The moment I saw that red dress in the shop window I fell in
love with it. I enquired about the price and found it to be well beyond my
budget. I won’t say that it was expensive as the rich lace work on the border
and the silk flowers gave it such an expensive and executive look that no
price seemed too expensive for it. It’s all together a different matter that I
did not have that kind of money with me. If I had a regular job things would
have been different. However ever since I lost my regular job due to recession
a new job was hard to come by with the qualification that I had. I took up odd
jobs as store sales person, or worked at exhibitions and trade shows as
temporary staff.With this some money came my way to pay the bills and make two
ends meet. However despite all these hardships I was still hopeful that
everything will become fine one day and then I would buy and wear that
expensive red dress. In a lot of ways that red dress was a representation that everything
was or going to be fine in my life. I felt the compelling need to buy that
dress and started working extra hard to earn the money to buy it. I did the job
of baby sitting. Worked at a children’s creche and even tutored small children
in the hope of saving enough money. By the end of six months I had saved enough
to buy the dress. What I had saved was to pay for two months rent or three
months groceries. However for me buying the red dress had become a symbol
of good times to come. So I was ready to splurge my money on my object of
desire the red dress. As I was about to step out of my shared and rented
accommodation my eyes fell on my room mate who was not just my roommate but
also my best friend in difficult times. She too was struggling like me as she
had also lost her job. She had been my colleague in my earlier company and we
had together got the pink slip. I found her doubling up with pain and rolling
on her bed. I rushed to her aid and found her to be in a great deal of pain. I
escorted her to the nearby doctor. He diagnosed her to be having appendicitis.
She was in a medical emergency and needed to be operated upon immediately.
Being out of job neither one of us had any medical insurance. We had very
little money between us. The money that we could put together would barely
cover the cost of the operation and what about the cost of medication? All this
while I had been clutching to the bundle of notes which I was going to spend on
that red dress. Due to tension I was sweating and even the notes had become
damp. I was in a difficult situation on one side was my friends health and life
and on other side was my dream of my red dress. Then my red dress took a back
seat as I extended my sweaty hands and put the money in the pool of money that
we had. My friend got operated and recovered in some time. I had struck a dil
ki deal with my heart that had let go of its passion for the red dress and
helped me save a life
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