I am going to tell you a story. Not an imaginary one but a real one.The story is about four cherubs. They are not descended from heaven as in the case of fairy tales. The have come from north India with their father.They reached Malabar in a very early age. Now they can speak Malayalam fluently. They go school now.

. The first day when I met them, I smiled. The second day, I met them and asked their names. Arjun was the youngest, Lakshmi was the second, Sasi the third and Ravi was the eldest of the four.

The third day, I became their friend, and played the smiling game, which I usually played with them. It might be only we who played the game in the world. That was nothing but smiling to each other, never stopping. The one who stopped was the looser. It was Arjun who won every time. I wondered how he could do that! It usually took hours to end the contest and Arjun would be smiling ever charmingly from the beginning to the end. People who possessed love in their hearts can only smile so beautifully. I knew that, and I was the second to finish.

The fourth day they were my enemy. What happened was, Sasi and Lakshmi ran into the veranda with their naked feet, full of dirt and soot. The white tiled veranda looked like a painting now. The figures of their tiny feet were ‘drawn’ on the floor in dirt. My mother fired me, on seeing that. And I fired the four in return…
They ran like a rocket!