At 12 noon. He was wearing a checked yellow half shirt, three buttons unbuttoned at the front, his chest revealed grey hair, and at the corner of his red lips was betel juice. He pedaled his bicycle, which was of the brand Hero, an old one, with a rusted green and white mudguard, rushing to the village. He slowed down as he witnessed the series of houses, found no soul, and somewhere, the matinee drama echoed the wailing of the treacherous villainess. He stopped, tilted, and placed the wooden box of peeling paint on his shoulder. With his left-hand bicep, he panned to his forehead, swept off his sweat, and spat the red betel stuff carefully at the corner. With his right hand, he took the funnel, its end fitted with a strong green rubber button, and he pressed it in and released gently, so that it echoed against the wailing from the television as poooopeeeeeee.

The disturbed beetles conquered the mud road and marched towards this man, and it signalled him to move a little, to tempt the upcoming ones, and halt again, when the bunch gathered. It was just the job of the man to grab the money from the hand, hear the order, and provide his service, and they were gone when this ceremony was completed.

Then there was one hand, trying hard to get attention, and repeating his desire, and he was able to get the ice cream of his flavour. With the excitement of the buy, from scolding and cunning and planning and admiring and fighting and cheating and behaving and misbehaving, dreaming and stuff, and with that all-in-one emotion, he grasped the stick of the ice cream, of mango flavour. In the dream of taking his tongue and licking the top layer of the juice that had started to melt in the noon hours, yet with a jerk, it fell on the mud, rolled, and fragmented like glass, coated with those tiny little stones called sand.

Tirunelveli, September 02, 20025