Epic Mishap!
It was like just another afternoon of her summer vacation and today too Rima was busy with her day-dreaming and imagining all sorts of heroic deeds she can do to save the universe from all the dangers that threatens to annihilate it.
She imagined how she can run into a burning train to rescue the crying child or maybe she can rush the victims of a bomb blast to a nearby hospital. She could perhaps save a ship from downing or a plane from crashing. She can even land at a hijacked plane and hand over the culprits to the police. She would then have her name published in bold letters on the daily newspaper along with her photo on its first page and wipe-out the 'good-for-nothing' tag that her mother had stamped on her.
When her dreams thus flew higher and higher like a kite in the wide infinite sky, a sudden loud noise from somewhere near-by ripped-off the tail of her kite of imagination and brought her crashing down to the earth.
Rima jumped off her bed and flung open the door to run towards the direction of the noise. She then saw Mrs. Chatterjee lying devastated on the courtyard of her house clutching her head with both her hands crying out for help. From her door came huge grey fumes of smoke while the fire danced dangerously within. From what Rima could gather from her constant mourning was this that her gas cylinder had burst and her kitchen had caught fire.
But by the time Rima had figured this out, a lot of spectators already gathered round the house discussing what to do or how to do with none moving forward to do. All those women and their terrorized kids could do was to stand there wide-eyed looking unblinkingly at the door as if expecting a tiger to pop out from there any minute.
Rima stood there for a while, imagining a possible chance to showcase her heroism and at once an idea struck her and she ran off to prove her valor. She went straight to her bathroom where two empty buckets stared back at her. She flung open the bathroom tap, but not a drop of water was found in there.
"Which idiot had left the buckets empty?" she began to shout but stopped mid-way as she recognized herself as that idiot who had bathed the last.
She then looked at the clock. There was yet another hour for the water to come flowing in through the tap. She looked here and there for a possible solution, desperately trying not to miss this opportunity to prove herself. Finally another idea struck her.
She, then, carefully peeped into her mother's room to make sure she was still deep down her afternoon nap. Having assured herself of that, she quickly took one of the empty buckets and ran towards Chatterjee aunty's house. She, then, quickly picked up water from the nearby high drain and ran towards the burning kitchen. By that time, a few more onlookers had gathered at her doorstep still waiting patiently and eagerly for the tiger to pop out.
Rima pushed her way through the mini crowd and finally succeeded in throwing the water over the fire. It stopped its cataclysmal dance but refused to end altogether. Gathering a bit more of her courage, Rima slowly went nearer and saw that the fire was still burning somewhere around the large wooden utensil carrier. She then ran back to the drain to fetch some more water.
The crowd had grown outside and almost all of whom who had known her—from Mrs. Roy whom she had denied money to the kids she had once refused to give flower—gathered round her to know exactly how much loss she had incurred rather than to offer compassion for the destruction the fire had done. Rima squeezed her way through them and threw the water over the utensils. But in hurry and excitement she actually threw the bucket along with the water. Consequently, the water missed its target and at once the bucket too caught fire.
Perplexed at the sudden turn of events, Rima ran towards Chatterjee aunty's bathroom and picked up her bucket and before Mrs. Chatterjee could protest she had dipped the bucket into the drain and had flung the water, this time hitting the target successfully. The fire finally subdued.
Rima heaved a sigh of relief. At once a proud feeling filled her heart and she jumped up-and–down and danced in her mind as she thought of all the praises she would receive for saving the great house on fire from such a dangerous disaster and its obvious eradication. She was finally the ultimate hero of the day.
But her train of thoughts was broken by a tight slap on her back, and that was not at all given as a pat for her heroism. Shocked, she turned back to find an angry Chatterjee aunty who grabbed her by the ears, shook her violently by the shoulders and shouted—"Were you out of your mind stupid girl? Why did you put my clean bucket into that dirty drain? And how dare you throw that filthy drain water into all my utensils? Oh, what a curse fell on my utensils! Now who would eat or cook in those?" and looked at Rima with her eyes as red as blood and as wide as a Rasgulla and Rima felt as if it would burst open any time now.
"I… I… just… wanted to… sa… save…," she stammered, afraid and a bit confused as to whether a clean bucket or a burnt utensil was more important than saving a burning kitchen.
Rima wanted to ask the same but the look on Chatterjee aunty's eyes made her courage reduce to a pin hole and she stammered and finally shut up. She never knew that Chatterjee aunty was such of a maniac who was so obsessed with sanctity that she would prefer dying to making her precious belongings dirty by using them as a tool to save herself.