Page 61 - GINGER

“So you ain’t as useless as I thought!”, the familiar voice spoke from behind Ginger’s back.
Her feet froze to the ground.

“You prick, you found the treasure; now give it to Papa.” Ginger’s father said, and clunk his
metal rods as if wagging his tail in joy and pride.

Ginger did not turn, she did not move an inch, so much that she stood lifeless, devoid of
any pulsation or breath.

“Oh you want me to come and do the effort now?”, he asked her, again.

Ginger held the new-found treasure tightly in her hands, and once again admired the
beauty that she held, and in it, the reflection of her face…her eyes.

Just about then, she realized.

By now the mermaids had lost patience, and with the lights emanating out of the forest,
they had started to take the chance of pulling themselves up the rocks and crawling up
and over, in vain.

They hissed like snakes and crept like lizards, as they saw the lights were only getting
brighter and stronger, hinting the treasure had probably been acquired.

The friends were running towards the light too.

With everyone moving towards it, suddenly the light seemed to have become the gravity
of that universe, and the treasure its cradled star.

Ginger turned, gathering all the best memories she had of her family, and closed ones.
She turned a changed person with a better understanding heart. She turned, he pranced.

He halted, as she looked up. “Here.” She said, and extended her hands towards him with
a plain face, like giving away her new-born child.

“Take it, you need it more.”

He looked baffled, dumbstruck and taken aback, failing to react.

He snatched it nonetheless, and pointed a finger at her. “You”, he said, clenching his
teeth, “you..”, and the treasure in his hands glowed, calling out to him.

Turning around to hide and secure from Ginger and everyone else, he held it in his hands
to finally look at it.

It was a plain flat glistening mirror.