Something that swam up the memory sea...

Today morning on my way back to hostel from church, I spotted a little girl walking towards my direction, with occasional flashes of fear on her face. She went ahead without making an eye contact with me. As my slow walking pace took me ahead a few steps, I saw a teenaged school boy with wide sad eyes, holding a chocolate in an 'it's just for you, please take it' pose, gazing at the direction in which she went... a typical 'album-song' moment, which can have numerous interpretations... numerous twists... 'boy grows up to woo the girl all over again type...' but, passing through the smell of this moment, my mind started a train journey back to my own school days...


Aah... school days... school bus... classmates... quarrel mates... fight mates... this is how the picture progresses in my mind... being someone who got her milk teeth sprouted pretty late ( when I was around 12 I guess... that's another story!) in life, and kids being the most cruelly innocent people you can find on earth, I had a pretty nasty childhood. While there were a few who liked me for various reasons, there were many who found me the right target to bring out their bullying potential. And for the natural fighter I am, I tolerated no nonsense. Quarrels, fights, slaps, kicks, beats, foul-mouthing, mud-slinging... a slide show of me resorting to all these in a school uniform would pretty much sum up my lower primary days...


And one day...


It's in one of those days that a little boy of my age, who is my school bus mate,  started calling me 'ammumme ( granny)' constantly, starting a random fine day morning. My action-heroinism did not wait to respond - after trying hard to ignore his comments for a day or so - and the result was a bloody big scar on his forehead - did not know the that a baby umbrella can tear open a little boy's forehead skin.... 


Surprisingly, the injured little one was too proud to cry or even expose it, and he just tied his towel on to his forehead tight, in 2/3 folds, in Phoolan Devi style. And maybe that all were busy chatting around, or is too used to my violent ways now, no one took notice of this. And as usual I froze, and was clueless about how I should respond. We sat beside each other till the bus reached his home, and off he went. I remember looking anxiously at him, with a troubled expression on my face, as he slowly walked into his house, at the entrance of which his mom stood with a question mark on her face - It was surely about her sonny boy's new style...


Well, I forgot the incident in no time, though... the next day I forgot to even see whether he is ok, when he boarded the school bus... But during one of our breaks, I saw him in a classroom near to mine, with a small bandage on his head...


The day a sight turned a glowing memory speck...


As I walked towards our water tap to wash my hands before lunch, I saw him sitting on a bench there, with a happy expression. He had a packet of sweets with him, and was offering it to all who came to wash their hands. I guess it was his birthday... Not knowing what to do, I did not go near him... but felt a soft tap on my shoulder as I washed my hands...


Our little Harry Potter it was, with his sweet laden hands held out... I could sense my face cracking a smile as my right hand moved towards his sweet packet. "Wait," suddenly he said... and took out a little chocolate from his pocket... "These toffees can be difficult to chew... will you take this chocolate? my mom brought this for me as it's my favourite." His face did not have an ounce of hatred.... 


"No, I don't want it...," said the 'rude-by-default' me... and walked off. And in that brief pause I had before I walked off, I could see those cute eyes turning moist... my periphery vision saw his chocolate-held hand laced with sadness going back to his pocket, throwing the chocolate in there - with disgust? sorrow? slight hatred? I did not know then....


Don't know how this got etched to my memory clearly... may be that my sensible sub-conscious mind stored it to make the sweetness of the picture clear to me gradually... to teach me how small actions can spread happiness, how they can also pierce through a sensitive heart... how I always had innocent love around me which I failed to notice... and how all my life I unknowingly turned a blind eye to many beautiful things around me...


And where ever you are...


That school bus mate of mine - I don't know where he is right now, for he had changed school in another year or so. And we weren't ever in touch... but the image of the little boy in front of the church today brought back the memories without any stale smells. Friend, I only wish I had the heart to understand you, back then... I know it might not matter at all now, may be you have even forgotten, but the mere memory of those little moist eyes are prompting me after decades to say "I'm sorry... I wish I deserved to be your friend..."