Corporate Boredom

Although Mr. Dev is preternaturally kind, and has the most sympathetic tone of voice I have come across since KM Sir in school, I feel quite sheepish about approaching him for work. Today I asked him twice (just twice!?): "Can I help out with something?"

It seems almost evident to me that he really doesn't have work to assign.

After asking him (twice) for work, I sat at my provisional desk three cubicles away and listened distractedly to Beirut. Every twenty-five minutes or so, I would look fleetingly in his direction and then duck - hoping that he would notice me, but also hoping that he wouldn't.

When I was about to leave, I went up to him, gestured towards the exit, and said, "I should be off. Have to get the bus out." He nodded politely, and I felt like the flab on someone's arm. While striding out (ah, with legs as long as mine are, 'striding' is quite inevitable), I thought of how like a parasite I am - occupying prime office space, consuming coffee, gratis, etc.

Then I thought, maybe my not having asked for work a third time should be interpreted in light of some stout rebel in me - one that sticks its grisly tongue out at mammoth advertising corporations that have employees with proportionately-sized egos. But I suppose I'm a rebel only insofar as rebellion contains cowardice - for what prevented me from approaching Mr. Dev for a third time was just that. Comparable, I suppose, to the way a child who's just been snubbed by her benefactor might draw a bloated image of that benefactor with big, black teeth and purple hair.