There are some sounds you could only feel and not hear

“Dude, Can I borrow your bike for a moment?” My colleague was standing next to my chair.

“I am afraid you cannot use it. It is already in reserve and you know that there is no petrol bunks nearby. So..” I said. He and others in office had already got used to me. I cannot lend something of mine. I own very few things. And I dont have anything exclusive. It is the same bike, pen, paper clips, notepad, sticky notes like everybody in the office. But somehow people have a funny habit of not using theirs and to use mine

I was not like this always. I used to lend people things before. Say for example, my old bike. It was a 100 cc bike and it gave very good mileage. People borrowed it from me all the time. I didn’t think it was a big deal. But sometime later, the changes were apparent. It felt like the bike wasn’t mine anymore. The gear didn’t suite my subtle feet nudges. I had to stand up on the brake to make the vehicle stop. I could hear some sounds from the vehicle which I hadn’t heard before and some sounds I felt.

The same happens with the Pens. I may not be possessive of my phone or bike. But pens are special. There are some pens I hold very valuable to me. When I hold it over a paper and let my thoughts wander, they just print it out in the paper. I didn’t mind lending it once, but when it came back and when I started to write with it something was different. I don’t know whether it was the ink or the nib. It refused to move at some places in the notebook and gave a irritating scratchy feeling when I tried to force it. I had to stop using numerous pens just because of this. I might sound crazy and people have told me that it has nothing to do with the pen. But hey, a man will have his own mind games right?

There are so many other examples. Besides, I am a normal guy. I tried hard to get a job and I am happy that I am holding a job for seven years. I am engaged to a girl. We know each other for two years.  Oh, I almost forgot. It is not only things like pen and bike. When I first joined the company, I was made responsible for a particular project. I had a great team and we put our heart and soul into it. The project was roaring success and got stabilized before the date we had committed. We were moved to different projects. We gave the expected results. After three years, when I was moved back to the same project because of the client request, I could see nothing was same. I mean 98% was same as before. There were some process changes/ developments and while imagining the smooth running of the process, I could hear those imaginary creaky sounds which made me go insane. I had to quit the project and take up a new one.

To avoid questions like my colleague asked, I never fill full tank petrol in my bike. It had to be in reserve for my excuse to work. It was after seven I could get off work. And to swim in the traffic is a nightmare. It took me 45 minutes to wade through traffic and reach home. A hot shower somewhat soothed my nerves after the hectic day. She was in the living room reading some random magazine. When I came out of the shower, she walked to me and gave me a hug.

“You must be hungry. I will fix something for dinner” she said.

I thought she loved me. Some imaginary sound started creaking in my head.