I was the last person to go in, at 9.45 p.m. When I walked in Samantha looked surprised. She had already finished packing her bags. The table was clean and there wasn’t a sheet of paper in sight.

She didn’t say anything for a moment and then apologized. She said that they’d told her that there were only five new recruits and had no idea that there was a Robin Varghese too. Apparently someone in HR had told her that I hadn’t joined at all. (Yogita. Idiot. Cow.)

She asked me to sit down and told me that since there weren’t any questionnaires left she would have to skip and go directly to the interview and see what projects suited me the most. I gently asked her if this would go against the Dufresne System. But then Samantha reassured me that the System was more a loose set of guidelines rather than a concrete, inflexible set of regulations. In fact, she said, a casual chat sometimes revealed much more information than all those long, boring questionnaires. Samantha then narrated how the Barcelona office had functioned for many years without a staffing executive. Till it was shutdown last year when they realized that the office had only four employees but was drawing salaries for twenty-seven.

When she put it that way I was quite satisfied and told her I was ready for my casual chat.

She asked me to tell her a little about myself and I was just getting to the part where my parents had shifted to Abu Dhabi, four years before I was born, when she got a phone call. She said that her flight had been preponed and she had to rush to the airport. Since she was desperately out of time she quickly asked me which areas I was most comfortable with out of logistics, natural gas, higher education, and printing and publishing. I made a little joke about always having plenty of gas but she didn’t react. So I told her I was okay with anything but higher education. That would be a little too boring coming right out of business school, I justified.

She nodded quickly, once again apologized for the confusion and ran out of the office.

It took me forty minutes to find a cab back home.

It wasn’t a spectacular day, but at least now I can look forward to my first live consulting project soon.

The very, very hot Shreya went back to Delhi this evening. But she promised to meet up when she comes down next time. There is a rumour that bastard Vineet might fly off to Delhi to work with her on a project.

But I honestly don’t think he is her type. Vineet is too intense and mature. I think Shreya wants someone younger and more fun and feisty. I could sense it in the way we clicked today.

What could be my first project? Suspense. Tension. Surely something in logistics? Or natural gas?

Still no idea what to do about a roommate. Should I ask Reema? Or is that too desperate?