It
was a bright and sunny March morning, a Sunday. I was out on the porch, reading
the newspaper, sipping a glass of orange juice. The neighborhood kids were engrossed
in a loud game of cricket. I felt nostalgic seeing the kids play, reminiscing
my childhood. Ah, the fun we used to have.
My
train of thoughts was interrupted by a shrill “ring, ring”. Glancing across, I
saw the neighborhood postman stopping at my neighbor’s house. The ringing
continued for a few more seconds, the postman waiting for either Ashok or his
wife to come and collect the post. Well, no luck there. Ashok and his wide were on a holiday in
Mussoorie.
I
walked up to the postman and conveyed this to him.
Shankar,
the postman, grew a little grim. Wondering why, I asked him, “What’s the
matter, Shankar?”
“It
is a courier, sir. I was supposed to bring this 2 days back only but I was not
able to. Now Mr. Ashok is not at home. If I take back the courier, I will have
to answer a whole lot of questions from my boss.”
“Can’t
you just tell your boss that Ashok wasn’t available?”, I enquired.
“I
could do that, Sir. But as I said, this was supposed to be delivered 2 days
back. I could lose my job if I tell my boss that I didn’t deliver it on time.
That, sir, I cannot afford.”
“Well,
Ashok and his wife are out of town since 2 days. So you can take it back, can’t
you?”
“No,
Sir. If I had brought it on time and had taken it back, I would have had to
send it back to the main office by today. Post-office protocol. Now I can’t do
that as it would show today’s time stamp in the logs”, Shankar explained with a
worried look.
Seeing
his plight, I offered to collect the courier on Ashok’s behalf. I was sure
Ashok wouldn’t mind. There was immediate relief on Shankar’s face as he tapped
my shoulder and said “Thank you Sir. But please don’t open it.”
A
good deed done for the day, I thought as I walked back home. I kept the
envelope on the dining table and soon got busy with other things, cleaning my
bedroom and doing the laundry.
Couple
of hours later, I walked into the living room and plonked myself on the sofa
with a huge sigh. Ah, that was tiring. It felt good to rest on my favorite
sofa.
I
switched on the TV and was swapping channels when Rusty ran in and jumped on to
the sofa on which I was happily lazing about. My Doberman had something in his
mouth and I reached across to take it out.
It
was a white piece of paper. Just when I had removed it completely from Rusty’s
mouth and reprimanded him for being naughty, I caught a familiar name on the
paper.
Gosh,
it was Ashok’s courier!
