Stationary Stationery
A ‘Prompt’ Response
The first I knew of it was when I heard a scrabbling sound, like pebbles falling over, followed by a scratching and a pittering and a pattering, and a few soft yelps and affronted shrieks.
At least, this is what Anya, my granddaughter, told me. She is all of four, articulate, and understands these things better than her grandmother does. Her eyes grew round in her elfin face, and she told me earnestly, “Achaama, I think they are fighting!”
“Who?” I asked her, looking all around me suspiciously.
She scrabbled about in the container on the desk, and then pulled out the orange eraser with the head of a lion. “He says that they are picking on him because he snores very loudly in sleep, and no one can sleep because of him!”
She picked out the pink pencil, with Minnie Mouse patterns on it, and looked at it severely. “She is the naughtiest! She calls the poor lion names! She calls him,” and here, she leaned to whisper into my ear, “idiot”, and her eyes widened with the shock of the word.
I looked scandalised. “No!” I said.
“Yes!” she said, nodding weightily.
“But how…” I began.
“She says that she is very pretty, so everybody should listen to her!”
“And do they?” I asked her, fascinated.
She bent forward, peering at Minnie, and she put her hand to her mouth, shocked. “She says, if they don’t listen to her, she sings very loudly, and that’s how the green sharpener broke, trying to get away from her voice! He tried to hide in the corner, where there was no place for him to fit into, and that’s how a piece of him broke!”
She reached into the container, and extricated the green sharpener with the chipped top. She looked sadly at it, and very severely, at Minnie. “I don’t think I’ll write with you again,” she declared, sealing Minnie’s fate. She put Minnie back in, and then she looked concerned. “Someone is fighting again!”
She peered into the container and gasped.
“It is the white elastic band! He says he is going to tie up everyone, and not let them go till they say he is the greatest!”
“The greatest what?” I asked, mystified.
She looked at me pityingly. “The greatest of all time, Achaama! Don’t you know?”
Chastened, I said nothing, and she patted my hand reassuringly. “That’s ok,” she said. “No one can know everything.”
Then she jumped, looking back at the container on the table. She shook her head sorrowfully. “I think we should throw away the elastic band,” she said, with a wisdom beyond her years. “Some things will never change, or become better.” She drew out the elastic band, and summarily disposed of it in the bin.
When she returned to her chair, I asked her curiously, “Is anyone fighting in there again, or is all peaceful?”
“All peaceful,” she declared. Then she listened, her head on one side. “The blue pen is telling a story to all the small erasers. They are all listening. The pen says that yesterday two birds came to the window, and they were talking about someone called Witchy who is very funny and very smart and writes her own books.”
Anya was quiet after that, listening to thoughts in her own head.
“Achaama,” she asked me, “do you think I can also write books and become funny and smart, like Witchy?”
“Of course, my dear,” I told her.
She sighed, but said nothing.
We bent over her interrupted alphabet writing, using the black pencil, not the Minnie one, because she was still angry with Minnie.
ⓒ 2023 Suma Narayan. All Rights Reserved.
My story is a response to this prompt:
Roz Warren, Writing Coach writes about the need of empathy and compassion:
Margie Willis’s poignant piece about an old four-legged friend:
Kevin Horton’s articulate piece about the importance of teaching ourselves to say ‘No!’
