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STORY TIME: Finally they laughed
Mr and Mrs Atif were fond of nothing. Simply nothing! They hated everything they had and cried over anything that happened in their lives. They would grumble about waking up in the morning and sleeping at night. They would grumble about eating lunch in the afternoon and dinner at night. Mr Atif would cry out loud if he was given a promotion in his office and Mrs Atif would practically bang her head on the walls if, by any chance, she managed not to flunk her cooking classes.
They were a bunch of ‘weirdos’. They did everything which was least expected of them... or of anyone for that matter. And their children were no different either.
These people never stretched their fourteen muscles to smile. In fact, I am sure none of them had paid much attention in their science classes to know that you need to stretch full fourteen muscles to smile, and they didn’t want to go wasting around their energy for such a small gesture as a smile. You can also imagine, then, that laughing was out of question.
“I never find anything funny enough to be laughed at,” said Mr Atif in a matter-of-fact tone, his eyes raised till his eyebrows touched the non-existent hairline of his bald head.
The thing was, they had seen so many people laughing at them that they had forgotten to do that themselves. They were never satisfied. Happy was another word, from another world. They always managed to find flaws in everything.
Once Mr Atif bought a new carpet for his room. Unsure of his choice, he asked his wife to give her opinion.
“What could I do, honey? None was any better,” said Mr Atif as soon as his wife raised her eyes critically, looking closely at the carpet.
She took a deep exaggerated breath, “Umm... the colour. Don’t you think it is way too brown? Like an infected mouse... too brown for our tastes, don’t you think?”.
“Yeah, I see what you mean,” Mr Atif answered.
“And the designs. They are so old-fashioned. We want something trendy.”
“Yah, I thought of buying one of the plain ones.”
“Hmm... And look at the way this particular design goes. Come look! Come near. Now! Do you see?” she said, her fingers pointing to a particular part of the carpet.
Her husband strained his eyes and followed the direction of his wife’s outstretched index finger.
“Hmm, it’s really bad. But what exactly is it?” he said, unsure of the flaw but not ready to accept that there was none.
“Now come on, Dah-ling! Surely you can see it. All the curvy designs on it... They look like as if the letter ‘S’ has been stretched”.
“Aha! Now I see what you mean. All the designs are the same too.”
“Not only this. Look at this one. Can you guess what is this?” She jumped slightly and said excitedly.
“I can’t see it, you show me,” Mr Atif said, encouraging her.
“It’s a rose, dear! With blue and green petals. Now have you ever seen a rose with blue and green coloured petals?”
And so they went on and on about the carpet. But miserly people as they were, they couldn’t or wouldn’t afford a better one. Being satisfied was one thing and being thankful for it was another.
If Cuckoo (their daughter) passed her history test, she would grumble about her geography one. And this was to take in consideration the time she gave to her studies.
If Shani (their son) got his favourite bicycle, he would frown as he had wanted the video game more. No compromise on the bicycle though — both of them would be a good bargain. Still for all the things they had without asking, they grumbled and complained and never ever smiled. They had everything, unasked... but a mere smile.
They sure were weird people!
But one day — it wasn’t a lucky day after all — Mr Atif came home with an unfamiliar air about him. An expression between a frown and a scowl masked his face. He was sacked! He was told that he was a total disappointment to the firm and after repeated forgiveness for his mistakes, they had finally made one good decision — “You are fired.”
Mrs Atif was in her own self, as she had been told on her face, “You are completely hopeless. You don’t need cooking classes. Rather a mental checkup.”
This was because she was the only one who couldn’t make a proper cup of tea. This was a new find as she was never told her mistake on her face... and so rudely too!
When Cuckoo came home, she was expressionless ... Blank. She had flunked all her subjects, as nobody had bothered to help her in her tests.
Shani’s story was almost the same. One of his friends had broken the handle of his bicycle and hadn’t offered to get it repaired. Ah! Misery of miseries!
They all sat in the lounge, seemingly concentrating a bit too much on their shoe laces. They didn’t grumble because they couldn’t. Grumbling was for the good things which happened to them, you see!
That was when Mr Atif looked at his wife. And ... smiled. Mrs Atif looked up too and smiled back. Shani and Cuckoo, as their eyes opened wide, small cracks appeared at the end of their lips. After a moment, every member of the family was smiling widely, and so wide that all thirty-two of their teeth showed and soon they all broke into peals of laughter.
The rest I leave to you, what you make out of it. Maybe they laughed because they were embarrassed or maybe they laughed because it just felt right. But I tell you one thing, these people are still the weirdest people I have seen ... when they finally laughed, it was like nothing I’ve ever heard before. Believe me, they are a pack of ‘weirdos’, I say... and you keep my word for that.
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