The new year surprise

"Shreya and Priya are going to love these chocolate biscuits," thought Sudha as she picked up the packet of biscuits from her table and headed towards the washroom. Her friend who had returned from the US had brought the biscuits from there. It was new year in another two days and she looked forward to gift these biscuits to her 9 and 7 year old as a new year present.

As she drove back home, she imagined the excitement on her daughter's faces as she told them about the surprise that she had got them. She smiled to herself as she imagined her girls' squeals and "wow!s" when she presented the biscuits to them.

She parked her car in the appartment parking and felt for the pink coloured plastic biscuit box on the next seat. To her disappointment, it was not there. Had it fallen from the seat? she thought as she began searching for it frantically under the seat.

She remembered then! She had left it in the wash room! She stamped her foot mentally. But she recovered immediately. There was one more day for the new year and she could get the box from the security of her company the next day, she thought to herself.

The next day, the first thing she did when she entered her office was to check with the security if anybody had reported anything. The security manager replied in a negative but he promised to check and assured her that if she had left the box in the rest room, she would definitely get it back.

That day when she went out for lunch, one of the security guys came to her. With a wide smile on his face, he told her that her pink biscuit box has been found and she could collect it from the security office. Why did the smile look a little forced? why did the guy look a little scared ? she thought. But she shrugged the thought aside - there were other things she could rejoice about. The biscuit box had been found !

She rushed to the security office to collect the box. But to her surprise it was empty. She was too stunned to think or say anything for a moment. She thought about the joy and excitement that she had imagined with her daughters. Her eyes brimmed with tears as she wordlessly walked out of the security office and went to her seat for some quiet time with herself.

"Did you collect your box,madam?" she heard the afternoon security gaurd ask her with a mischievous guilty curious look on his face as she left for home that evening. She did not know what to say. But she managed to conceal her upset and smiled back a yes.

She went to a bakery and bought a few coconut biscuits of various shapes and sizes. With a broad smile she gifted the new year gift to her daughters. Both Shreya and Priya sqealed and jumped just as she had imagined. They danced in excitement and gave her an extra hug that evening. Her daughters feasting on her biscuits managed to bring a smile on her face. She relaxed for a while and sat with the evening newspaper absentmindedly. Her thoughts drifted to the stolen biscuits - but this time she did not know what to think.

The next morning she knew what she had to do. She went to the admin manager of her group and asked her to send out a box of buscuits to all the admin and support staff of her department. She said she would sponsor it.

She thought of all the children in all the homes of these support staff feasting and enjoying the various kinds of biscuits she had sponsored. She thought of all the excitement, love, hope and freshness this new year would bring in those homes. She then went back to her seat with a smile on her face.

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Kindness of strangers

It had been a tough day for her that day. She had been handling irate customers since morning and had ended up getting delayed by an hour to pick up her cute little 8 yr old son and 10 year old daughter from school - which meant instead of the usual 5 pm, she ended up being in the school at six. To top it all, it had started drizzling.

It would be dark by the time they would reach home.

Things couldn’t have got worse !– she thought .

The faces of her eagerly waiting children on the gate of the school brought a small smile to her tired face. She hugged them and together they got into an already crowded bus and stood patiently albeit completely exhausted, to make the one hour journey standing along with people –a lot of them half wet and half sweaty. Uh ! How I wish I were at home right now! – she thought. The rain had intensified and she could hardly see anything outside.

As they neared their stop a good two hours later ( the heavy rains had caused traffic jams through out the city ), she gathered her children again, put them in the line of people who were exiting the bus. Collecting the folds of her saree, clutching her office bag, managing the umbrella in one hand and the children in another hand, she got down into the dark, lonely, rainy bus-stop - getting all set to start the last lap of her journey home – a two km walk from the bus-stop to their apartment.

She had walked about 5-10 steps with her children in the splashing rains, when she heard a voice from the back. To her surprise, it was the driver of the bus she had just alighted from, calling her.

Where do you have to go- he asked loudly making himself heard above the loud pouring of the heavy rain.

The house is a 2 KM down the lane – she shouted back.

Perhaps it was the heavy rains, perhaps it was her already difficult situation, perhaps it was the face of those two innocent children that she was trying to manage. Perhaps he did not like the look of the lonely road that the three of them were to walk down. God knows what came over the kind driver that day. He did something he had never ever done before. He knew it was not his regular duty and there might be people who might question him. But he did what his conscience called him to do. He said without showing any trace of emotion on his face- get back in - I will drop you to the house.

She was stupefied and stunned. She had been famished and hapless enough - and the two km walk on the muddy road in the rain would have been really messy and maybe a little scary. She couldn’t believe her ears and her good fortune. She accepted the help with a grateful smile and climbed back into the bus.

The bus took a two km diversion from its normal route and dropped the young mother and the children to their apartment gate.

It had happened at least 25 years back. Life has moved on and she has long retired from her job. But the gratitude that she and her children feel for the unknown driver whose spontaneous timely gesture of help at her frustrating situation, still lingers and the memories of that night have stayed in their minds forever.

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