Melody Queen by Puneet Bhandal

Author:Puneet Bhandal
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781915244307
Publisher: Lantana Publishing

TAKE ELEVEN

I ran down the corridor, wondering why Mr. Pereira had summoned me to his office. Was I in trouble? Outside his door, I wiped my face with the corner of my school cardigan to make sure I didn’t look sweaty. I cleared my throat and gently tapped on the door.

“Enter,” came a voice.

I walked in to see Mr. Pereira looking at his laptop screen and scribbling on a notepad at the same time.

“Ah, just the person I wanted to see,” he said.

I tried to get the image of him and Miss Takkar at the swimming pool out of my mind. I hoped this wasn’t the reason I was there today.

“So, Miss Takkar should be doing this but she’s busy with a group of students,” he began.

I nodded, feeling a bit anxious.

“We’ve been approached by a production house seeking a girl aged 11-13 for a movie role.”

“Oh,” I said, feeling immediately relieved.

“They’d like the girl’s actual mother to play the role of her mother in the movie,” he elaborated. “It was brought to my attention that your mom is an ex-actor so that would potentially work very well.”

I was sure Mom wouldn’t enjoy being called an ex-actor. And I had no idea why they wanted a real-life mother-daughter duo – Mom and I didn’t even look that similar. I didn’t feel that enthusiastic about this but I knew it was a great opportunity for Mom.

“I’ll do it,” I said.

“Excellent,” replied Mr. Pereira. “I’ll be in touch with your mother to let her know I’ve spoken to you. We can take it from there. The audition is at a studio in Mumbai – to be confirmed.”

“Sure, sir.”

I shut the door quietly behind me and scooted all the way to the cafeteria where I found Joya, Raktim and Zeeshan digging into paneer pizzas. I dashed to the counter to grab my slice plus my daily dose of vitamins in the form of salad, and took a seat at their table.

Joya smiled at me, moving her chair to make space for me.

“Hey, dost,” said Raktim. “How are you? We don’t see you at the Noise Zone anymore. What’s happening with you? Anything exciting?”

Hmm. I wanted to tell him that they didn’t see me at the studio because they didn’t invite me, but I decided not to.

“I might have an audition coming up,” I told them, beaming widely. I think I was trying to show off. I quickly explained the role to them.

“Sounds fab!” said Raktim.

“I can’t believe you and your mom might work together – how cool!” said Joya.

Zeeshan was too busy eating to comment. He just nodded at the news. Did he even care about what I was doing?

“If you get the part and become famous,” he said eventually, “make sure you put in a good word for me.”

I didn’t comment. Why did he make everything about himself? It would have been nice if he’d said something even vaguely complimentary.

“It’s all about who you know in this industry,” he added, tapping the side of his nose.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.