“It’s chaos,” said Rahul.
I smiled and replied, “It’s alright. It’s wonderful—a fantasy. And that’s all we need, don’t we? Jack, your story is fantasy, but it’s odd,” he said.
“Nothing is odd, my friend.”
The school bell rang.
“Now Jack, you may read your fantasy story,” said the teacher.
Jack stood up confidently, holding his paper with a little grin, and began reading aloud.The mountains were high and quiet. The sun looked like a painting in the sky, its colours melting into each other in shades of orange and pink. I was walking along a narrow path when I suddenly heard the roar of a jeep behind me.
To my surprise, inside the jeep was Aamir Khan.He seemed to be following me. I ran. At the edge of the mountain, there was no way forward. But then, I spotted a meadow below. I climbed down quickly and saw all my friends waiting there. We began running together. But Aamir Khan kept coming closer and something was wrong.
When I turned around again, he didn’t have a human face anymore. His head had turned into that of a fish. I was horrified.
“Run faster!” I shouted to my friends.
But when I turned again they were gone.
The fish-headed man smiled and vanished into thin air.Worried and breathless, I looked ahead and saw a village in the distance. I walked into it and tried to tell the people what had happened. But no one believed me. To them, I was the strange one.
Then, a small child came up to me and said, “You saw my father.”I was confused.He took my hand and brought me to his home. His mother was waiting and calmly explained everything.
“There was once a witch,” she said. “She cursed my husband and turned him into the creature you saw. He lost his memory. He forgets who he is, and now, he roams the mountains.”
The child looked at me with hopeful eyes and whispered, “The only way to save your friends is to stop them from reaching the Valley of the Red Dust.”
I was scared. I was touched. But most of all I knew what I had to do.
I stayed the night in their little home. It was snowing outside. They gave me a warm bed and a backpack filled with strange things, things I didn’t know I’d need.
The next morning, a jeep was waiting for me. It was cold, but I didn’t feel it. All I could think about was saving my friends and maybe, just maybe, bringing home a father.
The classroom fell silent.Jack?said the teacher, raising an eyebrow. The assignment was to write a fantasy, something more like a children’s story.
I looked at her and said,But I think this is fantasy enough, ma’am. I glanced around the classroom. Everyone was staring at me, wide-eyed.
Just imagine! wouldn’t you want to know what happens next? I asked. Because I can see all of you want to.
The teacher paused, smiled slightly, and said, The story was very imaginative. Odd? yes, but maybe, maybe you’ve written a new kind of fantasy.