Crossroads | ✓

t h e m

"Mommy and daddy are at work," the kid replied.

The bright smile on her face faltered for a second.

"Are you alone?" she asked next, for which the child shook his head.

"My babysitter is there," he said pointing proudly to his grandma lookalike babysitter.

The babysitter looked like she was ready to snatch him away from the woman with the bright smile if she does anything that comes even the slightest bit closer to strange.

"Ooh, I see," the woman said and gripped his chubby hands, "why don't you come play with us?"

He looked at the girl standing behind the woman. Her black hair was in a pixie cut which were ruffled up and full of sand. She was staring back at him with wide eyes and the little boy smiled at the cute girl.

Without answering to the lady, he said the first words that occurred to him.

"You're cute!" the boy said, smiling wide at the little girl who looked taken aback.

The man who was taking the photos laughed while the woman looked amused.

"So, are you coming to play?"

This time, the boy nodded.

And that's what they did.

They played.

When it was time to separate ways, the woman knelt down beside the little boy yet again and gave him a kiss on each cheek.

"You're one adorable kid, aren't you? See you tomorrow," she said hugging him and her body shook as the little frame trapped inside her arms laughed heartily.

"What?" she asked, a smile still glued to her face.

"My mommy always says I'm a charmer. Now you call me adorable."

He stuck his pink baby tongue out and that made the woman adore this new kid even more.

"Yes, you're one little charmer indeed."

*

*

*

"How was your day?" the boy's father asked him as he returned from the park along with his babysitter.

It had been nearly two months since that day in the park, when he earned his first playmate.

Ever since that day, it had been the two of them and the park for almost two months. But now, school was going to start soon.

"It was really awesome, daddy!" he squealed and started to narrate about what happened in the park that day.

Though it was nothing new nor special, the man listened to his son narrate it, smiling through its entirety.

But then, what the little boy asked next made the man to lose his smile.

"Daddy, can I go to Riverside? Where Nanda anna goes to school? Then I'll go ask Nanda anna to teach me play the guitar! Yay!"

"Kiddo. . ." the man started hesitantly. But the bright and expectant smile on his one and only son caused him to pause.

Riverside was a boarding school in a small hill station away from their small town. It was not that the man didn't want his son to go study there. It was just that, his son was only six years old and ending up in a boarding school at such an young age wouldn't be good for his son's future.

But the expectant smile on his face made the man to utter the one word his son —at that moment—  wanted to hear the most.

"Yes."