Fear has a new address

That was the note he left. Vijayan hadn'tshow any signs of worry, fear or despair. So when he disappeared from office all of a sudden, the shock was too rude. Everybody was spreading around their versions of the story. But none of the reasons seemed convincing, to me at least.
A week passed by and by now the fear was raging epidemically as more such cases of sudden disappearances started surfacing. All chit-chats were centred on this single 'issue'. The new IPL ad seemed prophetic now. Even at home, my roommates shared similar incidents involving their colleagues. A lot of these cases had untraceable causes ( and subjects) and each of the rest had numerous causes speculated. The most prominent of them; getting two '2's. Initially it was only the appraisal rating that people were applying this criteria to. With time and a rising headcount people started getting hysterical about the two 2 's theory. Some started changing their phone numbers, others shifted their cubicles and all in the process were crossing unattainable levels of stupidity. "Catch 22 situation" It was called. I asked one of my group of 'believing' friends about how this was related to Vijayan's note that had the number "13" and not 22. Someone said " 3 minus 1 ...Two..""Fine..but where's the other two?" I retorted. Mr. Five pointer answered " 3 plus 1 is 4 and two 2 s are 4..that's it." I was stunned. "You better stay away from it" he added.
Shocking or Ridiculous??? I was confused. as scenes from movies like Number 23 and 13B started running through my mind and I now starting counting my TWO bits..None since I'd started working..But ...my Birthday ...22nd DEC...Suddenly a shiver as cold as Titanic's climax ran down my spine. But that eternal optimist in me still felt that the Logic seemed skewed. But that seemed normal around here, especially with Numbers. People considered 3.99 as 3 and then blamed Arithmetic Atyachar on weirdly shaped curve. (It's got to be the only curve that I hate.) And the rusted Irony...they call the process NORMALisation.With pretty decent appraisals so far, that devil seemed too far to be feared. This was something else, I was sure. With my eyes fixed at the code ahead and mind counting the number of 'if' s and 'else if' s of the possible dreaded logic, I had entered an infinite loop. The loop broke with a "New Mail" pop up. Hoping for some relief I opened the mail only to realise that it was like a spray of iodised salt and black pepper being showered on an fresh and open wound of the size of a fist with an adamant middle finger. Our project was being scrapped and all of us were to be released this week itself. Before I could drown into sorrow I turned towards my Teammate for some company. Rakesh with his consoling but confused smile asked me "Next is what??" and started giggling. I used line that quite often after I'd picked it from a Samsung ad. And the last I had used it was two weeks ago. Vijayan had just got released and was going to....Before the sound of that Thunder could end and the loud BGM begin, I leapt over to Vijayan's place to check his note. The one that was written with blood coloured ink using MS Paint. As I took the print out in my trembling hands, I realised that all I had to do was connect the dots, all of them. The joy of solving the mystery rammed straight into the chances and fear of me being the next victim of the curse. You can run from it. You can even hide from it. But you can't sit on the BENCH.