My heart will have her smile written in pencil

*This happened a long time back and it is a true story. You have the freedom to trust it or otherwise*

It was my third grade(Third standard as we say in india), the first week of school and as usual I was dejected. But this year, there was a new sensation in the small town (shimoga) I studied - "pen-pencils". (For those uninitiated, pen-pencils are the crude front loading mechanical pencils.)

That year, I had begged my mother to buy me one of those cool pencils. As a result, on the second day of the school, I was a proud owner of one red-black pen-pencil. A tap at its back pushed the lead inside the equipment to eject the lead at incredible speed directly towards classmate's eyes but that was the manageable part. After 15 minutes of using it, I was stumped by my first technical hurdle. In my enthusiasm, I had never found out how to sharpen it. And it never came with a manual either. My manly ego avoided me asking any of my friends. The result was that I stood at the corner trying to figure out a way out of this complication. And then she came.

Either she might have seen my confusion or she was in love with me, I cannot say. But she looked at me in my eyes and understood everything. And voila, she had a blue colored pencil of the same make. She silently took the pencil and showed me the back part of the pencil which contained the metal sharpener. Her cute red fingers rotated the metal sharpener making the lead as sharp as her smile which was by the way, piercing my heart. The environment was simply electric. The song "Nee bandu nintaaga" was playing in my mind. The result was a sharpened pencil, damaged heart and my inability to learn the skill of sharpening a pencil that day.

Till this day, I remember her beautiful face and that enchanting smile.

*I dont remember her name. School was Rotary east school, Shimoga*

This song is dedicated to her