Smiles all over the face of this little kid as her mother dresses her up. She is 8 years old and looked charming in her shining little frock as her mother combed her hair back and tied a small pony tail. She was going to watch a movie with her elder brother who is getting ready in the adjacent room and their father was taking them out for a movie and followed by a dinner. At least that was the promised part by the little one’s father.
Their father was a small entrepreneur owning a small industry which manufactured t-shirts on a small scale. He would be running around procuring things and managing his labor force. She used to see her father thrice a day for sure, once early morning to drop her to the bus-stop where the school bus would come and pick her up, the next when she returns from school, he would be taking a nap or having lunch, and finally before sleep when he might be just back from work or watching TV series.
The brother who was getting ready in the adjacent room was in high school. A year more and then college. He was 17 years and much elder than the little one. They had their fights and the little kid would get bashed up as she was physically so little as compared to her older brother. He was busy with his high school friends, Soccer team and his life that little did he appreciate her cuteness and her little life which completely revolved around her Dadda, Mamma and her sweet brother.
The family haven’t been for any outings in a long while. The perils of being a so called small business man is that the market scenario would change every week. Their business was not doing that great in the recent times and he was also new into business. So it would take him at least 5 years to reap out something from the current business. That too if he survived in the market that long. Many people come and go in business field, not all make it big.
This explains the little kid’s obvious joy. There was only a one in a dozen chance that she would know anything about a movie, but going out after a long time mattered more than the movie or the food to follow.
After her mother dressed her up, she runs out of her room to see her brother’s progress. The boy was also wearing his favorite English Club soccer jersey which his father had bought him a year back. With the jersey on and his hair properly combed now the wait was for their father to arrive. It was nearing 5:00 pm and the movie started at 6:00 pm in the evening.
The brother switches on the TV and watches soccer. The kid doing back and forth from room to room, looking at her silky chocolate frock and checking how good it is in front of the mirror. Occasionally running back to her mother and running around her. She would dance in front of the mirror and again run back to her brother to check on him. Seeing that he is engrossed in some soccer match, she would go back to her room again.
It’s almost 5:45 pm. The boy is worried. He smells again that this is not going to happen. The little one is ignorant to the fact that there is a time schedule to watch a movie, so she didn’t bother.
At 5:50 pm, the tired father comes home. He drops himself half dead on sofa. As he sits there, the kids enter the room timid and silent. They stood eagerly at the other end of the room waiting for their father to start the conversation. But he never took notice of the kids standing.
Finally the little girl speaks to her father in all her innocence to get ready to go out.
The father surprisingly looks at the kids who are dressed up. The elder one reminds him of the promise he made in the morning.
The father smiles and rather easily brushes aside the thought of going for a movie. He tries to convince the boy that it had been a long, tiring day and he can’t afford to spend another few hours in the theatre and restaurant. The boy tries his luck again just to find his father’s emotions change from smile to grim. He walks away to his room, shrugs off and throws his clothes on his bed and silently thinks in great anger as to why his father had to ruin his day if he didn’t intend to take them out. He had friends playing outside and he quickly gets changed and charges outside to join his spry bunch.
While the father crashes on the sofa for a short nap , the little kid is heart-broken. Yet no tears shed from her eyes. The lady of the house, her mother also feels very bad for the child. She goes inside with the kid, slowly consoles the kid as she removes her silky chocolate tinged dress and gets her back to the normal wears. The kid, very sad has clear expression of the same on her face.
Her mother goes back to the kitchen, to get supper ready for the family for the night.
The little girl on her bed with numerous expressions as she looks on the ceiling. Slowly she falls asleep presumably to experience the movie and the dinner after the movie with her brother and father in her tranced state.
copied from my blog : anooppillaiz.wordpress.com
