The Three Legged Tea Table

She came towards them and greeted them. “Hello Guys! It’s really horrible to get transportation on a rainy weather. I had to wait for quite a while before I get a bus.” She takes the only available chair and sat. “Ooh!! I am feeling hungry. Did you guys order something?” Both Deepak and Subhashis nodded their head; “But we two are also very hungry” added Subhashis. Anuraddha ordered Chicken Spiral Pasta, Chicken Steak and Black Forest Pudding. “So Anu, how is the office going?” Deepak asked. “It's fine, the only problem was that no matter how much pressure we put the deadline always catches us before we finish. And my boss Supriya Madam, these days she is on the edge of her nerves. Well I can’t blame her, these days headquarter sent one of their representatives named Julie, Julie Francis Andrews, to oversee the operation of their branch office and my boss hardly misses any chance to impress her. And her favourite show-off is shouting at us.” Both Deepak and Subhashis laughed “Though Julie is a gem of a lady; she has so many stories to tell. Frequently she takes our team to lunch and then she really opens up and shares her experiences.” “What about you guys?” she asked back. “Well, for me there have not been many ups and downs at office. As you all know my workplace is quite uneventful and boring. All my workmates are also quite boring. They prefer to come to the office on time, complete their work and leave after completing. We don’t have any bossy boss like Anu’s or any colourful characters like Subha’s colleagues. I am really deprived of these spices at office front. Sometimes I really feel like running from this office. It’s really boring at times.” Deepak paused “But recently something really interesting happened in my aunt’s family. I am sure you two remember Shila aunty, whose husband is a famous doctor and her son, is an engineer studying in USA and her daughter is a doctor, who against everyone’s wish went to the rural village to practice.” Both Subhashis and Anuraddha said that they did very well remember. “Well, she returned last week. I went to my aunt’s house to give Ruku di a visit. She had a long story to tell.” “What about you Subha?” Deepak asked. The waiter came and placed their orders. For the next few minutes all of them kept on concentrating on the food. All of them seemed quite hungry. After they finished their pasta, steak followed by the pudding, they ordered two cups of tea and a cup of cappuccino. Anuraddha went to use the washroom. On returning with a fresh coat of lipstick, she found their respective beverages already served. “So Subha, tell us how is your multinational running?” Anuraddha sometimes teased Subhashis by sarcastically terming his office as multinational. It was true that it indeed was a reputed multinational but she used to tease him due it its strict business etiquette and strict dress code. They are not even allowed casual on weekends and even suspended few employees for breaking the rule. Anuraddha even teased him by saying him to go to bed by wearing formal dress and tie or else he would be suspended if his superior found him not properly dressed when they would come in his dream. Subhashis said “This week in office was different. Previous week, while at office, suddenly my senior Sudip da received a call and left in a hurry, he didn’t answer to anyone then. This week, after he joined, he broke a story to us. We came to know he suddenly had to go to North Bengal. All of us who were present there were completely awestruck by what we heard. It was something we all didn’t expect. He told us the story of his friend, another senior at the office named Amit do. Though I personally did not work with him or know much about him, I only knew him by his face though I knew that both Sudip and Amit were really close friends. The rest of the week, the story becomes our major point of discussion. Everywhere, in the cafeteria or in the men’s room, someone or the other were discussing about it.” “What is the story?” both Deepak and Anuraddha asked curiously at the same time. “This weather is perfect for stories as we couldn’t go outside, though I thought to visit the nearby mall, but this weather killed my mood to step outside. So let us hear the story. Listening to stories is really great way to pass your time.” Anuraddha added. Subhashis picked his cup and took a large sip. He put the cup down and began…… RAT – TAT – TAT When Amit came into the bungalow, it was raining heavily. Amit heard about this old British bungalow from his colleague, Sudip. Sudip visited this part of North Bengal a couple of years ago with his family and quite accidentally, he saw that bungalow. Their jeep, while going from Kurseong to Darjeeling had a flat tire at a place near this bungalow. This wooden bungalow in a quiet place looked to have perfectly fitted on the lap of the nature. The place looked very calm and quiet with nice flora and fauna around it. A name of some British officer’s was inscribed on the door, which Sudip could not recall, while narrating the story to Amit. Sudip could view the nice and perfect vision of the mighty Kanchenjunga from that spot. He imagined that the occupants were so lucky that they used to get the nice view daily from their bedroom windows. But the bungalow seemed quite uninhabited to Sudip. In the meantime, their driver came and told him that the jeep was ready. He asked the driver about the bungalow. The driver told him not to go to those unknown places alone. Long time ago, this place belonged to some army officer but now a day, nobody lived there.