The red monster on the staircase

Why was it that Sona, her best friend, had stopped coming over to play? Reena’s mother often let her go to Sona’s place next door, but Sona had stopped coming here. It just wasn’t fair, Reena fumed, under her breath.

“Maybe she isn’t allowed to go to anyone’s house,” Papa said, trying to console Reena.

But that wasn’t true. “Remember how often she used to play here last year?” Reena reminded him. Reena’s mother had a worried look on her face, as she said, “Yes, I remember…I wonder what has changed for her to stop coming here.”

Meanwhile at Sona’s house, her mother had a worried frown on her face. Every time Sona made a plan to visit Reena, she’d suddenly change her mind at the last minute, refusing to go. “What could have happened there for Sona to become so scared…and the sad part is that both the girls adore each other,” she thought to herself.

But neither mother could solve the mystery of Sona’s sudden fear. When the girls were in school the mothers discussed it over the wall. Sometimes when they met at the park, they talked about it. But it was no use. Sona refused to play at Reena’s place.

One day, Reena piped up at the dining table, “Does it mean that when I have my birthday party next month, Sona won’t come?” Now, this was serious. For Reena, a birthday without her best friend Sona, was no birthday at all. They had to find a solution somehow, and they had to do it soon.

It was Sona who solved the mystery for them, finally. One night, she woke up from her sleep, screaming. As her parents rushed to her bed, they found her tossing about, fighting some dreadful creature in her sleep. It took her parents nearly half an hour to calm her, and nudge her awake — out of her bad dream. When she eventually settled down, sipping on a cup of warm Bournvita, her mother gently asked her, “So what were you fighting in your dream?”

Sona’s eyes became the size of saucers, and she seemed to breathe faster. Looking around she whispered, “Those horrible monsters in Reena’s house!”

Both her parents looked a bit startled, their faces mirroring the same question, “What creatures?”

Sona continued, “Those big fanged, fierce-eyed faces with huge nostrils that they’ve hung on the walls since the last few months…the worst monster is the red one on their staircase…he’s the one who visits me every night, in my dreams,” she shuddered, almost spilling some Bournvita on the bed sheet.

Sona’s parent’s exchanged looks of relief. That was one famous mystery solved, at last! The next day, when the two mothers chatted over the phone, they laughed with relief that they now knew what Sona had been scared of. Eager to have Sona back in her house, Reena’s mother offered, “I’ll just take down and hide all those Indonesian masks that my husband brought back from his last business trip. Poor girl, to suffer nightmares like that!”

But Sona’s mother had a better plan, which the two women put into action as Reena’s birthday drew nearer. It was a ‘Chocolate Treasure Hunt’. The mothers explained that it was a practice run, for the real Treasure Hunt they had planned for Reena’s birthday.

If the two girls found the clues too difficult, they would make it easier for the birthday hunt. “So since it’s only practice, there won’t be any real chocolate treasure at the end, right?” asked Sona. Reena’s mother was quick to reply, “For all the hard work you girls will put into the hunt, there most certainly WILL be real chocolates at the end.”

So in minutes, the girls set off.  The hunt began in Sona’s house. But soon the clues led them into the garden. Then over the wall into Reena’s garage. The most exciting clue, which took the girls ages to crack, led them both straight into Reena’s house.

The mother’s exchanged smiles.  Sona just hadn’t realised she’d entered the ‘House with all those monsters’. One clue was in Reena’s kitchen and then, the next one was tucked right into the nostril of one of the fierce masks in the drawing room.

Reena jumped onto the sofa, unhooked the mask from the nail on the wall, laid it upside down on the floor and dug out the paper clue. As she read it out loud, Sona had gingerly lifted the harmless mask from the floor, turned it over a couple of times and burst out laughing, “Mama,” she shouted happily, “It’s not a monster, after all!”

So when the last clue led to the ‘red monster’ on the staircase, it was Sona who raced ahead of Reena to lift the mask off its hook, which resulted in a packet of brightly wrapped chocolates tumbling out, landing at her feet. From that moment, the ‘red monster’ who’d filled her nights with bad dreams, turned into the ‘Chocolate Mask’!

“And Aunty,” she mumbled, her mouth full of chocolate, “I think the clues were too easy…make them tougher on Reena’s birthday.”