The Flower Boy by Karen Roberts Page A

was aware of what was going through those heads.
    â€œA verb is a
doing
verd,” he said. His Tamil accent became more pronounced with words that began with
w
. He looked at them in what he hoped was an encouraging manner.
    â€œWho can give me an example of a verb?” he asked. In his eagerness to share his accumulated and hitherto useless knowledge with this young band of moldable minds, he sometimes forgot that they were four- to eight-year-olds who didn’t know what the word
example
meant, let alone
verb.
He also had a tendency to forget his audience and wax eloquently on and on, until the school bell cut him short with cruel suddenness.
    â€œSkip, jump, talk, cry, eat, drink, valk!” he boomed suddenly, making the class jump. “These are verbs, children, verds used to describe
doing
things.”
    They grinned and giggled, hugely enjoying the show. At the back of the class, Chandi silently drank in every word and verb.
    â€œWho can make a sentence with a verb?” said Mr. Aloysius, by now not even waiting for the answers that wouldn’t come anyway. “The boys
jumps,
the girl
eats,
the crow
flies,
the dog
barks,
the child
skips,
the voman
valks
,” he bawled, mopping his sweating head with his large red cotton handkerchief, which matched his red bow tie. He perspired a lot.
    Chandi stared intently, fascinated by the ring of curling gray hair that surrounded the moonlike smoothness of his bald head, like Caesar’s laurel wreath. Hair grew out of his ears too, gray tufts that stuck straight out.
    He wondered if Ariyasena, the barber in Nuwara Eliya town, charged extra for cutting ear hair. He absently probed his own ears with his little finger, trying to see if any had started there. He found a tiny lump of red-brown wax which he rubbed on a page in his exercise book and made a streak like the tail of a comet, but thankfully no hair. At least not yet.
    When the final bell finally rang, he shoved his books into their cloth bag, and joined the streaming flow of children rushing out of the door and down the path. He looked around for Sunil but couldn’t see him. He had probably already run down the path to the workers’ compound where he lived with his family.
    Chandi was disappointed because Sunil was fun to walk with.
    Sunil believed anything Chandi told him, because Chandi lived at the bungalow where everyone knew anything could happen. He believed Chandi when he told him that he had seen the new Sudu Baby being born. He believed that Chandi had got to name the new Sudu Baby, although he didn’t think much of the name Elizabeth, mostly because he couldn’t pronounce it. He hadn’t said anything to Chandi though.
    He believed Chandi when he told him that the Sudu Mahattaya had taken him for a drive in the big silver car. Everyone had seen the car at some time, and Sunil was delighted that someone he knew and actually talked to had been in it. And when Chandi told him about the time he’d gone with the family for a picnic at Victoria Park, it was then that Sunil had started to hero-worship Chandi.
    Chandi wasn’t really lying, not the way liars lie anyway. He just chose to believe nicer things than actually happened. He had long ago discovered that it was pleasanter that way.
    â€œChandi, wait for me!”
    Chandi stopped and waited for Sunil, who was running breathlessly down the hill. When Sunil caught up with him, they linked arms and walked slowly, like a solemn bride and groom.
    â€œSomething happened yesterday,” he said casually to Sunil.
    Sunil caught his breath.
    â€œYesterday, I played with the Sudu Baby in the tea bushes.”
    Sunil’s breath escaped with a little whoosh.
    â€œIsn’t she too small to play with you?” he asked tentatively, not wanting to offend his hero.
    â€œOh no,” Chandi declared airily. “She can crawl, can’t she? So I did too. We played hide-and-seek and she wore a dress with