I lay contently on the sofa watching a cricket match. "Ami, will you go to Mohan Uncle's house? I have an assignment to…." "No," I said promptly.
I love doing this. My sister gets really furious when I cut her speech short like that, and I feel a deep sense of satisfaction. "Fine… Sit like a sack of potatoes in front of the TV the whole day!" she said. "And remember, you have to look after Prakar and Shikar…" she started again. Prakar and Shikar are my cousins. They were visiting us during their summer vacation. The day before, my sister had to look after them, and they had driven her crazy. But I wasn't worried. I could keep them in their places with one frown. "No problem. I can manage fi ne. I'll show them who's boss!" I said proudly.
"Yeah, sure," replied my sister and left. Prakar and Shikar were playing some board game. I hoped that the game had thousands of squares, so they would remain playing for another hour. But obviously it didn't, because after fi ve minutes, Shikar came running.
"We are bored," he announced. "Come and watch this game. We need 60 runs from 38 balls," I told him. But Shikar seemed to be least bothered.
"We want to play badminton," he said. I took out two old racquets of mine and handed them over. There was no shuttlecock, so I gave them a small ping-pong ball and asked them to play with it.
A while later, a loud crash made me jump from the sofa. I'd had no idea that these boys were fooling around inside the house! A porcelain teapot lay broken on the fl oor. I quickly picked up the pieces and threw them away. The teapot had been sitting on that shelf for more than a century. Hopefully, my mum would never miss it.
"Get us a shuttlecock. We'll play outside," Shikar said.
I wasn't one to taking orders lying down, so I yelled, "No!" and sat in front of the TV again. Shikar rushed over and blocked the screen. Prakar went and stood near the switch.
"If you don't get it for us, we won't let you watch this…" Shikar said.
"We'll break the TV!" added Prakar. He tapped the TV once with his balled fi sts for emphasis. I was horrifi ed.
It was no ordinary threat. I leapt out of the sofa hurriedly. With Prakar and Shikar hopping beside me, I went to the shop to get a shuttlecock. There, I saw my PT teacher. He hadn't spotted me... yet. "That is my PT Sir," I whispered to Prakar.
