Scar-faced Grandpa

“So was grandpa a soldier?” My 10-year old son asked, looking at me inquisitively. 

“No! Why do you ask?” I said.

“He has this big scar near his eye,” he said, as he flipped the photo album.

“Oh yes, the scar!” I said, suddenly remembering.

“How did he get it?” he asked.

“Oh it is a very funny yet sad story!” I said, sitting next to him now on the couch and looking at the picture that made him curious. In the picture, I was happily sitting in the laps of my grandma with my grandpa sitting next to her. The photo quality was not great but the scar on my grandpa's face was strikingly visible. Pity grandpa didn’t live for long. He had just touched his fifties. Grandma lived to tell the tale about her husband’s scar to me. 

My son broke my thoughts as I stared at the picture. 

“So how did he get it?” he repeated the question.

I knew my son was looking for some kind of a heroic response. Very typical of boys in that age wanting to become soldiers, fire fighters, pilots or even pirates! As long as there was some action! Should I break his heart and tell him the true story or play with his emotions and tell him an adventurous tale? I wondered. 

He was now staring at me, waiting for me to start telling him his grandpa’s heroic tale.

“Long time ago, when your grandpa was a little boy..”

“How little?” my son excitedly interjected. 

“Ummm...not as little as you, a little older,”

“11? 12? 13?...” he asked.

"Stop stop stop! You don’t have to start counting your numbers, he was 14!”

“I was close,” he said.

“Yes, I should have made you stop when you said 14! Sorry!”

“Ok, what happened then?”

“Well, he was a very fidgety boy,” I replied.

“What is a fidge-et-tee?”

“Who just can’t sit still,” I answered.

“Aah! I can!” he said proudly, as he suddenly sat erect.

“Oh yes, you sure can and daddy is so proud of you!” I said with a smile.

“So, I am not fidge-et-tee,” he said.

“No, you are not!”

“Grandpa always kept moving his hands or his legs if he had nothing to do,” I continued.

“That’s strange!” he said, making a little frown.

“Very!” 

“Did his mum and dad not take him to a doctor?”

“Unfortunately, no. As they thought he was just bored and had nothing to do,” I said.

“Ok, what happened then?”

“So, one day on his 14th birthday, his dad gifted him a pen.”

“A pen? Who gifts a pen? It is a boring gift!” my son said. 

“Well, it was not an ordinary pen!”

“You mean it was magical,” he said, suddenly getting all excited. 

“No, not magical but it had pictures of his favourite cartoon characters and a small light at the top that lit up when you wrote with it,” I said.

“That’s magical,” my son said with an awe.

“Anyway, so my grandpa played with his pen all day long. My great grandparents did not know whether to be upset or happy about it. It was always in his hand. He took it with him everywhere!”

“How could he play with a pen?” he asked. 

“He kept fidgeting with it!” I said, stressing on the word fidgeting.

“Fidge-et-ting? Couldn’t keep still,” he said.

I smiled.

“Yes, he put it between his two fingers and kept moving it,” I said, trying to show him the action using my fingers. 

"In fact, even while he was studying or reading, he would have it in his one hand and shake it continuously,” I continued.

“He never got tired?”

“Nah! In fact it kept him active,” he said, sounding surprised.

“But one day, he returned home from school, all sulking and teary-eyed.”

“Because he lost his pen?”

“No, because it got confiscated by his class teacher. He was taking it to school every day and twisting it between his fingers while he was in the class. The teacher got very annoyed one day and confiscated it.”

“Con-si-fi-cated?”

“Con-fis-ca-ted,” I said slowly, focusing on every syllable.

“Con-fis-ca-ted,” he repeated.

“Yes, when your teacher takes away something that you should not be bringing to school!” I explained.

“Grandpa must be very sad!”

“Extremely. He stopped talking much with everybody at home or in his school,” I replied.

“That’s sad!”

“Very! So, one day, his mum went up to him and made him promise that as long as he didn’t take the pen to school again and play all the time with it, she would go to his school and request his class teacher to return it.” 

The son was now hearing the story very intently.

“So what happened next?” He asked.

“Well, on hearing this, my grandpa jumped with joy and promised his mum that he would not take his precious pen to school ever or play with it. He would just keep it in his pen-stand and only use it for writing.”

I continued. Getting closer to climax, no, not climax but an anti-climax is always disappointing. I was still weighing in my head if I should turn the story around and turn it in to some adventure. Was it necessary to tell him the truth? 

“So did his mum go to his school the next day?”

“She sure did! She went to his class teacher and requested her to return the pen to grandpa. She even told the class teacher that her little boy would not bring the pen to the school again.”

“And then?”

“The class teacher returned the pen,” I said.

“And then?”

“Your grandpa was thrilled. As soon as they reached home, he took the pen and put it in his pen-stand.”

My boy was happy as well. 

“Grandpa made sure he didn't take the pen to school again.”

“Yes, else it would be con-si-fic…” my son said. 

I smiled and said, “yes, con-fis-ca-ted. But he didn’t keep a part of his promise.”

I was finally reaching the end of the story. I decided to go with the truth. There were enough magical and brave stories around.

“He played with his pen?” my son said.

“Uh-huh!”

“What did he do?”

“One evening, he moved it so fast that the pen flipped from his fingers and hit the ceiling of his room!” I said.

“Wow! and then?”

“The pen came back hurling down, with its light turned on, and hit my grandpa’s face. Luckily it didn't hit his eyes,” I said softly.

“Yes, but it was close,” my son said, looking at the picture again.

We were quiet.

Suddenly he laughed and said, “grandpa was a very naughty boy!”

“Very!” I said, and laughed along with him.