Deepak sat without any expression or emotion. His eyes lost into the screen of the computer; his hands moved over the keyboards to type and access the shortcut keys aligning with the movement of the mouse.
Deepak was a video editor and one of the clients of the company had suggested some changes, which were surely labelled as ‘suggestions’ but were more like ‘you have to do it’. The team had done their work before time but little did, they knew that the two weeks they had saved would end up becoming the most difficult ones.
This was not an isolated case. It happened very often, clients often approving samples only to come to the realisation of wanting something else partially or entirely.
Deepak was used to these late hours, although they weren’t easy, especially since the company had stopped paying overtime, making it sound like, ‘there were talks of firing employees but then we decided upon managing expenses, hence no overtime for now, we will think about bringing it back in the future.’ It had been more than two years since the words had been uttered.
Deepak could feel his eyes drying up and blinked a few times to feel a sense of normality in them. He promised to meet his girlfriend, something which he had not been able to do for a long time and telling her that he wouldn’t be able to come wasn’t easy. Maybe it was time for the feared ‘how do we move forward from here talk’.
Deepak looked to his right and found his manager looking over at the work of one of his colleagues and Deepak knew soon the manager would walk over to him and ask the same question he had asked for countless number of times about how much work had been completed along with the reminder of how much work he wanted to be done and only then could Deepak leave the office.
Deepak turned to his colleague on left who looked dead inside and Deepak could hear the footsteps coming and then they stopped near him and before he could hear any words, Deepak spoke first, “I am not doing it, not for another minute, I don’t want to do it this late, I am going home and from tomorrow I will go home on time. Any word which you speak and it does not make me feel better will be returned to you in a manner you won’t like and I cannot guarantee that it might not be accompanied by something more violent in nature.”
The manager looked surprised as he stared at Deepak’s face and he spoke, “Are you all right?”
Deepak responded, “Yes, just working to finish the task”
“For a moment there I was worried when you looked at me like you wanted to say something and didn’t say anything for a while. Well, get a cup of coffee or something and keep up with the good work, I will surely remember it during the time of increment,” said the manager as he walked by and Deepak once again resumed his work in silence
Written by Anuran Chatterji
Early Morning Memories 