Terminological Inexactitude

I quite like Colty who just informed office he won't be coming today. Who wouldn't like a colleague who calls up his boss and weeps his inability to come to office because he's feeling extraordinarily manic-depressive and needs those 8 hours of precious office time to sort out his despair? So this was going to be one of the no-Colty days when some indefinable but grand disorder ails Colty and prevents his ass from sticking 2 his regular corner seat at the office (Colty's affinity for corner seats rivals only chlorine's affinity for hydrogen)...

I'll miss him...Sigh! And then my phone rings:"Colty calling..."

I press the green button but Colty at the other end hears no answer as I just greeted him with silence as he had instructed me yesterday ("For God's sake Mimi, don't ever say a 'Hello' when I call! It depresses me - Ugh, you summon the ordinariness of the world with your prosaic 'Hello'! )

Colty says cautiously, as if a thief may be lurking somwhere in his room or perhaps as if a thief was indeed at the other end of the line:"Hello?"

"Hmm?" I say.

"Hell Mimi! Can't you just say a simple 'Hello' since a normal, reassuring 'Hello' is all I wanted to hear to make me feel the world is fine?"

"Hello!"

"No, wait. I'll cut the line, and call again and we begin with your hello? OK?"

Does he suffer from obsessive-compulsive disorder too? The line goes dead, and the phone rings again. Deja vu?

"Hello?" I co-operate.

"Hi Mimi! Wassup?!" he asks.

He sounds suspiciously happy for a fella down in the dumps!

"You ok Colty?"

"Yup! Not particularly well...Just one of those passing phases..."

"I know...This too shall pass..."

"It has passed...away"

"What?"

"This phase"

"So you OK now?"

"Sort of..."

"Coming to office?"

"No...Need to recuperate..This post-sickness phase is the most excruciating period of all...Requires bedrest..Lots of water...With a little makeout session thrown in..."

"Hmm...So what exactly happened?"

"Nuthin."

"Nuthin?"

"Nuthin."

Like King Lear chiding Cordelia, I feel like quipping: "Nothing will come out of nothing!" But I resist the temptation...Besides, it'd be wasted on Colty anyway!

"You ok then?" is all I ask.

"Hmm..."

"We thought..."

"Who?"

"We..."

"Who we?"

"We...Everyone at office!"
How long, Lord, how long - I think in mock exasperation. Can't he follow simple words?
"Ah! Them! Say 'them' Mimi! Now proceed..."

"We thought you must be locked up in a dark room, wrestling with your private demons..."

"You got a vivid imagination Mimi, like mine..Eeeeeet eeeeeees a compliment...So say gracias!"

"Gracias!"

"Btw Mimi, need a lil help..."

"Go ahead! Beg and crawl for it on all fours!" I say.

"Huh! What do the Englishmen say, Mimi? 'The answer is in plural and they bounce'?"

"Ugh! Colty! Hold your tongue!" I pretend to be scandalised by the five-letter word.

"No more nonsense. We got business at hand. At 8.30 pm precisely, when the movie gets over and the credits start rolling in, will you call me and say my Uncle's just had a coronary?"

"Colty! Are you..."

"Yes I am..."

"What?"

"Whatever it is that you think I am!"

"Uh...OK.."

"You'll call?"

"Yeah...But why this desperate deception? Not that it's unlike you..."

"Mme and I are gonna catch a movie. And later, she'd expect to be fed. And you know how she likes to feed only at certain establishments. And you also know how these certain establishments fleece a guy like me when I'm..."

"...Broke, as usual, huh?" I completed the sentence.

"Yup! So well you know me! Will you do it?"

"Your lil act is a - what do the Englishmen say for a lie -'Terminological inexactitude'? Still, I'll play along!"

"Good old sport! Have I ever told you lately that you are a gem, Mimi?"

"Prefer to remain a homo sapiens..."

"Just a metaphor..."

"I know! Thanks! Ok, Colty! Done! Have fun!"

"Thanks! See ya tomorrow ! Bye!"

"Bye!"

"Wait..."

"What now?" I am cheesed off.

"My love to office people!"

"Sure!"

At 8:30 sharp, I ring him up and Colty gets a bit too theatrical with :"No, no, no! Mimi, Don't tell me he's serious! Gawd, my only uncle!" He conveys to Mme his Uncle's impending departure for his heavenly abode, and with that, he departs...for his earthly abode. Mme was to later confess to me she had no clue Colty could disappear in a second, as if some invisible hand had just brushed an invisible coat of paint on Colty...At 9 pm, I get a text message from Colty, the unacknowledged humbug of a poet: "Roses r red, Violets r blue, Buddies like u, R 2 b kissed on the head :)"