StoryADay May 2019 – Day 4

I skipped the Day 3 prompt, since I started getting two prompts in a single day, so I decided to skip one and just catch up to Day 4 prompt. Of course I won’t be publishing what I write for all the days, but the ones which I enjoyed writing, I’ll publish on my blog. Please consider the stories I publish here as my Copyright 🙂 Just in case, one day someone finds them interesting enough to be published 😀

Prompt – Write a story with no more than two characters

Ernesto’s escapades – The Short Cut

Ernesto was an earnest man. He saw the world as it was, which was very simply. After all, he had to live up to his name. He couldn’t understand why people were so sad or confused or angry all the time. Life was so simple, there wasn’t much to do really other than eat, sleep and shit. He could never figure out what the fuss was about really. People in general scared him. Not because they hurt him physically, but because they always seemed to be angry. And it seemed to him at times, that most of the anger was directed towards him, although he had no idea why people would be angry with him when he was just going on about his business all the time, it was all very confusing.

He had lost his parents when he was a baby, and he was raised on the streets, in the company of dogs. Dogs don’t do much, if you notice. They laze about, eat something, shit and shag, and sleep. And that’s what he learnt about living life too. He had not known what his name was, growing up and mostly people called him, “Get Lost!”, or “Disgusting”. He didn’t know what those words meant really since he hadn’t gone to school ever, but he guessed it wasn’t something good. He was living under the tin roof, his house and eating the scraps when he met the other man.

He had seen the other man with really strange clothes, something circular and pointy on his head, a stick in his hand, wearing clothes after clothes, quite like his, but they were all the same color, unlike his which resembled a rainbow. But then, he thought, everyone is entitled to their own style. He was just about to turn away when suddenly a group of men starting shouting at the other man and pushing him, with bats and chains. The other man looked slightly scared, and for some reason, he wanted to go help that man. So he took on his menacing dog growling look, the one he had learnt living with the dogs all these years, the one that scared most people away, and ran in the middle of the gang right in front of the man. He was crouching and making growling sounds from the base of his throat. One of the men said something to him and clanged his chain on the ground in front of him, but he pounced on him and bit him. The men shouted something back but retreated. And that was how he came to work for The Man, who he called Sir sometimes, because thats what the man had asked him to call him. Over the last few months, he had learnt a few words and how to speak with other people and a lot of other useful things. His Sir though used to get really annoyed with him at times, and again he just couldn’t understand why, when he would do his work just as he was instructed to carry out, right to the letter!

Just take the other day, it was right after breakfast was over and he was clearing away the dishes, that Sir said to him, “Ernesto, I need you to run to the market and bring these things from this list. I need them urgently, so take a short cut if you must, but hurry up.”

Ernesto said in great earnest, “Yes Sir, OK Sir, I going fast run in short cut.”

With that he broke into a sprint.

When he returned though, it was nearly time for dinner and Sir was pacing with a very angry face in the front of the house.

“Where on earth have you been Earnesto!!! I was so worried that I was almost going to call the Police and go looking for you!”, he thundered.

“Sir, I’m not sure why you angry. I did just as you said to do, I even ran, and I ran so much, I was tired and thought I would fall down, I didn’t stop to eat or drink on the way and even took the short cut as you told me to. But I not understand Sir, shops must have holiday today. All closed when I reached, so I was not able to get anything from the list.”, explained Earnesto, earnestly.

He watched the man’s face grow redder and redder, until he exploded and said, “You dare mock me now!? I have no idea what you’re talking about, because there was no holiday today and the shops closed on their normal time of 7 pm! You could not buy anything because you reached ridiculously late! And for the life of me I cannot imagine how you could be so late, when you look like you have run a marathon and you say had taken the short cut too! So the only explanation is that you are lying!”

“But I did take the short cut Sir, and I did run all the way. I am quite sure I am not lying.”

Sir looked like he was going to say something, but he just shook his head and asked Earnesto to lay out dinner. After dinner, the man seemed to think something over and asked Earnesto, “Can you tell me the route you took for the short cut?”

“Why, of course Sir! It is just as you had explained to me one day, when you told me about your days in the military. When you had to take a short cut and go through the jungle and bushes and cross a stream. So I ran out the house and remembered the opening to the jungle clearing on the left and although that was in the opposite direction of the shops, I knew I had to follow instructions to take the short cut, so I ran round and round in the jungle taking the short cut and finally I thought I had done a good job of covering the short cut, when I finally made it out and towards the shops. I know you must be beaming with pride now Sir, because I remembered your story about the short cut,” explained Earnesto, with an earnest smile on his face.

The man was speechless for a minute, and then suddenly, he roared into a big laugh, and just clapped Earnesto’s back and said, “Well at least, we had an amusing end to the day.” And with that and a shake of his head, he retired to his room, leaving Earnesto as confused as ever, because he wasn’t sure what was funny about the whole story 🙂

I wanted to mention here, that Earnesto might be a recurring character in my stories. He is inspired by one of my favorite comic characters, Suppandi, who had made me laugh a lot on boring train journeys. I hope you enjoy Earnesto too 🙂 I would love to get feedback on the story and whether it made you laugh.

©Prachi Pati