… “I had a dream, I had died.” Bibek said, sipping his beer. “I had to be dead in my dream to find out I’m nobody.” “You care to tell me about your dream?” I asked. In my defense, I was no less drunk than he was. “Only if you promise that you won’t interrupt.” “I swear on my Blue Moon.” A moment later, Bibek started. “I was dead but I didn’t know. I headed to my office … “I swiped my access card in front of the magnetic reader by the side of the entrance door and pulled the handle, but the glass door did not open. I tried it again. And again. And again, before realizing my card had been deactivated. When the receptionist opened the door for two guests with temporary badges, I sneaked behind them. Nobody saw me. I was dead. “I took the elevator. Nobody in the elevator noticed me. I went to my cubicle. Except for one green highlighter, a stapler, two yellow notebooks, and a pad of pink sticky notes, everything from my cubicle had been removed. I looked at other cubicles around me. Nobody from my team was there. I knew where they were. I walked to the North Conference Room, next to the receptionist’s counter, where my manager was holding a team meeting. I sat in the corner, farthest from my manager. I heard people talk about me. Everyone said nice things about me. All four women from my team were in that meeting. I looked at those women’s eyes. Except Amy’s, the other six eyes were dry. I was not surprised others did not cry, neither was I surprised that Amy did; she was a wonderful, moral woman, who always found a reason to like everyone. She liked me because we both passionately hated our company’s ethics and security trainings. Once the meeting shifted to work, my manager was more focused on finding out where I had kept the software deployment documents that I was working on. “ “I don’t think they’re checked in yet.” Dale said. I always knew Dale wanted my job. Now there was an opening, he was not going to let that opportunity slip by him. “I had checked in all my documents on Friday, the day before I had died. But who was I going to tell in that room? I did not have a voice. I did not see my need there, so I walked out of the meeting room. Nobody saw me. “In the corridor, I heard two employees from another group talk. I stopped right in front of them and listened to them. They did not see me. I did not know the name of the stocky white guy. I always assumed he was Sam. If he was not Sam, he was Dan. He was so stocky that I could not imagine space for more than a three-letter name in his body. I knew the Indian guy who was talking to him; his name was Kiran. Kiran’s face bore an uncanny resemblance to his bi-gender name, but his voice was so deep that he sounded like he had accidentally swallowed a bass drum. They started talking about me. Kiran: Did you hear Bibek died? Sam/Dan: Who’s that? Kiran: The tall guy with glasses from POS project. Sam/Dan: Jesus! From our program?… Jesus! I still can’t put a face to that name. But Jesus! From POS, you said? Rosario’s project? Kiran: Yeah. Sam/Dan: What was his name again? Kiran: Bibek. Sam/Dan: Doesn’t ring a bell. Was he a DBA? Kiran: He was not a DBA. I don’t know what he exactly did. Remember, he was with us in the elevator a week ago? After he got off on the second floor, you said his shirt smelled of spices. Sam/Dan: Jesus! The kinda chubby Indian guy? Kiran: Yes. He was from Nepal though. Sam/Dan: What’s Neypaul? Another country? Kiran: Yeah. A small country near Tibet. Sam/Dan: Jesus! This is horrible, horrible news. He was young. Jesus! You said Tibet? As in Richard Gere Tibet? Kiran: Yeah, that Tibet. Sam/Dan: He has kids? Kiran: Who? Richard Gere? Sam/Dan: No the guy who passed away. The guy from Neypaul. Kiran: I don’t even know if he was married. “Kiran, I’m married. My wife’s expecting twins. How come you don’t know? How did I manage to be this irrelevant? I started shouting. But nobody heard me. “Sam or Dan, you and I were in the same room for three hours during the data migration meeting. I even said a funny joke about not all children being cute. You laughed the loudest. How come you don’t remember me Sam? Or Dan? Stocky guy? “I was definitely screaming. Although, only I heard me, I heard me loud. “I walked away from my office. I was near my home. I watched two of my neighbors talk about me. One was asking the other, “He’s gone? The guy who never mowed his lawn? “I drifted again … “Now I was among my Virginia acquaintances who were struggling to say one nice thing about me, until one said, “He used to write interesting stuff on his Facebook.” “I drifted again … “I heard my wife’s cousin asking her husband, “We don’t have to cancel Neha’s birthday party, do we? We still have two weeks.” “I drifted again … “And I heard those two images inside my wife’s tummy. Baby A: “I’m hungry.” Baby B: “Me too.” Baby A: “Why is she not eating anymore?” Baby B: “I don’t know. I hear so many voices outside, but I don’t hear anyone laughing.” Baby A: “I hear them too. But I don’t hear that one voice who used to be here all the time. The one who always sounded annoyed at us. Where’s he?” Baby B: “I don’t hear him either. I don’t miss him though. Good riddance.” Baby A: “Good riddance.” And then Bibek finally came back. “You know what Pramod? When I died in my dream, I woke up and started to think, who’s that one person that I wanna be. Who’s that one person you wanna be, Pramod?” “I wanna be Bibek, so I can confess to the world it was my dream. There’s just one of us. There’s no Bibek.”
Posted on: Sun, 06 Apr 2014 01:35:34 +0000
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