Rajiv

“Papa look a Green Eyed Monster” (An exercise in speed writing – time spent, almost 22 minutes.)

Ding dong, ding dong, the bell was donging crazy. “wait, wait, coming” I shouted and opened the door. It was my son, frightened and edgy. “Bhoot” he screamed. “papa Bhoot.”
“Where.”
“There in the lift”.
“Where?” I went towards the lift and he trailed behind me, I opened the door, “where?”
“He was right here behind me. He follows me in, every time I enter the lift.”
Back in his room, he had many things to say about him, like: “I don’t ever see him directly, he always follows me when I am alone, always hiding behind my back.” and he said all this with great drama; first he would modulate his voice as if he was about to tell you something eerie, then he would stare at you with swollen nostrils wide eyed and blurp: “He has green eyes papa, dark green and shining.”
“Shining!!! “
“Yes like a torch.”
“Does he talk to you.”
“Never.”
“What does he do?”
“He follows me in the lift and stands behind me, I think he wants to eat the back of my head.”
“And why in the world would he want to do that”
“To frighten me, I think he likes to frighten people.”
“Well then, he must be a poor hungry goblin.”
“Goblin!”
“Yes, they feed off peoples fear”
“How can you eat someone’s fear.”
“How can I know, but I know one thing, don’t let him know that you are afraid of him and he will vanish into thin air.”
“Really Papa.”
“Absolutely.”

Next evening the bell again went ding dong crazy. “coming baba”, and as expected it was him.
“Papa!” he shouted excited. “He is gone.“
“Gone!”
“Yes papa, when I entered the lift, I warned him not to trouble me, I told him that he is not going to get any food here, look else where, go to Runu (a girl of his age who lives next block) or better go to Rishabh, he is fat and you will get plenty to eat there, and as the lift moved up he made a loud growling noise, like our cars engine and vanished. I ran down the steps and called the lift down and I could no longer see him.”
“Great” I said. “Come lets party.”
“Pizza!” he said “should I order.”
Well I didn’t have Dominos in mind exactly, but samosas and coke at best, never mind; In half an hour we were chewing our way into 500 rupees note.
These demons are quite costly I tell you…anyway -There is something I want to confess about my child that I haven’t told you yet. He is dyslexic. We noticed this when he would write his ‘b’ as ‘d’ and had difficulty spelling words. But there was a curious element to all this, he would sometimes hear and taste colors, for example red would be tasty and apple like, and spoons would be clink; for example when I see a spoon, I only see its visual form. In the case of my son, he would also hear a clink, every visual element would also be saturated by corresponding aural attributes. This I believe to some extent explains his extraordinary talent with the sitar which he plays like a maestro and he is just six.

Well atleast the green eyed danav (demon) has been taken care of.
“Papa papa!” Oops I must have spoken too soon.
“Papa Papa!” I traced his voice to the bathroom, and there he was sitting on the pot and staring at the door.
“What is it” I asked.
“He is here.”
“Who, where.”
“He hid himself when he heard you coming.”
So now I have to stand here in his toilet.. till he is finished.  “There are no green eyed monsters” I exclaimed, now a bit irritated.
“He is.” he contended. “I think he wants to switch off the light.”
oouf..these kids, I am sometimes jealous of them, I wish that for one day I could become him and he me.
“What switch” I holloed, and “if you don’t get over with potty fast I will definitely switch it off.. myself.”
“Sweet papa,” he said in a almost pleading voice. “you just stand there and watch out for that light switch.”

I tell you, I have to find a way to exorcise this one.

(to be continued)

© RajivMudgal., all rights reserved.