It is a beautiful early evening autumn day. Yellow crunchy leaves breaking and falling off of the gigantic trees across the road, and feet crushing on them as they accel towards their desired destination after a long day of work. Cars honking and the jingling bells of rickshaw, were all overpowered by the “vroom vroom” sound over the two shiny and heavy, metallic toy cars. “Labib! Where are you my baby? What is it that you are doing?” My mother said. “Racing my cars!” I replied with a joyous tone. “Oh really? But baby you do remember that you have homework from school right? And you have to fix your handwriting too, or else papa is going to scold you.” She said. “Okay, but I want to play more, I don’t like studying.” I said with a sad tone. “Well you can play as long as you want once your done with the work.” Mother replied. I then gently place my favorite cars on my mothers dressing table and check twice to see if they are parked properly or no. Then I leave the room with my mother and go to guest room where I had my studying table, to start working on my homework and my handwriting.

It is five past five on the big round wall clock as I watch the second’s hand running over all the lines that represented the seconds and minutes, and I have already started to think of when I will be released from this stressful job. “How long do I have to study today mammi?” I asked. “As soon as your done, I will let you go Labib.” She said with a smile. I then grab my seat and take out all the books and notes from my school bag, while mother brings a chair to sit beside me. She comes and sits as close as possible to me, and it looked like as if she will be scrutinizing every single drop of ink I print on my paper. I never felt well when I was put in front of the books and papers, the monotone color always struck my brain as if an arrow was shot through both my eyes and through my brain, and it was a natural experience I kept having since I started school. Nonetheless, I open my textbook and start reading through the usual topics according to my class syllabus. The first thing I started was to memorize a poem, and it was something I did not like back then. Why? You may ask. Well, as a kid I was always scolded by my father for not being able to memorize things. Yet, since I am bound to the shackles of despair and the only key to open them were to memorize the poem, I start reading it. I read the poem once, then try to remember as much as possible and give the book to my mother. So she can ask me to recite it. I tried my best to keep all the sentences in my mind but alas, the tick tock of the clock ,and me thinking of, “Oh my god, time is running away, and I am not going to be able to play as much as I want,” intimidated the little fragile body and made it sweat; making me lose every single word that I memorized momentarily, which was another problem of mine, always thinking of playing. Nonetheless, My mother hands me back the book and says, “Labib, read the poem couple of times aloud so that you can hear it yourself, then try to recite by closing your eyes.” Me being all frustrated and impatient again, start to read the poem with a vibrating voice. For some reason, the resonance of my own voice started to scare me as my body temperature started to rise and sweat, turning me red. Without wasting anymore time, my mother takes me in her arms and starts to read the poem on her own. I was completely shocked, and my body cooled down as if I was dropped into a bathtub full of ice, chilling me to a point where I stopped breathing for a moment. Then she takes over my book and kept on reading, not once, not twice, but thrice with her beautiful soft voice. Then she hands the book over to me saying, “Here, try reading once now, and recite me the poem.” She had this confident smile that gave me the feeling of safety and trust that I never felt before. I read the poem, recite it to her and it was no surprise of me not being able to recite it without seeing it at that point. She then gives me a hug and kisses and smooches me for completing my homework and moves on to practice my handwriting. Me without realizing, started to copy down every single word from the above line of where I was writing as best of my abilities. Completing all the required pages, I then slam the book close, and congratulate myself with a breath of relief as I immediately pack up the school bag.

Clock striking six, the red sun started to tuck itself away and under the horizon, wrapping up the short evening as I moved out of my chair and away from the table. The crunching noise of feet crushing the autumn leaves were gone, cars honking disappeared, leaving me with the one or two jingling bells of rickshaw passing by the road and the “whoosh” of the trees as wind intersected their leaves. And giving me the trust and confidence of not fearing the things I do not like which manifested in me because of my father’s scoldings as well as my natural perspectives of things, but then to challenge them by taking a deep breath and confronting it with all my abilities, without fearing anyone.