Choti Si Duniya - ArShi FF

66. Terrible twos

I hope you all had a wonderful Diwali which was as sweet as Khushi's jalebis, as spicy as Arnav's swag and as delightful as their babies! Belated Diwali wishes from me to you and yours!

This chapter is NOT to make you dislike the kids, but to touch upon some realities about kids' rainy days! But please remember they are still our cute munchkins we love!

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Piya

The first time Raizada house heard of this term; they took it lightly. As the eldest of Raizada family's next generation, Piya, was turning 2-years-old, her pediatrician had given a heads up to Payal and Akash about the impending challenge coming their way. A challenge in the form 'terrible twos referring to children who start behaving (or rather misbehaving) differently around the second year of their age. It of course varies from kid to kid, but most kids test patience of their family in that time. But Nani who had seen her kids and, grandkids grow up dismissed it saying all kids are inherently naughty at some stage in their childhood and all these 'new terms' were nothing to be taken too seriously. And Manorama who was a possessive grandmother for Piya, also agreed that her angelic Piyu would never trouble anyone, let alone give 'terrible' time.

However, they all soon got to see a new side of otherwise sweet Piya when she developed a new tantrum of hiding anywhere in the house when given a chance. Just a minute of taking their eyes off her and baby Piya would disappear in thin air! And then many stressful minutes later they would find her hiding below a bed, or outside in the garden behind a huge tree or even behind huge sofa set adoring Shantivan's main hall!

And worst still, she would refuse to come out of her 'safe spot', would start crying rivers through her doe shaped eyes and it would take hours of patient cajoling by her Manorama dadi, or Akash or her Khushi maasi, for her to somehow agree to come back to them.

Thankfully, as suddenly as she developed this 'habit', she dropped it in few months as she grew up a bit, much to everyone's relief. However, today even at almost 7 years of age, they all could trace her fondness of spending hours under the same tree she used to hide behind, in that 'terrible 2' symptom of hers!

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Chiku

After seeing Piya's antics, Khushi and Arnav braced themselves as Kavish was going to turn 2 in a few months. However, his naughtiness had pretty much began well after he turned 1 and started walking!!! They all had long ago agreed that Chiku was the naughtiest kid Shantivan ever saw (that is until his sister Arohi came along to shatter all his previous records of keeping her parents on their toes!).

But as he learnt to walk at 14 months, he decided hiding behind furniture was a small thing for him, and his tantrums would be bigger! Like doing the exact thing he was denied doing, when told not to go near kitchen or diya in mandir, he would want to go exactly there; when told not to pull people's (read khushi's and arnav's) hair he would do exactly that; when a tired khushi beg him to sleep as it was way past bedtime for babies, he would want to play hide and seek! And of course, whenever Arnav was going to office he wanted to tag along, in fact whatever Arnav did, Kavish wanted to copy every single thing, right from using a Bluetooth on his small ear to barging in a live interview of his papa, pulling the microphone and give interviews! (a/n - yeah, i know, there will be a chapter on this as some of you demanded)

Kavish Singh Raizada was given many nicknames, but true to one of his nicknames as laddugopal (baby krishna) he was every bit a baby krishna! As cute as it sounded, it was anything but that for his tired and exhausted mamma! Add to that her worry that her baby should not become a pampered brat or take after only the mighty side of his Laad governor papa! The only thing working in Khushi's favor was that her baby absolutely couldn't see a frown on her face or her getting mad at him so just one stiff 'Chiku!' in her stern voice or narrowing her eyes at him as he was being bratty was enough to control him most times.