Disclaimer: This work been inspired by my love for food. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of my imagination, or entirely (painfully) true. And of course, like always, any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental.
“What’s that sound?” asks my colleague. Almost immediately, everybody stops working.
“Did you guys hear that?” he asks us again.
A few of them shake their heads, and go back to working again. I follow suit.
“Z?” my colleague nearly shouts into my ear, making me jump. “Don’t tell me you didn’t hear it?”
Chhole Bhature: My twice-a-week go-to option for lunch (Wikimedia Commons)
“What are you talking about?” I reply with a shrug, and quickly add, “Maybe, it was Jesus calling out to you.”
I laugh, but inside I am dying.
“Grrr…grrr,” my stomach rumbles again.
Shut up, you idiot!
Scene 1
Have you ever felt important, so much so that you start believing that you are starring in a million-dollar movie? I feel that every time I am nearing the end of an article, and want to give it a spectacular ending. But, here’s the truth—I am not supposed to think like that too often. Because, it’s almost always then that I invite trouble for myself.
“C’mon,” says a colleague. “Let’s go get lunch?”
Oh! The sweet call of food! How did I forget how hungry I was?
I am about to grab hold of my purse when something catches my eye—the words on my laptop screen.
“NO! NO! NO!” they shriek. “You aren’t done yet; you are not allowed to leave.”
“Z, you want to come or not?” my colleague repeats. I stare at her, and then at everybody else who is heading towards the canteen.
“Oh, no…I am not hungry. I’ll eat later,” I tell her, rather courageously.
By the time my colleagues are back, I have managed to write only two sentences.
Scene 2
“The man wore a pink tie to his office, which has a hole in the middle…”
I stare at the sentence on my laptop screen for nearly 10 minutes after typing it. There is something wrong with it, my brain cries out loud, but I cannot, for the life of me, figure out what it is. Because, the only thing I can think of right now is food. If only I could bite into a pizza, feel the cheese travel down my throat, and into my stomach. Thud!
Writing makes you hungry, thinking makes you hungry. Everybody knows that. It definitely doesn’t count that I just polished off a plate of choley bhaturey, two pieces of fried chicken, a glass of cold coffee…
That feeling when everyone’s started eating, but I’m still staring at a blank Word Doc. (Pexels.com)
“Z, are you done with the article?” my colleague calls out to me. I am immediately shaken out of my reverie, and look up to smile at him weakly. He doesn’t smile back.
“Done or not?” he repeats, his eyes perhaps assessing me for signs of insouciance.
“Almost,” I say, lying for the seventh time that day.
Scene 3
Today is Friday. I am finishing an article that is boring me to death, but guess what, we’ll all be ordering in food, and that is what is keeping me sane.
“Hey! How about some biryani today?” somebody suggests. Instantly, an intense discussion follows.
“No, man…not today…How about Chinese?”
“Chinese is not good for your health. Let’s order salad?”
“Eww. Who eats salad for lunch on a Friday? How about fried chicken?”
“I don’t eat non-veg on Fridays.”
“Fridays? Really? What’s there on Fridays?”
“Friday is when Goddess…..”
*One hour later*
“Hey…let’s just finish looking at this brief and then order?”
*Two hours later*
“Guys, we got a conference call…”
*Five hours later*
“Guys, what are we ordering?”
And I, honestly, am yet to finish my article.
(Cover image credit: Pexels.com)
