"Amma! You said yesterday that you will give me twenty rupees amma. Pakki's shop has only two wilsons 'ma. I saw yesterday" said Putta.
"Do your holiday homework, don't bother me now" amma retorted amidst a hundred things she seemed to be doing simultaneously.
Amma's mornings were always busy, but over the years they had become fine tuned like clockwork. Her day started at six, and by nine she would have finished making breakfast for four, three for the family and one neatly packed into the blue and yellow Tupperware Tiffin box for Putta. Until eleven she attended to everything else that needed her attention before rushing into the kitchen for lunch preparations.
The lunch would have to be ready by twelve thirty, the time at which Putta's father would come in for his lunch break from the office carrying his briefcase and all the worries of the outside world with it. Any delay in the schedule meant that she would have lunch with a grumpier husband at a gloomier table.
She reached out for a box of poppadums and started frying them in a pan of oil. Presently, the house was filled with the pleasant pungent smoke of oil and fried spices and caught Putta's attention.
He wandered into the kitchen, for reasons best known to himself, carrying a bottle of ketchup in one hand and tugged at amma's saree from behind. In a moment of frightened surprise, amma's elbow caught Putta on the face and the bottle of ketchup was sent flying to the wall. When Amma turned around, the kitchen floor and walls seemed straight out of a brutal murder scene.
As a sense of fright and guilt realized, tears welled up in Putta's eyes. Amma, however paid no attention to this emotional display and twisted his ears.
"You idiot, look what you have done", she screamed. "You and your monkey business during the holidays, so much better when you go to school, idiot!" she said as she twisted his ears harder.
Putta's fears compounded when he heard his father's voice say "what happened?" through the door. As his father walked into the kitchen and understood what had happened, Putta freed himself from his mother's grip and made a dash for the doorway only to be foiled in this meaningless flight by his father's hand that caught his hair and dragged him out.
One tight slap later, he was sent out to the corridor where he heard his father's stern voice instructing his mother
"I don't understand why you can't keep that scoundrel in control. Don't feed him today. No lunch. No dinner. That should teach him". He walked out to the corridor to a shaking Putta and raised his hand for another slap but stopped.
"No playing today. No cricket. I want you to sit and do your homework until I come back in the evening, understood? and you'll stand here for one hour, OK?", he said.
He dragged him out to the porch and said "stand here".
The midday sun made Putta remember that he had gone to the kitchen to ask for water. He felt unbearably thirsty now.
"Amma, water" he shouted.
"shut up! You think you are standing there for some royal treatment?" his father quipped.
Realizing there was no water coming, his mind drifted back to Wilson. Ah! The glorious 'cricket tennis ball'. He remembered Teju, the best 'fastballer' outside of the older kids who played at the college grounds in the evening, praising the Wilson.
"Fastballing needs pucca cricket ball", he had said. "Tennis ball has no swing, no speed. That is why, if you want to play with Viju and all at college grounds, you need practice with Wilson".
He had gone on to explain to a bunch of wide eyed eight year olds the nuances of 'Fastballing'. "Wilson, if you put some spit and rub it, it goes slow after bounce. But batsman can't guess how slow because you secretly put spit on it while taking runup. Especially when you play with lbw rules and all, not like we play with both side fielding".
In his reverie, Putta had lost track of time and was surprised when his mom called him inside for lunch. But Putta still bore a grudge against her for letting appa know that it was he who broke the bottle. He looked away from her and quietly sat at the lunch table.
"I don't want to eat", he proclaimed.
"My darling is angry? Did appa hit you too hard?" asked Amma.
"no, he can't hit me hard because I am strong. Very strong", he said and made it clear that he was not interested in lunch anyway.
"eat! Here, take this twenty for whatever game that you wanted to buy. After you eat.
The mention of the twenty made him reconsider his unshakeable stand on lunch. His mind was however covered with pictures of his adulation in the evening.
He would be the hero who bought the 'fastballer' ball to the match today. And he would practice by hanging the ball from the wall, just like they showed on t.v. He could also practice 'Fastballing' in the house.
And his worth among his fellow cricketers would be raised a few notches higher once he told them how he fought with his parents for the ball.
The possibilities seemed endless as he rushed across the street to pakki's shop for the Wilson and confidently gave pakki the twenty.
'Wilson is twenty five" said pakki and handed him a Vincent instead and added "and I don't have Wilson anyway. No one plays with it, it is too hard".
"Not even at college grounds?" asked Putta.
"No, not even there".
It took a while to sink in that he had fought too hard for too little for a good for nothing. His euphoric sense that he had brought with him on his way to pakki's shop was quickly disappearing. As the transition from the conqueror of challenges to a victim of circumstances occurred, Putta smiled and felt like he had suddenly grown up.
