Suddenly, Someone: The Novel

Ch. 1. The Old Man in the Train

"This world will only ever be a place to live in.", my father said to me, frowning and sitting on a chair outside the office room, while the aggregate of financial losses incurred by his start-up, brought upon by perfidious investors, was being calculated inside. Still do I so desperately wish to have understood the crucial insinuation those words could have carried, no later than that day, and certainly not as late as after the complicated happenings I am going to narrate herein.

I would usually not call myself what a sceptical man would exhibit, but it is veracious that I have remained a little too dubious with jobs. After a delicate practice in the field of newspaper editing and article formulations, I saw myself in an internship as an assistant designer on a three-month project with Mr. Fridges Brietner, an entrepreneur who dealt his finances in textile and share markets. I would say the contract produced impressive pocket money, but that was never enough.
My father is a brilliant businessman, proficient to the maximum limit when accounts are concerned, but no, I had no interest to transform myself into an accountant or an economist. I did draw certain economic illustrations under my father's supervision, fabricated with assistance from a dozen company advisors (I was the assistant on paper) but that did not purchase me the fruit of my desire. I did find my name on a work-experience which was certified by one departmental manager, but how much can you count on that!
I can code; write essays of rules that a compiler can absorb, but a nine to five overdose in an IT sector is not how I wanted to decorate my schedule. There was a time when I had a passion for writing songs, but that faded away in the eleventh grade, when Mechanics and Calculus presented themselves within my syllabus.
Therefore, I would lay lazy day in and out. My mornings represented me sitting idly in front of my laptop over a cup of beverage, constantly surfing LinkedIn for content management programmes. In the evenings, one would find me at the field trying out my skills at wicket-keeping, or otherwise, at Mr. Hudson's Smoothies', three blocks from the main street. On some days of the summer, when the temperatures would tend to one-third of a century by the Celsius scale, I might even be too lazy to leave my nest.
After galloping the streets of Lowestoft, which also happens to be my hometown, for exactly one year, I decided to pursue my career in Law and Criminology. Why law, might you inquire? As it so happens to be, diving into that pool of suspenseful depth and havoc, savoured by constant touches of mysterious thriller here and there, is something that stimulates the wires in my cerebrum. I have always shared an intense admiration for Conan's works. As much, if it were the nineteenth century, I would have taken chances at my own office with a phone that would ring whenever crime in England was anticipated. (Would I have a telephone? If I am not very much mistaken, the caller was invented near Conan's time of the limelight.)
Yet, consider this that today technology has evolved tremendously, and with it has evolved the way we respond to threats as those caused by our kind. The intelligence supervises suffice if not the local police. Even otherwise, Sherlock's methods are outcast to be able to procure the tricks of any advanced criminal of these times. I figured this, that only as a member of the legal rationality would I be indulged with the world that I relate to so very ardently, while also, in passing, be able to profit the respect of my father who disbelieves the existence of a remarkable career beyond academic approach; a respect in its being a gruelling trophy I could only have imagined to be the champion of. No, I did not try for a policeman because I am sure there is no post that recruits men as slim and tiny, and nevertheless as lazy, as myself.

"It is a good subject,", my father said as cordially as he could, "particularly good, indeed, if you can excel at remembering the details of all those articles you read, and then making the best out of what you've learned when you step foot in the courtroom. I guess that's basically any other job, just so this might need a little more of your 'smart' skills as compared to the 'information' you happen to gather upon your course. Don't overlook the 'info' part, though!"
"Why you learn Sciences back in high school for nothing?", my mother interrupted. "Mason just made half your grades, and he wants to become a software engineer. Why you say you have to study law?"
"'Sherlock' is a lawyer. Pfft-", my elder brother whispered mockingly and snorted away near the fridge.
"And why do you have to study criminology? Ain't there no seats for you in the civil department?", my mother continued.
"There is no civil department. Criminology is a common subject for a bachelor.", I replied.
"Is it now?", she stressed.
"Oh, now let the boy do what he likes.", my father returned, who was simply satisfied that I did not choose to become a lyricist. He turned to me, "But my son, are you infallibly sure that this is what you want the next forty years of your life to look like? How confident are you, that you can and will do as good as you think you will be able to do in this profession?"
"Well, no, I'll manage ......", I replied.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"I guess, that's settled, then."

(Remaining portion to be uploaded soon.
You can find the entire novel at: linktr.ee/dibyendumaji)