Time is the best healer. Everything was back to normal. I also continued to spend my seven hours of the day playing cricket and shouting, "Bowled Hai!" at least eight times. The atmosphere of the home had also changed; my parents did not fall into any kind of argument. I was pleased, but... leave it!

The new day came, but that day comprised something extraordinarily new for me.

"Mom, it has been fifteen minutes since my friends have called me. I got to go." I said that and rushed out. I saw an old man with a brown complexion standing at the gate. He was thin as a rail, bald, and skinny. He was soaked with sweat and wiped it with the thumb of his right hand from his forehead, and with his left hand, he was holding the handle of the bicycle. He wore the 'khaki' colored uniform.

Before he could say anything, I told him that my father was not at home. He may come later, but his reply shook me with bewilderment and suspense. "I am a postman of the village post office, and I have got a letter for you."

For a moment, last week's incident reflected before my eyes. A drunken butler had made himself crept in the backyard of 'Lallan kaka' and chased his oxen for at least two hours without any reason. They were exhausted and stumbled on the ground with a loud thud. He had also tormented them badly. When the villagers got to know about that, the same was done with the butler, and then he was never seen again in our village. I was experiencing myself as an oxen and that old man as a butler. Just experiencing. Because he had said something that was too strange to believe. A letter for me! 'For me'! Literally!

Then he got his hands in the backpack he was carrying and fumbled for something. I sensed fear. My nerves were giving me various nightmares about what could be inside the bag. He was still searching. What if it turned out to be a dagger, or a pistol, or a headless ghost, or a wolf dog, or a small syringe?

"Yeah, got it! There you go!" He said this when he came up with a brown envelope in his hand, but I was not present there. Of course, I should have run from that place.

I was sweaty and terribly exhausted when I scored twelve runs on nine balls. The boys, supporting and encouraging me, were filled with madness, as if they had never seen such a game. The tenth ball was such that it could only result in a six or four and nothing else, but for me, the result was different-or should I say quite different?

It was out. The stumps were blown away. Everyone's eyes were on me for this preposterous thing, but mine were on that which or 'who' made me out. That man, that same postman, was standing at some distance, gazing at me with a broad grin and beckoning me with a brown envelope in his hand.

I ignored that man and wanted to play more, but the boys' gleeful excitement was too suppressed to do anything. The match was then called off, and everyone was going back, as was I, hiding my face. "You played well. Truly." The man said,.

"What problem do you have? Leave me alone!"

"I just want to deliver this letter."

"So, give it to whomever it belongs."

"As I told you, child, it belongs to you."

His reply again made me wonder. I remember my grandpa's advice not to accept anything from a stranger, but there was something else bubbling inside me. The curiosity. Curiosity about that letter.

"It's from your grandfather."

After what he just said, my eyes were bulging out. I rushed to snatch the letter from his hands, took it, tore the envelope, and read...

"I hope you are in good health. I am a little pale. I am enjoying my farm with your grandma. This trip of mine has made me active again. I forgot my knee jerks and all. I hope to see you soon on my farm, and guess what? While writing, I realized I am ambidextrous. Isn't it pretty cool? I have a gift for you." Then the letter suddenly ended without saying a word. He knew that I was not familiar with those heavy words, and then, too, he had shown off his vocabulary skills to me. Without being much bothered about anything else, I asked that man about the gift.

"Oh yes! There you go." Then he took out a small cardboard box tied up with a thick thread, resembling a gift box. I untied the thread, removed the lid, and tilted the box. I poured its contents into my hand, and to my excitement, they were raspberries.

My eyes were moist. Grandpa had sent me raspberries. I had a mouthful of them, but I was unable to chew them properly, and their blood red juice ran down my chin, then my neck, and stained my 'baniyain'.

"Are you okay?" He asked.

"Yubgubpuggup." I replied, as my mouth was stuffed.

He looked at the sky and asked for his leave, as it was getting darker. I looked at him, and something provoked me to talk to him. "Will you come again?" I asked.

"Surely, if I get more of your grandpas letters." Then he passed me a sweet smile. I ran back home with a cheerful face, quick steps, and shaking bumps.

