Chapter 3: The Rich and Famous
Megha started work two weeks later. The uniform was crisp, the heels were painful, and the smile she wore was flawless. She moved through the marbled halls of the Prestige Grand like a ghost—efficient, invisible, and essential. The hotel was less a place of rest and more a fortified bubble of excess, a sanctuary where the ultra-wealthy came to escape consequence.
She mastered the art of preemptive service: refilling a glass before the diner looked up, securing a private jet hangar before the client finished their call, and, most importantly, insulating the guests from any inconvenience, no matter how minor. This was the true meaning of the "customer is always right" policy Kenji Tan had described. It meant that the staff were not just employees; they were highly paid facilitators of every desire, every whim, every flaw of their clientele.
Megha learned quickly that the billionaires she served were often the most demanding and the least grateful. Their requests ranged from merely absurd to aggressively cruel. She watched as a colleague was reduced to tears over a botched bespoke floral arrangement, and another was dismissed entirely for simply making eye contact with a Saudi prince. To them, the staff were props, objects whose sole purpose was to affirm their own boundless power. Megha, however, was already far beyond judging them. She merely logged their weaknesses, their habits, and their entitlement. They were not people; they were the customers she needed to satisfy, the ecosystem that sustained her visa and her family's freedom. She was the lifeboat, and she would not tip it over with morality.
And then there was Kenji, waiting in his office for his 15 minute release every Friday evening when her shift ended.