Mr. Caterpillar

5.

Sunday had dawned bright and sunny. Golden chink of light poured in through the window. Niti flung her feet off the bed and went across the room and stared out the window. The unblemished blue sky stretched overhead, not a cloud to disrupt its beauty. Then she noticed something she had failed to notice before--the smell of fried egg and toasted bread; this smell meant that her mother was home and she was in good spirits. Yawning and stretching her arms, Niti set off for the kitchen. She had forgotten all about her dream.

Mrs. Shetty was hunched over the stove, frying scrambled eggs.

"Good morning, dear," she said when Niti entered the kitchen.

"Morning mom," Niti replied, drew up a chair and sat at the table. She read morning paper (only sports section) while Mrs. Shetty fixed her breakfast.

Niti found nothing interesting in the paper, so she rolled it up and kept it on the table beside her plate and began gobbling her breakfast. She was slurping up her tea when Mrs. Shetty, her back turned to Niti, said, "Niti, I didn't saw our scooter in the parking lot."

She had forgotten all about the scooter. In fact, she had forgotten all about the previous day. Now, it all came back to her like a hammer-blow.

"Uh," she said, "I left it in Mr. Nath's garage."

"Oh, I'm so surprised to hear it," Mrs. Shetty said, her back still facing Niti.

Niti ignored her sarcasm. "Uh, mom, the thing is going to need a big fix. Mr. Nath said that repairing it will cost more than twenty thousand rupees."

At this, Mrs. Shetty turned her eyes wide with rage. "Twentythousand? Oh, Niti you are not going to pay him--"

"I'm going to repair it," Niti said at once.

"Repair it? Who is going to pay you twenty thousand, for I'm definitely not paying anything for that piece of shi..." she trailed off.

Niti clenched her shaking fist, got to her feet and stomped off the kitchen, banging the door behind her.