He was sitting with a strained look fixed upon the screen. Almost the entire city is asleep except for night owls like him. It is not the first night, it has been like this for the past one and a half years of 23,000 rupees per month paying job. “Offer” they called it back then. The family was proud, he has made it to the the “elite” according to them. The strain in the eyes didn’t matter to them. What mattered was his salary and the societal status that it brought.
Turning an inner eye, he looked back at the six years that has changed him. The six years of growth they told him. “Six years of growth”, he repeated after them. “What is the point?”, he had asked then and got a reply that he forgot almost immediately. “What is the point?”, he asked
No command 'what' found, did you mean: Command 'wcat' from package 'sac' (universe) Command 'chat' from package 'ppp' (main) Command 'jhat' from package 'openjdk-6-jdk' (main) what: command not found
the computer replied. He let out a sigh and walked towards the coffee-maker, with the inner eye still looking back.
He didn’t knew the difference between A.R.Rahman and Ilayaraja, he knew Sachin played cricket, he knew money bought food and clothing. He would eat, play, chat, roam, and study occasionally. He could laugh without practice, he could scorn with meaning, he didn’t need cliches. Like and love were just like and love. That was six years ago.
A drop of hot coffee turned his inner and outer eyes towards the drop, that has fallen on his hand. His colleague laughed.
“Sleeping, huh?”
“No, just thinking :)”
“Dreaming, then :P”
“:)”
“Went the concert?”
“No. I bet you did :)”
“Yeah, I, She, she, he, He, hE, sHe and the TL all went man. You really shouldn’t have missed it …. [lengthy discourse about the awesomeness of the concert]”
“Wow, that was really interesting, dude. Looks like I missed the best musical relish of our times o_O”
“It is. o/”
He went back to the cubicle and now it is the monitor’s turn to stare at him. He replayed the conversation in the mind.
“I want to boast about something to you”
“Shit. You are hooking up for something, aren’t you?”
“Listen to me now”
“Oh! God ass.”
“I want to show off about the groping event I attended in the disguise of listening to a lunatic thumping his drums and blowing his lungs out.”
“So you want to tell, who all you groped?”
“Yeah, she, She, sHe. How’s that? … [lengthy discourse about the awesomeness of the girls and the fun I had]”
“That was super badass of you. Now get the hell out of here”
“Yay. Mission accomplished.”
It has been a wonderful “offer” after all. It has been “6 years of growth”. And the Like and love had a entirely new meaning.