Lost And Found

Meera walked briskly after finishing her job towards another house. She was a house maid whose entire life was dependent on her wages. That day was really hectic. She usually used to work from morning 8 till evening 8. Meera was not only a house maid, she was a good cook too because of which she had to stay beyond her working hours in a house that she used to go at 7 pm. Meera could barely hear the party sounds as she was busy frying poories. There were only 2 more left, she saw some guests barging in and out of the kitchen to carry the fried poories. She finished cleaning the platform and headed towards the backdoor. Before that she took her stuff and wanted to inform her Bibiji that she was done for the day, expecting that her Bibiji would give her some goodies to her children, which she always used to. She walked back to the hall waiting to catch a glimpse of her Bibiji. She could see that the party was not the usual one and saw some people talking in loud voices.

Somebody grabbed Meera by hand and pulled her to the centre of the hall where the party was going on. Unaware of all the happenings, Meera was searching for her owner with helpless eyes and looked back to see who had pulled her hand. It was the same fat lady who had come to the kitchen to take the poories. Meera tried to take her hand from the fat lady. But, Alas!, before she could do that, the fat lady bombarded in her ears as to where Meera had hid her mobile phone.

Meera started crying and called out "Bibiji, where are you? I don't know what this fat lady is talking about, please save me from her".

On hearing this, the fat lady rammed her to the floor. Meera's head hit straight on her Bibiji's feet. Bibiji lifted her gently and wiped her tears. She consoled her and told the fat lady that Meera had been a loyal house maid whom they ever had in the last 10 years and that she should not blame her without evidence.

Fat lady got angry and pointed towards Meera's bag first and told Meera to drop all things down to which Meera blatantly refused. This made everyone suspicious of Meera. But, Bibiji was very confident that Meera could never do that and somehow made her to drop things down from her bag.

Meera started to put things out one by one on the floor. Everyone's eyes were glued to her bag. First, came the old steel box without the lid, which was filled with rice. Second, there was a plastic cover with broken sweets. Third, came the pieces of roti, which she had not eaten from morning. It was smelly as the food was packed tightly in her bag from morning. Everyone's nose was covered with their hands.

Meera started crying profusely requesting Bibiji to allow her to go home as her kids would be hungry. The fat lady's eyes fell on Meera's pouch which was tucked in her saree. She would not let Meera go without showing the pouch to which Meera said she would not show that to anyone. Bibiji also grew suspicious of Meera and told her to show that. Meera refused, but the fat lady snatched the pouch from Meera in such force that it fell on the floor.

The mobile started ringing. The fat lady could not close her mouth nor did the people attending party.

Meera wiped her tears off and answered the call "Pappu, I'm sorry, I got late today. Make your sister and brother to drink water, and I am getting lot of goodies to you all, bye"

She picked all the stuff on the floor and walked away in peace with a pride on her face. She could barely hear her Bibiji calling out for her now. The only thing on her mind now was to feed her children.

Bibiji's husband was aware of all these things and went to the fat lady to ask her phone number, which she gave reluctantly. He opened his laptop and with the help of find your phone on Google, he could locate it. It was right next to her. Bibiji's husband turned back to look at the lady and tell her that the phone was next to her. To his dismay, he saw her son playing happily with the mobile, his hand pointing to her son. The fat lady turned towards her side and saw her son playing with her mobile. She screamed at her son and left the party with him who was still playing happily with the lost and found mobile.

There was utter silence in the hall. After the party got over, Bibiji thanked her husband immensely for his timely help. She tried calling Meera, tears filled her eyes, when she heard the reply "the number you are calling is switched off, please try later."