed for it with her foot aching in the stilettos. She saw the same sign hanging there again.

Frustrated, she walked to the security guard and spoke, “How do you enter the mall? Every entrance is blocked.”

The security guard went up and pushed the right door in the double door entrance and said, “Like this.”

Always make sure you have a glass full of orange juice after a crazy night. Just putting it out there. Free tip.

Every gang of friends has people of different characters and different levels of craziness. When you ask me for an example of people with maximum craziness factor, I can think of a few starting with the story of Eric on the top of my mind. Eric is the type of guy you can go to when you’ve lost all hopes in life but still need one last sign that you should go on. Trust me, after meeting him, you’ll definitely feel good about how well you’re doing with your life.

He’s one of the people who take life as it comes to them and does pretty dumb stuff. The latest one being, getting a tattoo on his eye. A dragon’s mouth that opens to one of the eyes, with all its glory. After getting the tattoo, he went to the mall with his girlfriend Chloe.

“Chloe, take some cucumbers, it’s at the far end of this row. I’ll go get something else. I need the tattoo to get healed soon,” said Eric to Chloe.

As they came to the billing section, Eric emptied the contents of the basket on to the counter, which had a bunch of cucumbers and a bottle of Vaseline.

The lady at the counter looked at them both, smiled and said “Nice!” with a thumbs up. Eric and Chloe looked at each other, finally realizing what she meant, they smiled and said, “Thanks” in chorus.

Kids these days, huh? Wait there’s more.

What if Chloe was busy that day?

If Chloe was busy that day, the only company that Eric had was his brother who was staying with him.

“Frank, get the cucumbers,” said Eric pointing at the far end of the row.

The lady at the counter looked at them both, smiled and said, “Nice!” with a thumbs up. Eric and Frank looked at each other, finally realizing what she mean, they both went, “Oh, no! He’s my brother, it’s all right.”

The lady posed a creepy look on her face, pulled her colleague on to the counter and walked away as quickly as she could.

Not a good day at the mall for brothers’ bonding if you ask me. Enough of the crazy ones. Shouldn’t there be at least one gentleman in a group? Let’s introduce Max.

A polo t-shirt, denim jeans, and running shoes, Max is the ultimate family guy. He was walking his three year old niece, Lucy, in the mall in her stroller. When his eyes caught the two pretty looking girls who were walking against them, Max bent down so he could reach Lucy’s ears and whispered, “Remember what I told you? That’s the girl,” and pushed the stroller slowly.

As the pretty girl at the mall walked past against them, Lucy grabbed her hand. The pretty girl turned to look at Max standing there with a sly smile on his face.

“Excuse me, my daughter has a question for you,” he said.

The pretty girl went on her knees, looked at Lucy and said, “Hey, little one, what is it?”

“You look like the angel from my story book, are you really an angel?” she asked the girl.

The girl, heart-warmed by the question, said, “Aww! You’re so cute! And yes, that’s a secret, shush,” and touched her nose as she saw Max who was smiling at her.

“Where is your wife?” she asked Max.

“No, we’re divorced. I’m a single parent,” replied Max with puppy eyes.

She stood up to Max and said, “If you don’t mind, we can take her to the toy store.”

“Of course, I’d love that. I mean, Lucy would love that,” he stuttered as they walked together.

And they lived happily ever after. I’ve always wanted to say that, sorry, couldn’t resist. But every neat love story can become a tragedy if you twist just one thing.

What if we change just one dialogue?

“My daughter has a question for you,” said Max to the pretty looking girl at the mall.

As she kneeled down, Lucy looked at her, started crying and said, “I want daddy and mommy!” and started screaming.

The pretty looking girl at the mall went, “Security! We’ve got a kidnapper!”

Not a happy ending for sure. It is strange how the crazy things are the only ones that’ll be etched in our memory and will be worth a laugh when we reminisce after a lot of years down the lane. Now you’re thinking how they all are connected. Okay, back to the story.

The phones in their pockets pinged to a text in their IM group.

Teresa: Where are you guys?

Max: At the mall.

Eric: At the mall.

Elisha: Right next to you.

Matt: Me too.

They all met at the food court and went, “Hi guys!” in chorus. Smiles exchanged and food eaten. But where’s the fun in that?

What if all the what if’s had happened?

They said, “You won’t believe, a crazy thing happened at the mall today!” in chorus. Smiles exchanged, food eaten and stories shared.