Two Strangers !

This is my story; let me tell you something about myself before starting the story.

I, Nikki am the business head and star performer of a very big company. While working hard to become a star performer, I didn’t know when I got tough & was not able to see anything beyond my work.

I had hidden the real Nikki inside myself, who was alone in her life without any friends.

Even today, I got up to go office as usual and started getting ready.

Suddenly I saw my father's cloak clutched by my maid’s fault. I ran there and saw that everything was strewn on the floor. I got angry, I told my maid to go from there and I started stuffing my father's stuff in the cupboard. While storing goods, I found a diary written by my father which I had not seen since he left.

 I don’t know what happened today, I decided to read that diary and not go to the office. My boss was also very surprised how the woman who never took leave is suddenly taking leave without any reason. Well, my mother too was surprised to see this and also happy that I am taking time for myself. At work, I had made myself so much busy that all of my friends were also left behind; I had no time to spend with them. After taking breakfast in the morning, I took my father's diary and sat in the shade of a dense tree in the garden and started reading the diary.

In the diary, he wrote about his good and bad days as well as his special friends on bad days, he described friends as a very appreciative and important part of life. A friend is the kind of relationship that we choose by our own wish and also keep up without a blood relationship. In the diary, Papa had also written some things that shook me from inside, we become so busy at work that we are not able to take time for our own desires. We think life is too long, we will get so much time that we will fulfill our desires after completing all the work. But this does not happen; it made me think by the statement of my father's unfulfilled wishes.

I spent the whole day thinking about it, throughout the night, I kept rolling on my bed one side to another. My mother and brother were shocked by listening to what I said at the breakfast table in the morning, and were happy for me too "I have decided that I will go to Manali alone ". I loved the mountains, See! Our dilemma while living, things changes from “is there to were there”. Well, my family was happy that I am taking time for myself. Because I also became a machine as I was working with machines.

Leave from the office also got comfortable because I never used to take leave. My 15 days holiday was going to start; I decided to go by train instead of a flight because I loved traveling by train. In the past few years in order to save time I had started traveling by flight so that I could give more time to my work. Due to being engaged in work for a long time, the social meetings with people had stopped, so I sat on the train with my novel. I was busy reading my novel when suddenly the sauce fell on my novel, I looked up angrily.

My tolerance level was reduced due to working with machines, so now I could not even save him from my anger. A 24-25-year-old boy was sitting above. I was guessing his negligence with his costume, which seemed completely careless with the dress."Sorry, the sauce accidentally fell on your book," he said in a chirpy voice. The way he spoke further aggravated my anger. As other passengers watched the matter grow, the passengers who all were nearby made me cool. Anyway, I did not see anything in front of my anger, but as soon as the matter was finished, we all sat on our seats. I was spending all of my time reading the book. It was late night and I felt like drinking coffee. I made coffee for myself on the kettle, I had taken a cup of coffee in my hand then suddenly train jerked and the coffee fell on the same boy's hand. My senses flew, I was sure the boy would shout at me now to avenge the morning's debate and I would not be able to escape because of my mistake.

The Business Head, working on such a big post, now has to hear from this careless looking boy, I was feeling embarrassed thinking that. But on the very second moment, I felt relief when I heard "It’s not your fault that coffee fell on me rather it was due to jerk of the Train. I cleaned it with water".

Hearing this, I turned my gaze towards the passengers sitting around. Their eyes had seen both scenes in the morning as well as now; it seemed as if they were making me feel ashamed. As soon as the boy came back to the seat, I said sorry to him, to which he replied: “It’s ok, don't feel embarrassed”. I was feeling very let down by seeing his intelligence.

The feeling of revenge was not visible in his words despite all that I scolded him in the morning. That was how our conversation started. He told me that he lives in Manali and his name was Sam, he was a software engineer. But on his first visit to Manali, he loved the place so much that he decided to stay back there only for the rest of his life. Sam loved being in the hill station, So between the job and the dream he chased his dreams. Sam said, "Life comes only once and you get a chance to fulfill your dream only once, time never comes later". His words took me like a mirror. Whom I thought was a careless person; he really knew the meaning of life.

When he came to knew that I was also going to visit Manali, he requested me to stay in his cottage. He used to run a cottage in Manali, it was his passion to meet new people, share his experience with them, and learn something new. On my traveling alone, he raised a question, to which I said: "I have no friends, because of my work. If I am not able to give time to someone, then how will I sustain friendship". He found me a bit strange but he did not say anything at that time. Finally, during our journey to Manali, Sam learned a lot about me by talking about my family, likes, dislikes & hobbies.

While giving me the keys to my room when we reached the cottage, Sam urged me to drink morning tea with him. When I reached the room, I was surprised to see things which I liked. The next morning after getting ready, I reached the garden; Sam asked me "How did you find the arrangement of the room". Then I understood that all these arrangements were made keeping in mind my choices. Everything that I told Sam in the train was in the room.

I said thank you to Sam to which he said, I still remember that "Your first holiday must be such a memorable one that you would love to go on a holiday again & again". At the same tea table, Sam decided to accompany me to see Manali by himself. In spite of my refusal, he told me by saying "work will always go on, friend's time is precious which we get rarely ".

His words taught me the lesson of life that my father used to teach me, how one should live his/her life. And then our journey to Manali started, where we spent time together, we did not know when we became good friends. Finally came the day when the holiday was over and the time came to enter the world of machines. Really, I'm going to miss this holiday a lot and I wish to return on holiday soon. Sam had come to know me well over these days; he made me felt that I am a human being and not a machine.

On the day I left Manali, he gave me a gift, my smiling photo album that will remind me of my true friend, which made me felt that life is so beautiful. Sam told me one thing which is a sign of true friend "It is not necessary to always talk to your friends, but whenever you meet it should be like that you are talking every day. Don’t feel shy before remembering your friend, when you are in trouble this is you call a true friendship ".

This holiday gave me a new friend who brought in my life, both true friendship and real philosophy of life. . .