Fairy tale

It was her favorite time of the day -  story time before sleep. Chandini handed over the book to her mom. Roshini usually told stories that came to her mind but today her daughter had insisted her to tell stories from this story book. Roshini flipped the pages of the book and the dim light of the lantern showed that it was a story book with fairy tales. “Aha, fairy tales” she muttered to herself.

She loved fairy tales as a child. Mostly the ones where a princess was in danger and a prince charming comes to her rescue and saves her from the monsters or step mother or any other sorts of danger, with the kiss of true love playing an important role. She spent most of her childhood in her dream land of fairy tales until one day when she got lost and was picked up by human traffickers. She was then made a sex worker at the age of 13. She didn’t know a way out and neither could think of any. Memories of those days were hazy and she didn’t want to think of them. She gave birth to her daughter, Chandini at the age of 16. She didn’t want Chandini to share her fate and mustered up the courage to escape from the hell and succeeded after various failed attempts.

She was overwhelmed with emotions thinking of her past and how Chandini was the turning point of her life. Today, she lived in this hut in a slum and worked as a daily wage laborer at the construction sites. She also managed to send her daughter to school. She hardly gets time to spend with her daughter the entire day but makes sure that she spends time to bond with her at bed time with her stories.

 “Ma” Chandini called. “Story pleeeaase. I am waiting.” She said with an enthusiastic smile. 

Roshini kept the book aside and looked at her daughter. 

“Ma! What happened? Won't you tell me today’s story from the book?” 

“I will. I know the stories from this book. I have heard them when I was young.” Saying so Roshini began the story.

“Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess. She was loved by everyone in the kingdom for she was kind and humble. One day an evil monster, having heard of the princess’s beauty kidnapped her and held her captive in a cave. The princess was in distress and shouted for help for entire day but no one came to her rescue. Finally the princess was struck with an idea. She took her hair pin and pricked the monster’s eye and stamped his foot with her high heeled shoes. The monster howled in agony. Having diverted the monster’s  attention, the princess fled from the cave and escaped.”

Chandini giggled by the end and said, “Wow ma. That was pretty cool.”

Roshini smiled at her daughter and patted her to sleep. She had altered the climax in her version of the story. She had removed the prince and let the princess save herself. She knew that life is not a fairy tale and didn’t want her daughter to dwell in it. Her stories always conveyed that “when in danger, save yourself. Don’t wait for the nonexistent prince charming. No knight in shining armor will come to your rescue. Life is ruthless."