A Kick Too Far!
Nimi Kurian
17 October 2007, 07:53The loud laughter and easy banter echoed through the trees and down the valley. It was a happy sound. But, every time he heard it, Murugan winced. It was once again a reminder of what was way beyond his reach. The school on the top of the hill was a constant source of irritation for him. And the privileged children in their jerkins and uniforms, black shoes and ties were a reminder of what he could not give his son.
“I wish I was a Catholic like Sagayanathan. Then, the Brothers would have asked me to send my son to their school to get a free education. But now…” As usual his musings left him feeling depressed. At one point he had even considered converting…just so that his son could go to that upper class school. But then his wife had threatened suicide and called in the priest from the temple and her parents. He shuddered as he remembered all that drama.
Murugan believed his son was clever. And like all parents he bragged about his son Siva’s achievements. When anyone visited his house, he would call out to his son and ask him to recite the English rhymes he had learnt.
“Siva, Siva! Come and sing one song in English.”
Siva would come in front of the guests and shyly recite:
“Humpy dumpy sa-o-awa, humpy dumpy ha-a-grey-faw…”
The guests would exclaim and Murugan would be proud. However, this would set him thinking about how much better Siva would fare if he got the opportunity to study in that good English school.
As the days went by his resentment against the school grew. But his dislike for the students was even greater. He was angry with the children because they had rich parents, because they could study in this elite school and most of all because they took all this for granted. Never once, did these kids think that it was not them but Siva who should have actually benefited from the school. His anger against the children grew and he always felt he had to prove a point — just to show them.
One morning, he was walking along the path that ran just below the school playground. “Oh! The upper class boys are playing football today,” he sneered. “They, with their football shoes and socks and in their PT uniform! Ha! I can kick any football faster and higher than them. And that too, in my bare feet. I don’t need any shoes for that. Let’s see if those rich kids can do that!” The more he thought about it the angrier he grew.
The boys were however, not playing football. They were at the edge of the playground, throwing the shotput, practising for the Inter-school Sports that was to come up soon.
“Oh! No!” came a shout, “You can do better than that.”
“Come on, we need to win…”
“Throw! Throw! Throw!” Their high pitched childish voices carried clearly through the morning air.
Goaded and encouraged by his team mates, the boy took a deep breath, heaved and threw the shotput. Despite its weight, it whistled heavily threw the air. The others watched in amazed silence as the shotput went a long distance and fell with a gently thud on the soft grass at the edge of the field. Then propelled by its own weight and the velocity of the throw it moved forward and slowly rolled down the grassy slope. They ran forward and stood around the edge.
Just then, Murugan turned the corner and was surprised to see the crowd of boys all peering down towards the path. He tried to see what they were looking at and spotted the shotput fall onto the path. It lay there, inert — as if the exertions of the past few minutes had been too much.
Murugan saw this as an opportunity to ‘show these upper class children a thing or two’. He ran forward all poised to kick the ball.
At once, the boys realised what he proposed to do. “No, no. Don’t do that. It’s not a ball!” they shouted.
“Ah ha! Now they don’t want me to kick that ball because they feel it will get defiled!” he thought maliciously. He looked up at the boys, grinned victoriously at them and with a flick of his hair, he gathered speed and reaching the shotput, kicked it hard hoping to see it fly away.
A searing pain shot through his foot. After that, he didn’t remember a thing.
The boys ran down the slope and carried an unconscious Murugun with a bloody leg, to the school dispensary. The nurse was shocked to see such an awful sight. However, she soon cleaned him up and send the boys to alert Brother on the happenings. When Brother came into the clinic, Murugun was just coming around. As his bleary eyes focused, the Brother’s figure came into focus. He saw the white cassock, the broad green belt and the kind, benign face smiling at him. Murugan lost control of himself.
“It’s all your fault,” he shouted. “It’s all your fault.”
It took a while for Brother to get the story out of him, but when he did he was surprised. Surprised, at the simplicity of his need.
“All he wanted was for his son to study here!” he muttered.
