i better wait

I better wait

“She doesn’t look umm… too umm… interesting”, I can hear her. Her name is Fat Lady.

“What’s her name again?” Oh, now she wants to know my name.

“Daisy” That’s Mother. She usually answers questions in one word that way when she is nervous or irritated maybe, I don’t know.

“And how old did you say she is?” Fat Lady has started to sweat. She looks like a witch, like the witch that imprisoned princess Rapunzel. I don’t like her. I think she will imprison me the same way if I go with her. I don’t like her! I don’t like her at all.

“She is ummm… four” You are lying Mother! You are lying I am not four! I am five and a half years old. I am bigger than dolly and even she is not four, she is five.

Silence!

Mother is looking at me. She looks like she is I don’t know umm… sad? Pained? Sad, I guess.

Fat lady is looking at me. She looks like she has just been pinched by Kale. Kale says he is the greatest pincher of all time. He pinches even better than Mother.

Oh fish! (I learnt to say that just the day before yesterday, it is nice isn’t it?) Oh fish! Looks like I just did something very wrong. Mother usually looks at me like that when I break a window pane or flush a bar of soap into the toilet. Ah! Now I remember what I did wrong. Holy Fish! I just said that I am not four but five and a half years old. That too in front of Fat Lady! And I thought I was thinking! Oh fish! Oh OH fish!

I can see the big black mole above Fat Lady’s fat lips sweating. I can see that she is not comfortable. I can see that Fat Lady has become fatter (or am I imagining it?)

I can see that she is not going to adopt me.

I will have to wait.

Again.

Mother says it is not good for nice little princessesess like me to be waiting. Mother says I have to find a home soon or else I will be waiting for the rest of my life. Mother says if I grow too old nobody will adopt me. Mother says that since I am a good child, I have to get good education, good culture and a good husband (when the time comes, of course}. Mother says I can not get all these if I stay here with her.

Mother says a lot of things. And honestly, I don’t understand very much. But from what I understand mother wants me to leave her and go away to some other stranger’s house. Some stranger who looks like Fat Lady. Some stranger who doesn’t even know how old I am. Some stranger who doesn’t know that I like boiled potatoes more than vanilla flavored ice-cream. Some stranger who doesn’t know that I have a mole below my belly-button. Some stranger who doesn’t know that I pee on my bed at night!

Last week they came for Dolly. A kind looking old man and an old woman. They asked her all sort of questions like if she peed on her bed at night (She said no. she is the only kid I know that doesn’t pee on her bed at night. She is cool!) And that if she knew abcd (She couldn’t get it all right. She got stuck at G and I had a hard time whispering to her that H comes after G from behind her sofa.) The old man even asked her if she liked soccer. She answered no of course, she didn’t like suckers in fact she was afraid of them. She also said a big black sucker had sucked her blood last summer and that she had to lie in bed all the week before she could get up and not see four Kales. The old man laughed HAW HAW HAW! And then he was joined by the old woman and Mother. Dolly was almost in tears. I didn’t know what to do either.

Yesterday mother told me that the old man and woman were going to adopt Dolly and that they would come to take her next month. I told this to Dolly and we cried together all the day. Dolly said she didn’t want to go away from me. I listened. Dolly said she was afraid. I listened. Dolly said she liked the old man all right, it was the old woman she was afraid of her. Would she beat her? Would she starve her like one of the evil step mothers that she reads in her story books? I listened. Dolly said she couldn’t leave mother and me and all the other kids and even Kale. Dolly said that she would die. Dolly cried. I cried. We both cried all the day and didn’t know when we fell asleep. It was only at eight o’ clock that mother woke us up to have our supper and brush our teeth and go to bed. I woke up first and then Dolly woke up. We looked at each other and then started to cry all over again. The boys teased us for being such cry- babies and we cried even louder.

Before Dolly five of my best friends have already left me. They all cried like Dolly when they had to leave and said that they would die. I was vey afraid and thought that they would really die but it has already been eight months before Guddu, the last one, left and we haven’t heard of anyone dying. Thank god! They keep on writing once in a while. They write about all sort of things like their summer vacations with their Step-parents in Thailand, like the new puppy they got as presents on their birthdays, like the boy next door who is so cute and who can count one two three four up to two thousand and thirty six.

I think of all the things they write and wonder. Weren’t they the ones that told me that they would die if they left me? Were all the things they wrote, true? Was it really wonderful to have a vacation in Thailand? Could the boy really count up to two thousand and thirty six? Would I be really happy like them with a pair of foster-Parents?

I don’t know the answer to these questions, honest.

I ask Mother,” Mother, Will I be really happy, like the rest of the kids if I go away?”

Mother answers,” Yes, darling. You will be happy.”

I don’t know if mother is telling the truth

I guess I will have to wait.