When I reached home, mom asked, "Why have you come so late, and from where have you gotten yourself hurt?" Seeing the bloody stain. I was glad that mom took it as a blood stain, and I too was not going to tell her the truth. I told her that it was done when the ball hit my lower lip. I didn't realize there. I couldn't wait to see that man again, to have those raspberries again and to have my grandpas letter again.

A week later, when I was washing my hands and feet in my home after playing cricket, I heard the ringing of the cycle bell, and it had not kept me waiting about whose cycle it was. I rushed out, and there was that man with the same cheerful smile, in the same outfits, and with a brown envelope. I grabbed the letter from him. "Would you like to go out with me?" He asked.

I didn't reply at once and then nodded.

We walked through the fields, chattering throughout the errand. Honestly, he was more talkative than me, as if he had not had a mate for years. When he had nothing to tell me, he used to tell me any of his story which used to come into his mind.

"Have you ever heard the story of an avaricious farmer who ruined his life because of his greed?"

I did not like stories, not even when my grandfather told them to me. I used to agree to listen to his story but never let him move further from 'Once upon a time...'

Time passed and we became best friends. I began to give him more preference than my friends. Always, once a week, he used to come to my house and give me grandpa's letter with a cardboard box filled with raspberries, and then we used to roam around the village. I began to spend two to three hours with him and then gradually, the duration increased. Then he started delivering me letters daily and it became our regular routine to go out. My parents used to get upset with me for being late, but it least mattered for me. As for me, the thing that mattered the most was my friend, 'Raspberry kaka'.

While we were walking near 'Lallan Kaka's house, we saw a newsboy coming out of his house.

"So, he hired a newsboy?" He asked.

"Yes, I think he has a lot of money."

"So, I think very soon he will buy a car and hire a chauffeur for it." He ended it with a laugh.

"Do you know I am omnipotent? With my power, I only mean to serve. I want to be a philanthropist, but being a postman is not destined for me. That's why I'm neither a fatalist nor an atheist. I only believe in myself and my hard work." He said this during our walk through the sugarcane fields. This was not the first time he kept on chattering with such sophisticated words; I became used to that.

Sometimes he used to boast of himself by calling himself a linguist and also traveled to various countries of the world that he didn't even remember. After a loud laugh, he would say, "You are credulous, little guy." Then, with a nudge, he would go away with his bicycle.

The next morning came, and the sunlight used to waft all around the green meadows and the golden wheat fields, thus leaving the environment without any blemish. But there was a blemish on that day for me. The 'raspberry kaka' had not arrived that day. I spent my whole day sitting at the doorsteps, staring blankly in the air, waiting now and then to hear that ringing of the bicycle bell, but nothing happened. Nothing at all.

The following day, I was unable to play well. I got bold before I could reach up to ten runs. At the end, we lost. I left the ground at once with a heavy heart, saying nothing to anyone. The grief inside me was not of losing the match but of that thing that happened to me the last day.

"Hey! How are you? And sorry for yesterday." A familiar sound came.

I turned around and was astonished. He was standing there with his bicycle, but not with a letter. I looked at him suspiciously but was unable to make up anything. Before I could ask him anything, he started, "I'm sorry I couldn't bring your letter. I was wrapped up in some sort of business, and actually, the city father died of cancer yesterday, and we were asked to join his funeral."

"How is the city mother now?"

"What? Leave it! You won't understand."

Then I realized something suspicious.

"Where is my letter? Have you read it and thrown it?"

"No! What are you saying? Why would I do that? I didn't get it today, nor did I get it yesterday. Then I went to your grandpa's village, and he told me that he forgot to write, but he promised to write it tomorrow with more raspberries."

His talk was unintelligible to me. We hadn't had a word after that, and he left. When I reached home, I felt something was wrong. A man from Grandpa's village had come with some information. My parents' faces looked pale, and other villagers were also shocked. I was under the impression that they were aware of my secret meeting with that postman. I was afraid.

The crowd gradually went to their respective places, then I stepped inside. Mom looked at me without a word and rushed into the room. I was unaware of everything. I tried to forget that incident. Rather, I was waiting for the next day and asking myself the same question many times. "Will he bring the letter tomorrow or not?"