The little toy car was so fascinating, as the boy moved the car in its own way from the floor to the sofas looking for an ongoing adventure on the way. The boy named Vihaan is merely five years old with chubby cheeks and fair-skinned to be enough to be mistaken being red when laughter aches his tummy, bad. He takes the car everywhere with him, keeping it safely in its school bag and sometimes a small bag pack while attending a family function. The car was small, red in color with black tires, which move the thing smoothly from one place to the next. It was a cherished thing for Vihaan but his only mistake was to leave it behind while dancing with the children of his age group and adults to the loud music throughout the evening. The festivities and the celebration completely made him forget about the car until having his dinner with a bunch of complete strangers of recently meet children who were fighting to have more cold drinks and going to washroom one by one, leaving the adults frustrated about the new queue on their way. Vihaan was a part of the queue too until he saw a car in the hands of a child who had the same car as him. Initially, he runs his way down the stairs to the first floor right towards his bag. The car was there but the presence of same car in other child’s hands annoyed him. As a result, he went out of the ceremony and threw the car on the side of the footpath and had his dinner done. Strangely, he couldn’t forget his car, he couldn’t sleep wondering about it but he cried terribly to lose his favorite car. His parents gave him new remote controlled cars and the flying helicopter but few years later, he saw the same car in other child’s hand on the street. The car is same as before but not this one. He prayed attention to the car from the distance wondering what happened to his red car, if it’s the same as before or someone took it and keep it safely in their collection of their toys. The other child was a beggar with borrowed discolored clothes and brownish hair due to the lack of vitamins while growing up. He was climbing up the public bus and begging for coins to be filled in his blackish jute bag. He was using the terms like let be merciful towards us. His friend too probably five or six years old was begging his way, moving from one passenger to the next in two columns of bus seat and getting down. The traffic turned from red to green, both the children started to count their money and just about to hand it to their parents at the other side of the road. Vihaan called the child owning the red car and asked him to show it to him once.
The car was the same one as he used to have in his childhood days; however, it was not his car. It has the same red color, black tires that move smoothly but it was not his car. Vihaan was delighted to go back to the old times in his mind as he started to move the car over his hands as if it was a bridge. The child started to hurry Vihaan to give his toy back so that he could go back to their parents who was calling him on the other side of the road. Vihaan handed him the car without having his last thoughts about it to his satisfaction. Vihaan wonders why he truly needed to throw his precious car away for such a stupid reason as he started to walk his way towards school. Is that a mistake he made too long, isn’t he?
(The above story has been published in the anthology , The Perfect Chaos by The Writer Order)
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