Anbreen

i don’t exactly remember my first day at school, but i have memories of days which were near my big day, memories of crying a lot and not taking my eyes off my mother’s figure. i was sitting in my class looking outside at my mothers, sitting there on a bench.

i was standing against a wall, my memories say it was a wall with wooden card board pasted on it, making it look like a wood wall, standing against that wall was me, crying with continuous tears rolling down my cheeks, there was a girl in a white lacy frock, standing just like me against that wooden wall and doing exactly what i was doing.

i remember being in a colorful class, with beautiful colorful chairs and desks, there i was sitting at the back row, and there he was , a boy of my age but was of much better built , standing in the door and playing with the door, what my memory tells me he was my teachers son, he was playing with the flaps of the door, opening them and closing them carelessly, whenever he opened the door, there was a sigh of relief in my heart and again whenever he closed it, i like a scared child wished that God would give me a hand long enough to open that door, while i remain seated in my chair. The thought of a closed door scared me, that little boy was un-aware and unknown of the mental distress he was causing a small scared girl sitting in the back row of the class, the teacher was busy working her way around a some drawing papers on the desk.

its amazing how our memories work, how small ignorable acts can remain in the memories of people around us for years and in some rare cases these small ignorable acts by people who we don’t even know have a true potential to change the course of our life, by staying in our memory for long.

i remember wearing a yellow trouser, standing somewhere in a small assembly area in a lazy morning, a morning where nothing was out of the ordinary, i don’t really remember what happened during the assembly time, but when all the kids were moving towards their classes while helplessly trying to maintain a straight line, i remember her. sitting there on a wooden chair, with eye glasses resting on the tip of her nose, hands with continuous motion in order to work on the knitting of some winter garment. when i passed by her , she looked at me, by taking her eyes off the knitting process , she didn’t make any movement just changed the position of her eye balls and looked right through me. nobody noticed that she was looking at me, but she was, she looked at me deeply and after absorbing her look, my mind instantly started working on the thoughts that must have visited her mind after looking at me with looks that made me felt naked. she must have thought that i am a boy, and not a girl, just like all of them.

a satisfying feeling passed thought my heart and mind.

i remember sitting in a small play area in my school on a bench, with a newly made friend. yes, a friend. probably my first ever friend that i remember making. we were both sitting at the start of the lunch break with our lunch boxes in our laps and were about to open them. she asked me to open my lunch box first, with pride and joy i opened my box, she started inquiring about the eatables that i had in there, she touched my sandwich, then my two milk toffees, then my small chocolate bar. touching each and everything and asking questions like how much did it cost, who got it for you. and during this whole process my lunch box moved from my lap to her lap and i only realized it when she told me that she is very thirsty and want to drink some water.

i, being proud of having a friend in a lunch break for the first time in my whole life got up from the bench moved towards the water cooler, picked with a water glass from the side corner, cleaned it up with the running water from the tap, filled it up with pure drinking water and moved towards the bench. when i turned back , there she was sitting with my sandwich in her hands, half of it in her stomach and the other half completely stuffed in her mouth. i placed the water glass besides her and looked at her, she fished the part of the sandwich that was in her mouth drank the water, looked at me and said that she got hungry while i was away to get her water so she ate my sandwich. stunned at her confident excuse , the only thing i managed to do was pass a smile. which was a clear indication that i have forgiven her for betrayal on the first day of our friendship. my 2 milk toffees and my small chocolate bar were my only hope for the rest of the day. i sat down on the bench and then she opened her lunch box, where there was a big yummy Zinger and she started telling me that how her father took her to KFC last night and she had a zinger over there and her father got her another one for school as well and her mother microwaved it for her in the morning. As she was telling me the story of her Zinger my eyes were fixed on 2 milk toffees that were lying besides the Zinger burger. they were exactly the same Toffees of same brand that i had in my lunch box, i was happy about the fact that we both have something in common and we can eat our toffees together. after her zinger story, she closed her lunch box, got up from the bench and vanished in the crowd of girls playing in the playing area without saying anything. and there i was once again sitting alone on the same bench. i was not sad, nor happy about her leaving me like this. i was OK with everything that has happened. Anyways i cleared my mind from her thoughts, seated my self comfortably and opened my lunch box for my 2 milk toffees and a chocolate bar. to my surprise there was just my small chocolate bar in their my two small milk toffees were missing.

and today as i am writing this, i think she only got one Zinger for her lunch that day, everything else was an un acknowledged treat from my side.