Raghav looked at the 100th saree that the salesman had taken out. So far none of the sarees had impressed him. Either they were too dull, too heavy, boring, simple or just plain ugly. He looked over at Farhad, who was engrossed in a conversation with the salesman. They had already spent over 2 hours at this shop and were no closer to finding a saree for Kriti.
He stood up to stretch his legs and as a sign to Farhad that he was ready to leave the place. Unfortunately for him Farhad was so engrossed in his conversation that he wasn't paying any attention to his signs. He looked around in frustration, wondering how people loved shopping for hours. He was just about to kick Farhad when he noticed her in the mirror. She was talking to an elderly man in his 50s.
He quickly turned around to find her. She was wearing another dull blue saree. The color was so muted and plain that it looked as if something an elderly widow would wear. Her blouse was modest - extremely modest with a high round neck and the sleeves stopped just about her elbow, even the back of the blouse fully covered. It was as if she didn't want any eyes to be drawn to her.
She might have selected her clothes as a shield from unwanted attention her smile had the exact opposite effect. Her smile would draw any males attention - especially since her full lips were begging to be kissed. While he imagined being able to taste those lips she finished her conservation with the man and headed towards the exit of the shop.
Without sparing any thought of Farhad, he followed her out of the shop. She walked leisurely through the throngs of people in the mall. A few times she stopped at a store window and stared at the display for a few minutes before resuming her walk. After a 10 minute walk she stopped a few feet away from another saree shop window. Looking at the sign he knew this had to be her shop - Deshmukh Saree Emporium.
Rather than entering the shop - she continued to stand a few feet away from the window display thinking. Wondering what could be so interesting about the window display - it looked exactly like all the other saree shops in the mall; nothing extraordinary. Maybe that was the problem - she realized that window display had nothing special about it. He was about to walk upto her when she walked into the shop. He followed her inside; There were a lot of shoppers inside; each one being assisted by a sales person.
She stopped in the middle for a few seconds before she headed toward the back of the shop. He continued in the back too. By the time he was able to get in the back she had disappeared from the small hallway. There were three doors in the hallway, with one of them labelled as changing room. So he had a 50% chance of picking the correct door she went into. Rather than trying the door closest to him, he walked to the door all the way at the end of the hallway.
As soon as he stood in front of the door he knew that is was the correct one. He could hear her voice through the door. For a moment he thought she was speaking with someone, but when she called out her own name he realized that she was having a full conversation with herself. He smiled and twisted the door handle.
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Pallavi made a note on her pad before walking away from her desk. She had a staff meeting this in two days and she hadn't made any notes. She reread her points she had already listed:
1. Keep rotating the stocks on the shelves
2. Extra staff support will be needed during the weeks leading up to Diwali
3. Any staff that wanted to signup for the show needed to give their name by the end of the week
She tried to think of the other 5 points she had thought of this morning but couldn't remember any of them. Hoping that she would remember them at some point she moved on to the other part of the meeting - Customer Handling. Over the last week she had noted some areas of improvement in how the sales personnel were handling customers.
1. Be polite but don't be forceful
2. Always ask if there are any preferences or pictures (make clean up easier and the customer experience smoother)
3. Offer to have the customer try the saree
4. Remember - Customer is ALWAYS RIGHT
The last point was going to be problem for a lot of the sales people, but it needed to be reminded.
YOU ARE READING
Destined to a Gangster - Reimagined
RomanceAs I was rereading Destined to a Gangster I was unsatisfied with the story. Since it was my first full story I had made many mistakes and didn't do justice to both Raghav and Pallavi. As such I am relaunching the story with changes. Pallavi Deshmu...
