Coffee and Eggs

SHE

She was sitting on the chair, in front of her, rested a cup of brewed coffee with its steam rising and soon the mist dissolved in the air. The silence was near deafening as if, even a pin drop would have been loud. Table seemed neat under golden hue of the ceiling light, though it gently kept collecting thin freckles of dust appearing to fall from nowhere in an otherwise squeaky clean setting. The air inside felt so still as if was like that one memory that tends to forgets leave its space. With the spoon held in her ever so thin drawn fingers, she stirred her drink, to break the ominous silence of her surroundings. The steel of the spoon cringing over the rim of the cup filled the silence with its sound, and the gentle whirl in the cup, moved the memories stranded in the mind.

HE

Eggs- they were always handy. The steel it broke the shell and with a blub came the color-less protein and the yellow fatty blob. He looked at the mess in the bowl, briefly clenched his teeth and then with a frown wondered- when did the growl of the younger years turned into passive meekness?. He glanced at the gooey- stuff with a yellow eye winking at him. It occurred to him as if the yellow blob was smiling at him, like a “smiley” straight out of an modern internet text. The onions, a dash of garlic was already by the side, as meticulously planned.

The pan it sizzled for nice five minutes like a long-shot in a “mallu” movie. It was a matter of time before colorless mess came loud with white brightness and with a tad of crimson-yellow, giving the visual finality of the project. The lifting part from the pan was tough. But a little extra oil was the learning by experience to manage for the flipping-part of the omelet.

The Omelet lay there lonely on the table cherishing its own time and cooling itself off, while he lit his cigarette which seemed to be more essential than the meal at that moment of time, much like an essential component to cherish before celebrating the completion of day to day missions.

The first bite- told it all. Oops, so much for the culinary skills and the dreams about writing and everything with poetry- the salt was missing.

A dash of salt from over the omelet does as much good a job as with the premixed version- was the learning for the day.

The taste resembled something in common with day to day reality too. All was painted nice, looked nice, smelled nice, but while in the mouth- was a bit bland; So much for art of living in the bliss of solitude- hogwash.

Savoring the last bite of his quick meal, he poured his gaze, over the silent TV set, the book shelf at the other end and rested finally on the photo-frame on the table and he took a deep breath. He mulled over his sigh for a moment before lifting himself and puttin the plate into the sink. He then walked over to the refrigerator, gulped the water through the bottle. Staring at the eggs inside the refrigerated he wondered, all said and done, there is whole unknown world that resides under a shell.