The Enemy

1

The fan rotating in the warm morning was making the paper kept in front flap around, the long haired woman dressed in a purple saree, smoothed the unruly paper with her long fingered hand and wrote 'Miss Varsha G', Guest lecturer and signed under it with a blue point pen. She straightened up and joined an equally tall, beautiful woman and an even taller man.

"I will give your the joining report in the evening", the office secretary, Meera said to her as she took the paper. "Just walk out of the office and on the left side on the corridor there is a door marked 'Common staff room'. Its the room for the guest faculties . There are five tables and chairs, since no one is currently using them, you can pick whichever you like. And do go and meet Dr Varkey, he is in-charge of the time tables" .

The trio of guest lecturers thanked her and before they left the office of the Computer Science department, Meera said, "Sorry I forgot to say! Welcome to the department!"

They thanked her once again and went in search of the room. The corridor was long and dusty because of the steps of hundreds of students. Either sides, there were classrooms and finally they reached and opened the door  marked 'Common Staff Room' and immediately, the beautiful woman said, "I will pick this one. What about you, Dr Abel?" she said looking at the tall man as she pointed at the table and chair made of wood that was kept next to the window. The room was spacious and the furniture were kept at a distance to give some space to the user. On the walls were there were no windows, steel racks and cupboards were arranged.

"This appears fine, Dr Devi" said Abel as he took one next to the door. "Which one are you picking, Varsha?"

Varsha looked around with her large observant eyes and said, "That one". She was pointing towards the a table at the end of the room. She had carefully chosen a seat from which she could observe everyone who came into the room before they could observe her. They kept their belongings on their tables and proceeded to the cabin of Dr Varkey to sort out their time tables. At the far end of the corridor was a very large room for permanent faculties which was divided into individual cabins using glass walls. Dr Varkey was a tall thin man, who looked serious because of his glasses and white hair. He quickly gave them the preliminary time table and asked them to note down the subjects they would be taking so that he could finalize the it for all the semesters of B. Tech Computer Science. After walking out they were greeted by two men, "Hi guys, you must be the new guest faculty", said the older of the two. "I am Dr Jayan and this is Dr Govind, we are both Assistant Professors. I am not sure of your names".

So the trio introduced themselves to the two senior faculties. Devi and Abel both had got their PhD from reputed institutes and Abel had taught in a college for a year for first year students and was glad he won't have to handle them here, while Varsha had just finished her M. Tech. After talking to Devi and Abel they turned to Varsha.

"So what are you teaching, Madam?" asked Govind.

"I will be teaching Information theory and an elective and I have to find out  from the permanent faculty between tutoring Logic Design Lab or Programming Lab", she replied politely.

"For that you have to meet Dr Abhiram. That's his office, but I don't think he is there", said Jayan pointing towards a dark cabin. Seeing that they could not settle it, the trio thanked their seniors and went their way.

"What do you think?" asked Jayan to Govind.

"What?" asked Govind suspiciously.

"What do you think of the new lady colleagues?" bugged Jayan.

"Dr Devi is very beautiful..." said Govind.

"But it was difficult to take your eyes off Varsha?" Jayan asked slyly to which Govind sheepishly nodded.