A small girl’s expedition in daily life. ‘Imli’s Holiday’ – a short story by Bhaswati Das Gorain.
Imli took a deep breath. It was another sunny morning in November and she woke up from a deep peaceful sleep. The morning rays peeped through the holes in her tiny shanty and she gleefully counted the shiny lines.
She turned and saw her mother slowly warming some gruel saved from the previous night. The aroma cheered her up. Her Baba had already finished puffing a few balloons and was tying them to a stick.
“My Gudiya is awake”, he came and lifted her tiny body from the bed. Imli laughed gleefully.
“Baba is so strong”, she thought.
He always called Imli as ‘My Gudiya’ (my doll).
In another corner of the room slept her baby brother and grandmother. She slowly tiptoed and kissed his soft cheeks. She loved her brother fiercely and marveled at his smallness.
Soon her mother set off towards the rich aunty’s house where she washed dishes and scrubbed floors every day. Imli and her father took all the balloons and started towards the busy streets. Her Baba would drop her at the Government school where she was enrolled in the third standard. Then he would spend the entire morning trying to sell as many balloons as he could to the pedestrians and people sitting inside lavish cars when the traffic signal turned red. Whenever he could sell more than twenty balloons extra bucks blessed his day. Extra income enabled him to proudly buy toffees for his darling Gudiya. On other less fortunate days, his Gudiya still greeted him with equal delight and be thankful for the happy reunion.
Imli loved the hustle and bustle of city streets. Cars of all shapes and colors flashed past them. People of all ages walked briskly eager to get to their destinations. A few passersby would, sometimes, stop and buy from them before hurriedly resuming their journey. Imli paid keen attention to their mannerisms and dresses. In her childlike imaginative world, she became one of them.
It was in the summer of the following year when Imli changed. Right after her exams got over, one day, Imli pestered her mother to let her visit the rich Aunty’s house. After much cajoling and behavior coaching, Imli was finally taken. She went in as the innocent 10-year-old Gudiya of her Amma and Baba and came out full of wonder with the rich people’s lifestyle.
She marveled at the enormous house, the wide-spaced rooms, the neat arrangement of furniture, the fine soft linen home décor and the different kind of utensils which her mother was cleaning with extreme care to not spoil or scratch. Everything in that house seemed to be shining like jewels.
What struck Imli even more, was that there was another girl- little older than herself- who was seated amidst so many toys! Imli had never thought so many pretty playthings could belong to one child alone. It looked like a whole toyshop to her and she got teary-eyed. A surge of embarrassment and inferiority took over her. She no longer felt like her Baba’s doll. And the sight of her Amma scrubbing floors tortured her innocent heart even more. On the exterior, she calmly seated in her spot but inside her, a storm raged. With an iron will, she fought back her tears.
To be continued…
