We were enjoying Holi, the colour festival on the terrace of a house in our street. We had just moved in this neighbourhood and but for the shaking off of the inhibitions caused by the Holi festival, we might have taken some time to get acquainted with the neighbours.
After having played Holi among ourselves, we started ambushing the passes-by in the street with balloons filled with coloured water. We noticed the same activity from other terraces in the street as well. When there were no passers-by, we would fling balloons at people in adjacent as well as opposite terraces.
One little girl on the opposite terrace was valiantly trying to throw a balloon at me. Every time, her throw would fall short of me and i would encourage her to do better with the next one.
Next day, I found her standing in the street and crying. Asked what the matter was, she said that her father had not returned from the office and she did not have the key. I took her to our home. That ios how I acquired a new friend or how she came to adopt me and my family. She took to coming to our house every day and became more or less a member of the family. This is what happens wherever I am posted. Some or the other child gets attached to us and becomes an additional temporary member.
Her name is Shyamala and I call her Blackie. Blackie is 8 years old and very worldly wise for her age. Her mother, it seems, was away for quite some time and she lived alone with her father or " Fawther " as she would pronounce the word while referring to him. The father sometimes worked till late hours and Blackie would stay in one or the other house in the street awaiting his return. More often than not, ours was the house chosen by her.
By and by she took to helping my wife in the kitchen. Everyday she would come with a comb in her hand to get her hair dressed by my wife. She would play one or the other game with me. Mostly, it was cards.
Once I scolded her for some minor thing. Thereafter for a few days, she would address me as ' somebody '. If she was asked to enquire from me, if I needed tea, she would say " Does somebody need tea ? " If she wanted to play cards, she would say, " I shall play cards with everyone except " somebody ". Her feminine logic meant that I should force her to play as she associated coercion with masculinity. I would ignore her or try to placate her in a grandfatherly fashion or even cajole her in a little boy's fashion. This did not suit her. She wanted me to be a teen-aged male dominating his female playmate. My wife and mother would sometimes hint at the course to be adopted or rather not adopted with her but I would not budge. Finally we came to a compromise and she resumed speaking to me.
Once she seemed to suspect me of prying into her affairs. she assumed the role of a counter-espionage agent. Her first test on me was to bring a Panchtantra comic containing a story of a monkey who got his tail wedged below a heavy falling tree while prying into others' affairs. She expected me to behave in a mollified manner after this broad hint. I asked her bluntly why she wanted me to read this particular story. Why didn't she come out openly and say what she wanted. Her doubts dissolved, she served me my dinner to make up for her error of judgement.
I once told her that I wrote little pieces on women and children. " Would I write one on her ? " was her querry. " May be " I replied. Well, here it is, Blackie. Read it if you can find it, especially since you have gone into hiding expecting me to chase you like a Hindi film hero !
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