I woke up late that day. It was a Thursday, and it was not one of the days I had planned on going to office, as clearly indicated in my email signature that Tue, Fri were my working from office days. But then again, who paid attention to my email signature anyway. The bottom line still being that I had planned on going to office and that I woke up late, despite my very well articulated plan. This was nothing new to me. But then again, this meant that I now had a good enough excuse to skip going to office and work from home. The temperature was dropping down and I am not very comfortable with lesser temperature. I start to freeze when the centralized Air Conditioner goes below 18. I have been contemplating whether to go or not go. I have a very specific semi-formal outfit in my mind and I was pretty sure this was going to blow people’s mind away. Well, atleast the test runs I had in front of my portrait sized mirror in my washroom. But then again, I had snoozed way too many times and it was almost the same time I was planning to be out of home and here I was still laying in bed, looking at the clock, wondering what good will come by going to office. But then my phone rang. It never rings in the morning. No one calls me at this time, let alone any other time. I was thinking this might be one of the alarm, but I was awake enough to know that the ringtone was not the same.

It was my manager, who called me to inquire about the email that he had sent the previous day to which I hadn’t responded mainly because I had no idea what to respond back to. And now, I was clearly put on the spot, but I think I managed to get out of that hurdle. Phew, I need to be more prepared. And now I was standing and peeked out my window to see if there was sun or atleast a figment of sunlight anywhere, which to no surprise there wasn’t. I pushed through my laziness and decided that I should get ready, no matter what. I knew for a fact that she was going to be in office. I have to go. Obviously! It took me more time than usual to get ready and the time was running than I had expected. In my head, I was looking fly. I had very odd choice of clothes and shoes, but in my head it was all super great cool. I was out of the house with some great beats I had added to the favourite album. I was just about to get out of the door when the kids in front of me were getting their jacket out, which I didn’t realize why until I looked out. Rain! What the hell? Where did this come from? I stopped there and started checking the weather forecast trying to figure out my next move. I had two options, to get the umbrella and go to office or see this as a sign and skip going to office. 

I did contemplate a little more on the way back to my room since I had to get the umbrella anyway. I decided to push past my excuses and get my ass to office, no matter what, no matter if the white shoes become black and wet with the rain in play. Luckily enough, the rain stopped by the time I came back down. Phew, one hurdle eliminated. The journey to office was tarty given that I was looking very fly and was getting more awkward than usual, for very obvious reasons of course. I was late when I reached office, obviously and there she was right there as I entered. She sat at her pre-booked place, gave a look at the odd figure entering office so late in the morning, and got back to work. No fucks were given. I had my head down all the way, trying to avoid any more people who might place over at me and start to wonder whether they came way too early. I finally reached my desk for the day and as I was sitting, I saw her diagonally opposite to me, but what caught my eye were just not her eyes, but there was an addition. Oh, damn! 

Perhaps, a lot could be told just about how softly the dark eye shadow floats over her eyes, the words might still fall short, but those small specs of hair playfully falling over the eyes are definitely something of envy. Perhaps, a lot could be written about the stories that those dark deep eyes contained, the pages might still fall short. Or perhaps how intricately the eye liner rests at the eyes edges. While the phrase “if looks could kill” might very much hold strong in this context, the red bindi being the cherry on top would just be a double kill. While the world might revolve suddenly in slow motion, I was there trying not to get lost. Because I know, uncertainly, how deep the rabbit hole I would be putting myself into and yet I wondered what if. While the day got busier and the partition kept those over the fence, I could only hear her sharp western accent, I started to know for certain how royally I screwed up anything I had in my head when I started speaking during the meetings and calls. The damn partition kept everything apart, but just not my low, audibly oddly weird noise. Oh, damn! 

ak | x.ix.mmxxii