The secret life of objects

Despite having had a long and tiring day — after her physical training instructor made her practise all day for the inter-school sports championship — Mini was still unable to sleep. She was worried about her school’s annual short story competition. Not a single idea had come to her. The deadline was on Monday, and she had just one day left to think of and write her story.

Suddenly, goosebumps dotted her body as strange voices penetrated her eardrums.

“Who is this disturbing me?” Mini sat up in bed and rubbed her eyes, trying to see in the darkness. She frowned as she saw some shapes moving. Was she dreaming? She pinched herself.

“Ouch,” she said. She had pinched herself hard. The shapes paused. The conversation stopped. Mini held her breath. The shapes began moving again, and the conversation restarted, as though a midnight secret party was going on. Would this noise wake her family up and get her into trouble, since it was coming from her room? Fear gripped Mini at the thought of ghosts in her room. 

She pretended to go back to sleep to hoodwink the shapes. The noise turned frantic. Sitting up in bed, Mini switched on the light. Her eyes widened in shock.

All the objects in her room — the beanbag, the chair, her teddy bear, her dressing table, her study table, her pencil box, her books and textbooks — were huddled together in a deep discussion. They were unaware of the light in the room or Mini’s presence at their meeting.

A high-pitched voice, like a mouse learning to speak like a human, was reading her book loudly. It was the toy mouse, her second-birthday present, which she had chucked into a corner of her room along with the storybook. The rest of the objects were listening intently.

After the story ended, the objects from Mini’s pencil box, which had fallen on the floor and which she had not bothered to pick up, started a mad dance. The two erasers bounced like crazy balls, then rubbed their backs against each other. The six pencils slithered across the ground like happy snakes, curling around one another, and making funny sounds. The red sharpener whistled shrilly, the compass drew figure eight patterns in the air, and the ruler tap-danced to the sharpener’s tune. A few minutes later, the mad dance stopped. Mini was surprised to see this side of the objects in her room.

“Oh no,” the grey beanbag groaned. “Mini sat on me today with her sports shoes, dropping bits of mud and dog poop on me. I’m feeling yucky. Can one of you please wipe the stains?”

Taking a tissue paper, the teddy bear wiped the brown stains off the grey beanbag.

“Can you please squirt a few drops of perfume so that the smell is camouflaged?” the beanbag requested.

The teddy bear sprayed a few drops of perfume.

“I feel so much better,” the beanbag sighed, as the teddy sat on it holding the bottle of perfume.

Mini’s stuffed dog, which she had thrown under the bed, was now barking excitedly and chasing the mouse all over the room. The mouse crawled across the bed, and the dog jumped onto the bed after it.

Seeing Mini, the brown dog jumped into her lap and started licking her face. Its warm tongue dribbled saliva all over Mini’s chin. When she tickled its stomach, the dog rolled on the pillow, yelping playfully.

“Wish I had taken better care of him,” Mini

said ruefully, scratching the dog behind his ear. The dog licked her hands. Wiping the drool from her hands with a tissue, she crushed the tissue into a ball and chucked it into the green dustbin in her room. She missed, and the tissue landed several inches away from the bin. The dustbin extended its arms, picked up the crushed tissue paper, and dropped it into its stomach.

The two wooden crows, a gift from her aunt Maya, started cawing loudly.

“Shh, stop cawing, you will wake up the entire household,” Mini said. She felt bad for dumping them on the window sill.

The crows instantly fell silent.

Her comb and hairbrush started dancing on the dressing table. Mini laughed as the hairbrush constantly missed its steps and bumped into the comb, making the comb fall several times. Her doll started dancing, and her study table and chair also did their crazy dance.

Mini’s eyes began drooping. Switching off the light, she went to sleep.

The next morning, when she woke up, her first thought was about what she had seen during the night. As her eyes moved around her room, she saw that all the objects were where she had always thrown them. Shaking her head, she dismissed the night’s events as a figment of her imagination.

Then her gaze fell on her beanbag. Her teddy bear was sleeping soundly on it, still holding the bottle of perfume. She hadn’t imagined it. The objects in her room had a secret life. Picking up everything, she put them in their places. She decided to take better care of her things. Mini smiled as she realised she finally had an idea for her short story.