Table Manners

While waiting for someone to show up at a Chinese joint, I couldn't help but overhear a couple's banter on the opposite table. The guy looked like as if he had skipped his date with the gym to be with the girl. The lady, it was quite obvious, liked the dude but the dude was playing it cool. A little too cool. Maybe. The boy had broken up and the girl was busy trying to coax some vital information out of that gym manufactured body.

I think you should just go back to her...

NO WAY!

So you are over her...?

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah

I don't think so...what if you see her here...say on that table with someone else?

The dude and the girl both look towards me; I'm alone. Waiting for someone, maybe that Jane Doe is the one I await. If that happened it would be the best example of how small this world can really be.

It won't make a difference to me!

She just smiles and manages to mouths 'good' but there is no sound that accompanies the word.

They are eating some sesame seed laden snack and washing it down with beer. The seeds play havoc on then woman's system and suddenly she starts sniffling like crazy. That’s the end of the snacks.

Back to the beer.

She looks at him and waits for him to say something. It’s so obvious that he fascinates her but he just doesn’t budge. Is he dumb? Or he just looks dumb? She starts liming her beer and she waits.

He lights a cigarette. She makes a face. This could be trouble.

She undoes her hair and the band hold it rests in her hand; she plays with it while her hair behaves like an old lover- hanging precariously on her left shoulder refusing to fall.

She starts the game again.

Give me some.

Points towards the cigarette.

This is the point where the guy should just pass the one he’s puffing on for it will take the conversation to the next level. Maybe that’s what she wants but he has other plans and offers her a brand new stick.

She looses the plot and in just a whiff of nicotine-laced smoke everything of the last seven minutes goes down the drain. She looks around and nothing comes to her mind.

She mulls over it for a while.

The guy looks at her like an expectant pup.

She gives in. Decides to try it out once more.

Haven’t been to 4S in a long time…

Oh I was at Stone yesterday….

I don’t like Stone…there is no place like Toto’s here in Delhi…

I like Mumbai…

No way I prefer Delhi…….

Opposites attract?

Image Courtesy: Prince George Theatre Workshop