A MAGICAL WORLD

Once upon a time, there lived a beautiful Princess named Isabella in a far away land called Tinker Land. She was loved by everyone in the kingdom because of her free spirit and cheerfulness. She used to visit even the remotest corner of the village in her carriage, talk to the commoners and play with their kids. She would wake up early in the morning, go out in the garden, sing songs and dance with the birds and the animals.

But one day, out of curiosity, she went to see the forbidden piece of land near the village which her parents had warned her not to go to. A witch used to guard that place and seeing Isabella, she got infuriated and cursed her, “For your insolent behavior, you will remain grounded in this land for ever unless your true love rescues you”. With those words, the witch vanished in thin air.

‘Sara. Sweetie. You should sleep now. It’s way past your bedtime. We’ll continue the story tomorrow’, the mother said.

‘But Mom, I wanna know if Isabella found her true love’, Sara insisted. Her eyes were wide open, still in a trance as if.

‘I’m sure she did, honey. Sleep now. Good night’, said the mother and kissed Sara on her forehead.

Sara smiled to herself. She liked good endings. In this case, she believed what her mother told was true. She went off to sleep. That night, she dreamt of being a princess wearing a pink gown and flaunting it to the maids and the servants. She saw herself lying all day long on lush meadows, dancing in the woods without any care in the world, dipping her feet in the sun-soaked river water and so on. She saw someone galloping in a black horse. Her heart pounded. She knew it was him.

Sara was 3 years old then. Her mother, as promised, did complete the story the next day and Princess Isabella did find her true love after going through a lot of hardships.

Sara is 23 years old now. She is young and pretty and admired by all. She has a friendly demeanor, makes her presence felt when she is in a group and is an absolute happy-go-lucky person. She had done a course in advertising and was currently working in some ad firm. She found her job extremely stereotypical. Despite the pay being good, she despised it because she was never given a chance to express her ideas as it should be. She was sharing her apartment with two other girls whom she was not very fond of.

She recently broke up with her boy friend. They dated for almost a year. “It’s just not gonna happen”, told the guy before calling it off. She did feel bad for some time but she always knew that he was not the one and that the relationship was never meant to last. So she just let it be. She went for retail therapy for the next three days and then she was back to normalcy.

One fine day, she decided not to go for work at all. She stayed back home and waited for her flat-mates to leave for work. After they left, she opened this box which she used to call “my magical world”. It contained all the books, gifts and letters which she had received from her friends and family in the past 23 years! She first came across this book her school friend had gifted her when they were 10 years old. Then she found an anklet which her friend Vicky had given her when she was leaving for college. Flowers, bracelets, hair clips, cards and letters followed. Then she found this really old and tattered book called “my magical world”. She held it in her hands for some time. It was the same fairytale which her mother used to read to her before going to sleep. The book had lot of colorful pictures seeing which she kind of recollected the story - it was about a princess… Princess Isabella. She then remembered how she always wanted to be like her and have a life like hers. So she figured out the inspiration for her box’s name. She smiled to herself.

She was extremely excited on discovering the book. She started reading it. “Once upon a time, there lived a beautiful Princess named Isabella in a far away land called Tinker Land. She was loved by everyone in the kingdom because of her free spirit and cheerfulness . . . With those words, the witch vanished in thin air”. She turned to the next page only to find that that’s the last page in that book. She found it uncanny. She now vividly remembered her mother telling her the complete story – how the Princess waited in that forbidden land for 5 long years and how several men tried to set her free but all in vain. Finally, a Prince who was passing by that place saw Isabella in despair. He looked into her eyes and felt some sort of a connection. Isabella felt so too. He held her hands and kissed her. The spell was broken. The Prince was her true love.

Sara was amused by her mother’s white lie. She closed her eyes. She loved fairytales. They were unreal, she knew it but they always made her feel good. She had always wanted to lead a cheerful and colorful life like the ones described in the fairytales. She had also always wanted to meet her true love. She never had an image of the person in mind. But she had wanted someone like… ‘Aladdin’ for his sense of his determination and caring nature, ‘Shrek’ for his peaceful and loving character and ‘Peter Pan’ for his mischievous and courageous outlook.

She woke up from a long sleep. It was late in the evening already. Her flat-mates were not yet back. Stuff from her box was strewn all over the place. She got up and looked outside the window. The breeze was pleasant and the starry sky looked pretty. She suddenly saw a shooting star. She quickly closed her eyes and made a wish.