Behind the rigidity

Too many tries !

Vedant turned slowly towards his mother only to find her looking at him with neutral expressions

"Mu-"

"Go bring all the balls and keep them in our bedroom"

"But Mumma this is not fair" he dared to argue

"Did I or did I not warn you beforehand?" she asked,her face still remained neutral

"Lekin-"

"Yes or No ?" this time her voice held some strictness and Ved slowly nodded his head

"I want words"

"Y-yes" he stammered

"Then I suggest you to go and keep all of them inside the room.I shouldn't find any of them with you later on"

Ved looked up with pleading eyes but Bhavani didn't melt.He needed to be taught a lesson.More than the wastage, she wanted him to learn and realise the value of the things around.

He stood there for a few more seconds before finally going to collect all the balls lying here and there.Bhavani remained there till he brought the first ball,then began with her work.

After he was done placing each one of them he came back finding his mother,
"Mumma"
"Hmm"
"I've kept all the balls in your room" he informed sadly
"Good"
"For how many days?"

Bhavani stirred the curry and turned around with a smile
"Don't worry beta I've kept it easy this time,as soon as you can prove that you are responsible enough to have them back, you'll get it back"

Vedant's heart sank,this was one punishment he disliked to the core.When his mother doesn't give the duration he finds it difficult to gain his things back because he usually has no idea what exactly would do the job.No matter how much instant punishments hurt but it always gets over within a few minutes or at least hours.But confiscating of things always troubles him because he loves them way too much,or when taken away,to be precise.

On top of that unlike his father, his mother sometimes refuses to give the deadline,like she is doing this time.
As much easy as it sounded in his mother's mouth,it wasn't so.

He recalls an incident when he had lost his brand new unique stationeries in school for three consecutive days and his mother had only allowed him the necessities for a real long time.

Vedant had to rely upon just a single medium sized pencil,a broken eraser,a simple sharpener and a rough plastic ruler.
It sends jitters in his body to even think of how the pencil lid broke often and sharpening of the same got the pencil smaller and smaller.
Only when it got really tiny and the eraser couldn't neatly clean anymore ,did his mother fill his pencil box again with all the proper things after he had apologized and promised sincerely.
That experience makes him check and recheck all the things inside his bag before he comes out of the classroom,till date.

He was brought back to reality when a certain utensil dropped from  Bhavani's hand and he felt the need to whine out of the situation as quickly as possible
"No no no Mumma please I'm sorry.You can keep them with you till tomorrow and then give it to me before I go to school"

Bhavani didn't turn back but answered him anyways
"And what made you think I'll do as you tell me to?"
"Nahi nahi please,tomorrow I've my games period"
"So what shall I do?" she asked nonchalantly
"Mumma some of us bring our balls from the home.Aur aapko pata hai na unme se mai bhi le jata hoon please please "
[And,you know right that among them even I'm included ?!]

"I'm sorry beta but you should've thought before your negligence.I had warned you several times.Now let's go and have our lunch" she said dismissing the conversation and started arranging the plates.