Eaalim Institute | THE READ TO YOUR CHILD SERIES PRESENTS.. “The passenger”

THE READ TO YOUR CHILD SERIES PRESENTS

SHORT STORY THREE

The passenger 

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                 Phenomena are things that have always Abeen there. They are just what they are. It seems absurd and meaningless to contemplate about or question them. It was the age of phenomena. Everything was so clear, so colourful and so dreamy. It was an avenue, a narrow street with a dead end. It had two rows of very poor and simple houses, whose dwellers’ greatest achievement was to reach the end of each day, successfully having any dinner or supper. Miraculously enough, they were really very happy and content people. But their young children, especially boys, were madly happy. They insisted on consuming every day’s portion of happiness, perhaps, they were wise enough to realise that happiness was too dear and scarce to miss the slightest glimpse of. Their main target and objective in life was to enjoy themselves and feel happy. So, they only enjoyed deep sleep, any and every food presented to them, and most importantly any and every chance and opportunity to play. In short, they had a good appetite for life. They seemed to devour life as much as they hungrily devoured the tasty food. And surprisingly enough, every and any food was very delicious.

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         Having taken their daily and almost compulsory nap ,in winter as well as in summer, such boys would get up in the early afternoon, as if they clung to the day before the day departed them. Each boy got out of his house like a crab, holding half a dried loaf of bread covered with any sort of dipping, sometimes pickles, sometimes cheese, sometimes sauce, for their mothers would then begin cooking their dinner.  It was the custom of their mothers to dry the bread after baking it, only to preserve it to stay longer as they didn’t have fridges or freezers to preserve it They had been in the habit of eating immediately after sunset, the sun would determine their daily routine as they hadn’t known electricity by then. So, like birds, they would sleep with the sunset and get up with the sunrise. Of course, there were exceptions, when they stayed up a little later to play or listen to some fairy tales. As their habit was, they would hold their pizza like food.

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             Then, they began to gather, calling each other to join in the game. As if it were the call to resurrection, they would rush madly, crying and laughing. Their meeting point was in front of her house. She was an old maiden called Bakhita ,which meant the ‘most fortunate’. She was a very old woman, always dressed in black. She had a dark complexion, almost the same colour and degree of her dress. Her hair was originally grey, but she would tinge it with henna, a dark orange and brown dye. Her hair was not very long, so she would  do her hair in pleats and extend it with wool, false hair. At the edges of her pigtails, you might see a key or a seal tied to her hair. It was her habit to spend the whole afternoon, sitting at the step of her mud brick house. Therefore, when she sat down you could hardly distinguish her from the background, especially as she kept silent and motionless. The naughty boys would use a piece of wood or metal to carve lines and marks in the mud bricks leaving their marks in the wall. Similarly, the naughty and wanton boy of time had left his marks, wrinkles in her features.  The boys even imagined that time and cupid, the messenger of love, were two playmates, who in turn  played with people’s fates. The imaginative boys would also remark that time passed every night and found the elderly people asleep. Time would then spray them with a white substance, powder, or flour, which would stick to their hair, turning it into a grey colour !

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        The boys would indulge in their play and game, but she was always there haunting their imagination. They would restlessly wonder, ‘why does she come out every day, sitting like that?’ They even thought she was more like a passenger waiting for her train to come to the right platform. While they were in that state, they would suddenly stop their game, a procession of men carrying a long wooden box would suddenly pass their avenue. Their small minds would tell them, ‘it seems that the elderly people have their game to play too.!’ Everything was really a game for them. Every day, the boys gathered and played, and every day Bakhita went out to spend the afternoon, sitting in front of her house. It seemed like an endless game, till suddenly, Bakhita decided to join the game of the elderly.

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          Bakhita didn’t come out one afternoon. Instead, the men of the elderly  game gathered, they looked as if they would play their game in the boys’ place. Bakhita had suddenly decided to mount the wooden box and play the game of the elderly. The boys’ naive eyes gazed as the  men took Bakhita in their wooden box and went away.

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