Vodka on the rocks

Part - 2

The boy was of the age of maybe ten or eleven. Seated on the floor amidst what looked like a pile of old worn out books, he looked panicked as hell, continuously threading his own fingers through his stock of thick enviously silky hair till he resembled a scarecrow. The room was of modest bearings yet gave a heart warming and homely appeal. The boy turned the pages of his book frantically and then let out a kiddish groan and dropped his little head in his hands. 

"What happened? Aren't you done studying yet?"

A deep yet oddly mellifluous voice broke the silence and a man came on the screen to sit down on the floor beside the boy. His eyes were a familiar charcoal black and the gaze, full of wisdom. He was fairer than the boy yet the facial structure was unfailingly same. He was a surprisingly handsome man. The smile dangling from his lips in that eerily facsimile face looked so easy, so unmarred, effortless.. so beautiful that it looked almost unreal. 

The boy looked up towards his father and gave a precocious sigh as if the Universe had decided to conspire against his little self much to his eternal predicament. 

Keerti and Raghav had tears in their eyes which they tried to hide from their respective spouses as Jaya gave the screen an almost painfully tender look. The Deshmukhs had gauged and understood the identity of the man, pretty easily. Raghav looked very alike his father. Pallavi snuggled against her husband, knowing her touch always calmed him, which it did, as predicted. 

"I am revising. But.."

"Yes..?"

"I can't find the answer to this question... I have searched it everywhere. But there is no example solution to this.. what will I do now, if they ask the this in the exam tomorrow?"

He almost bit his nails in nervousness. The man smiled widely and picked up the scribbled piece of paper on which his son was solving the problems. 

"Raghav, you have already gone through the questions a hundred times. And maths is your favourite subject isn't it? You have never scored a single marks less than full... still you are getting so tensed... why kanna?"

Little Raghav sighed again and almost pulled out his hair in anxiousness. 

"I don't know Nana. I think I know everything but the moment the question paper is in my hands, my brain goes blank and I can't remember anything.."

"Kanna... how many times have I told you, don't take so much stress. It is just an examination. Treat your questions as puzzles. You love solving puzzles right? If you look at them as puzzles, you will not get so unnecessarily tensed. Life will throw you so many examinations time and again, one tougher than the other... all you have to do my dear, is to treat them all like a game of puzzles. Find the missing pieces, strategize the next move like you do in chess or cricket and search for the best fitting answer. Don't overthink and stress out."

Raghav rolled over like a toy and landed on his father's lap much to the latter's amusement and found himself being gathered in his long arms. He placed his head on his father's chest and listened to his heart beats closing his own eyes as Ajit began stroking his son's raven locks lovingly. Before long, Raghav had brought his nervous anxiety under control and was breathing normal again. 

"How do you know this will work?"

His son's suspicious yet infantile curiosity made Ajit smile widely. Trust Raghav to always be one curious cookie. He never did accept things at its face value. Something which both him and his wife had strived to inculcate in both Raghav and Keerti and would do so for their unborn as well.