The Eggplant And The Tears

One fine evening my mother wanted to make eggplant curry for dinner. A day before she had ordered eggplants along with some other vegetables from a local online shopping website. It was my responsibility to cross-check the receipt and make sure that all the stuff ordered was there and the pricing was correct. Also, I was the one who had to keep all the vegetables and frozen food in the fridge before they went bad. I remembered clearly that I had seen eggplant along with the other vegetables but I couldn’t remember if I had put it in the fridge.

That evening, my mum asked me where the eggplant was. I replied it was in the fridge with the other vegetables. She said it isn’t there. I went and searched for it in the vegetable compartment but I couldn’t find the purple-colored plant anywhere. I then searched for it in the plastic bags it came in, but it wasn’t there either.

My mother was becoming more and more infuriated. She started searching for the receipt and found out that the eggplant had been ticked off, meaning that it was there. BUT WHERE WAS IT? She started going off about how irresponsible I was and couldn’t be trusted with anything and I was getting more and more panicky. I had seen it, yes I had, but now when I couldn’t find it, I started having second thoughts that maybe absent-mindedly, I had ticked it off from the receipt thinking that it must’ve been there. My mum continued scolding me as I ran through the house searching for the vegetable. Tears welled up in my eyes as I realized that it was nowhere in the house. I sure was in for a hard time.

My mum asked, ‘Did the maid steal it in the morning?!’

‘I don’t know.’ I replied trying to push back my tears, but I just couldn’t help it. If my mum saw me tearing up without a good reason, she’d definitely give me one.

‘What did we have for breakfast today?’

Now, I couldn’t even reply because I knew that if I spoke, a waterfall would start gushing from my eyes.

She started laughing when she realized what she ate this morning. ‘We had eggplant for breakfast idiot!’

I gave a long sigh of relief. I started laughing and crying at the same time. THE TEARS NEEDED TO FLOW DAMMIT!