I was disturbed, it was beginning to get on my nerve. It was one of those days when you badly want someone to speak to. I saw my mobile lying around the corner, picked it up hastily and was checking numbers on the directory. I began talking to ….

‘Hey, how’re you pal? What’s happening?’

‘Yeah, your call had me awake, I’ve been asleep a long time I guess’

‘Hmm… must’ve been a tiring day for you’

'Trying day rather'

‘Yes, your voice sounds shaky, Is everything alright?’

‘Yes, everything is fine, I just felt like talking’

‘Come on, I know you far too well, why do you hesitate to tell me?’

‘Um, I went through a pretty strange experience yesterday, met a person and he… he blurred out’

‘Blurred? Do you remember what exactly happened?’

‘Yes, I can remember every bit of it. It was 1:01 AM, and I badly needed a break from the cluttered code. I went straight to the coffee machine, helped myself with a cup of coffee’

‘Hmm Hmm’

‘No, Tea. Yeah… right… I took a cup of tea… ’

‘Okay…and…’

‘And I walked down the stairs to reach the smoking area, it was more than an hour I smoked a cig’

‘Was there someone with you?’

‘No’

‘Are you sure? Think… ‘

‘It seemed so, but no one was actually there.’

‘Seemed so? You mean you weren’t sure if there was really someone with you?’

‘Yeah… I know how absurd I sound. I was sure there was someone around, but I couldn’t see anybody - Maybe I just chose to ignore. I was feeling a bit paranoid. Sometimes you feel that way, you feel being watched, being stalked.’

‘Go on…’

‘From a few metres away, I could see someone sitting on the park bench in the smoking area. I felt better, safer (Relieved). I was just a metre away from the guy, he looked very familiar. For a moment I was very sure that I knew him’

‘Can you remember who he was?’

‘No, I thought I knew him, I didn’t know his name. He just looked very familiar and he was actually waiting for someone so that he can light his cigarette. I offered my shiny steel Zippo. I got a glimpse of his face when he clicked the Zippo and I was even more convinced that I knew him. He shot back with a ‘Thanks’ and got back into his thoughts’

‘Did you ask him whether he knew you? Or did you speak to him?’

‘Yeah, I did. I was already feeling lonely and was buckled up with some goddamn piece of code. He looked interesting indeed, and we got into a bit of conversation, ’

‘Anything specific?’

‘Hmmm, was asking him about his work and he wasn’t interested to speak about work’

‘And…’

‘I told him its a nice shirt, You know that I like olive green’

‘Yeah, you have always liked green. What did he say?’

‘He gave me a faint look as if I were talking to myself’

‘Maybe you weren’t loud enough and mumbling to yourself, Did you try to get the conversation going?’

‘Yeah, he was trying to whistle a tune. I asked him if he was trying Floyd’s ‘comfortably numb’’

‘Hmm...’

‘Now I could see a gleaming response, maybe he was interested after he knew that I too liked the song he was trying to whistle’

‘I see… go on’

‘Was telling him that I was a Floyd fanatic, and he was listening. We talked about the Live 8 concert and about ‘The Wall’, where the whole band wanted to play the entire show behind a huge monster wall’

‘Hmm Hmm’

‘His cigarette slipped from his fingers, I tried to tap that off and it had already burnt a hole on his pocket’

‘Oh!’

‘And he was trying to wipe it off from …’

‘Hey, am getting a call, will get back to you soon - I want to talk about this’

I realized that the phone has been ringing in my ears for quite some time; I wasn’t in a mood to pick up and answer. I canceled the call, threw my mobile on my couch and lay down. The green shirt hung on the door, looked really ugly with the cigarette burn.