Reminder

By Akanksha Sapkal

Silent, confused, gloomy she was sitting on one of the benches in the garden with tons of emotions surging within. She was so lost in her thoughts that she never even realized when a little girl around the age of 13-14, came and sat near her on the same bench.

"It's feels so peaceful here, isn't t it?" little girl asked, looking straight ahead where few children around her age were playing happily. Elder one just hummed in response, without even looking at the person who asked the question, not wanting to loose even a single second of this rare peaceful time.

“Are you ok miss? You look really sad!” The little girl asked with adorable pout on her face. The elder one turned towards the little one, and for a while she was shocked, she did a double check to confirm that the girl sitting next to her is actually real, she even poked her arm to be sure and yes she was real. “You? How?” She thought, while looking at the girl with wide eyes.

“Is there something on my face? Why are you looking at me like that?” The little one asked while checking her face with her small hands. “No no, nothing is wrong with my face, I mean your face, I was just…….never mind.”

Leaving the confusion aside little one gave the elder one the most adorable smile while playing with free hair of her braid and said, “You know, you look a lot like my mother.” This automatically bought smile on elder girl’s face. “Thank you darling, this means a lot to me, also you are adorable.” She said with the sweet smile. “Thank you miss, but you didn’t answer my previous question, you were looking so sad, are you ok?” little one asked again. “Don’t worry about it, just dealing with grown ups problems, you won’t understand.” Elder one replied. This offended her to extent that automatically an angry pout formed on the lips of little one, frowning a little, aggressively she said, “I hate this thing about grown up people, they always tell us don’t lie to elders, don’t hide anything from elders, always share your problems with elders, but mummy never tells me her problems that is so unfair. We children, although I am also a grown up, but anyways, we also have many problems you know infact some problems are more serious than you think but still we don’t go around and be sad and sit on some random garden benches like you, but what we do is, we share our problems with elders, and we try to solve one problem at a time to make it easy, and most importantly we don’t forget to play, this distract us from our problem. That’s why I was in the garden in the 1st place.” Elder one was so stunned for a minute to even speak. “Wow! I used to speak a lot, I mean you speak a lot.” “My teacher also says the same you know, that’s why I got punishment which I have to complete tomorrow, plus I have a tons homework, and then there is this guy, I have to teach him a lesson so he won’t bully my friend again, plus my mom has….” “hold on I got it, you have tons of problems, but point is how do you plan to solve them?” elder one asked interrupting little one in between. “Seriously pay attention, why don’t you? And my mom says you should never cut in between when someone is speaking “ little one snapped. “Oh is that so, I am sorry then?” “It’s ok, and to answer your question I said it before I will say it again, we try to solve one

problem at a time, that's what my mom says everytime. She knew I was tired of school stuff so she told me play for a little while, you know to clear my mind, now that I feel better after playing and talking with you, I will go home and complete my homework, and deal with punishment tomorrow because it's not urgent, right now important thing is to complete my homework so I won't get punished again, and about the guy who bothers my friend, I will think about it later on, one thing at a time, after all crowded places makes me uneasy” elder one slightly chuckled at the last remark. “That’s actually so wise of you, thank you, because of you I feel a lot better now. I didn’t knew I was this wise when I was kid.” She slightly mumbled last sentence to herself making sure it went inaudible. “Thank you for calling me wise miss, and I am glad that you feel better now, I just couldn’t see you sad, so I had to ask.” Little one replied. “That’s so sweet of you, I was just like you when I was a kid you know, I wish I had never changed.” “Well, I guarantee you, I will never change, probably my face and my height will, probably I will talk less after growing up, because everyone says I talk a lot, but apart from that nothing will change about me, I plan to remind myself this same thing whenever required.” Little one said giving elder one a genuine smile. “I guess this is my reminder then” elder one smiled exactly replicating little one's, after all they were similar, they were one, weren't they?

By Akanksha Sapkal