Consequences

At a certain point in our childhood, we suddenly come to realize that our actions have consequences and only we are responsible for those consequences. Before this realization, we think of ourselves as insignificant in the scheme of things. This is the story of how this realization came to me, and how I learned to take responsibility for my mistakes. 

As a child, it was not easy for me to make friends. We lived at an inconvenient distance from the town, so I rarely saw my classmates outside of the school. My best and perhaps only friend when I was in the fifth grade was not one of my classmates but the son of one of our house help. His name was Abdul. Since he lived with us and was the only one of similar age around me, we used to spend most of our time together only being apart when we were in school. Every evening we used to go to the garden nearby and play catch or climb trees till the sun went down. Sometimes we used to light up firecrackers that my dad would bring for us when he came back from work. 

One such day while lighting up a firecracker, I did not let go of it in time and burned my fingers. As a result, my father stopped getting us firecrackers considering it as too dangerous, and us as not mature enough for it. We were not happy about this development as the festival of Shabe-baa-raat was coming and fireworks were what made it special to us. Even after nagging my father for days he did not give in to my demand for fireworks. It was also around the time when I first got to experience the wonders of the human invention that is money. Some of our extended family had visited us earlier that year and while leaving they gave me and my brother some money in an envelope, as is the custom. I and Abdul walked down to a shop nearby and bought some candy right away. 

A few days before the festival, we decided that we would go to the weekend market and purchase the firecrackers ourselves. The only problem was that we did not have any money at the time. As fate would have it, one morning I saw my father's wallet sitting on the dresser while I could hear him talking on the phone in another room. I thought that if I took only some money out of it he would not notice, so I took twenty rupees. I intended to use that money to buy firecrackers during that weekend. 

When I came back from school the next day, my mom told me that Abdul was moving to his ancestral village to live with his grandparents. On further inquiry, I found the reason was that Abdul's mother thought he was being spoiled as she could not properly discipline him. She was not happy with his recent academic performance and thought he was not paying enough attention to his studies. She believed that he would do better under his grandparent's supervision. The thing that finally made her come to this decision was the suspicion that he had stolen the money that went missing. He had asked his mom for the money to buy firecrackers earlier and she had refused. When she heard my father asking if anyone had found the twenty rupees, she assumed that Abdul must have taken it, even though he denied it. 

Suddenly the severity of my actions dawned on me. I thought to myself that if Abdul was being sent away as a punishment for stealing, what my punishment would be if my parents found out that it was me who stole. On the other hand, I felt bad that Abdul was being punished for something that he did not do. I also thought about how lonely I would be when he goes away and how much I would miss him. Finally, I decided to tell my father the truth. Father was very disappointed with me, but he did not punish me in any way. He just tried to explain to me how stealing is wrong and why I should be sorry for my actions. My punishment came later when I found out that even after knowing the truth about Abdul being innocent, Abdul's mother did not change her mind about sending Abdul away. At that time I realized that we can not always undo our actions. We can apologize and try to make amends for it but its effect on us and others will still be there. 

Abdul finally left our home after three days. I did not form such a close bond of friendship with anyone else for the next few years. Abdul's mother stopped working for us the next year and I never met him again.