small talk

(As it happened)

I usually do not drink coffee. However, as events need to turn out the way they need to turn out for the subsequent story to be written, I was swamped by an uncontrollable urge yesterday in the morning to drink coffee. So I ambled to the office cafeteria to get myself a cup of coffee.

On those rare occasions when I drink coffee, I drink it with a lot of milk and sugar. But yesterday was a day when the waitress would ask me if I would like a black coffee and I would say yes.

As if cutting down one sachet of sugar could turn my well developed single pack into starved six packs, I skipped the condiments area as well.

It was only when I was back at my desk did I realise that it was better to stick to the usual.

I now had two choices. I could either walk back to the cafeteria to fill my cup with milk and dump a bag of sugar on to it or walk across to the side of the building I usually keep away from, to the refreshment area that had milk and sugar.

No brownie points for guessing where I went. The refreshment area was very small. It was literally a hole in the wall with space just enough for two people to stand next to each other.

As the coffee turned from black to light brown, I turned around to go back to my desk; only that the way out was blocked by a lady I had never seen before in my part of the building.

'Uh, I feel so tired', She started.

As it was less than 24 hours since I took a resolution to learn to do small talk and pretend to be a little more social, I said 'It is Monday morning. What do you expect? So is everyone.' This in hindsight is not a great line to open a conversation.

But nevertheless, she continued on, 'I have a house with gardens on three of its sides. For four hours yesterday I was out in the sun gardening.' I thought, 'Now, that is small talk!'

Just then I saw Mary walk towards us to the refreshment area and stand behind this lady.

The lady continued on, not noticing that someone was behind her, 'I was on my knees for four hours. It was soooo tiring.' To emphasise her tiredness, she started to moan out very loudly.

I can't say that I get turned on by someone moaning in close proximity (How often does someone come close to you and start moaning?), but I was very turned on by the sounds she was making.

The expression on Mary's face only confirmed that she must have heard only part of the conversation.

Not wanting to prolong this any further, I squeezed past the lady, who was still oblivious of the effect she was having on the people around, to walk out from the area.

It was only after I saw Mary's wide open mouth and stunned stare on to my pants did I realise that I had a distinctive boner.

Since then, I have been unsuccessfully browsing the Internet to buy Harry Potter's cloak of invisibility.