It was a peaceful day on the 21st of May, 2016. It was one of the mostly peaceful areas of Bangalore, at least, until the children come to play. It is surrounded by villas. I’m a retired 65-year-old man, and I have just sold my house a few days ago. The new owners have been here a week now and I have just come to visit them to check on how they were doing. I had gotten a smaller house further off the outskirts of the city and had sold this one for a good price. The house was officially theirs and I was a guest here.

I sat at the window sipping tea peacefully, as I heard the win whistling through the trees. I saw the children coming as usual after their long day at school. Among then I spotted Raj wearing red sneakers as he usually does. The boys are now a good 11 – 12 years of age. I had known them and seen them play since they were little children. They caused destruction like a little tornado and I’ve had to fix a good amount of property before I had the sense to put grills on my windows. I see them talking, and I wonder what they’re going to play. It seems like they’re going to play football. I just stare out of the window, watching them play while sipping the tea. I was a little worried as the children play a little carelessly, and even though the window used to have grills, the owners told me to have them removed since they messed with “aesthetic purposes” which I believe was not a good idea. I told them about the children and that it was better to be safe than sorry, but they refused to buy if I did not remove the grills.

The boys seemed to be having a very happening match. Things seemed to be going on very quickly, and the ball was just a blur of black and white. I see Raj take over the ball, and I’m slightly concerned now. He has a very powerful kick but a bad aim. I just have a few moments to take in the blur of the ball approaching the window as fast as a bullet and then I heard a BAM on the window, followed by the shattering of glass. The ball was now on the floor, bouncing around and knocking stuff over and creating even more mess in its wake.

I walked the few feet to the window, inspecting. I was shocked. At first, I did not remember that this house was not mine anymore, and I found myself worrying about the thousands of rupees it would cost me to fix the window when I remembered. I did not own the house anymore. I did not have to fix it. I realized what this meant and started grinning. The timing is honestly perfect. If the ball had just hit 5 days ago, when the grills were not there and but the house would have been mine, I would have had to fix it. But no, it had perfectly hit the window just when the house was theirs.

I hear the owners thundering down the stairs, coming to investigate what had just happened.

Excellent. I put on my most formal smile, greeted them, and said “I am utmost sorry for your damages, but I told you so.” Their jaws dropped to the ground. “Thank you for letting me visit. Have a wonderful day” I said, strolling out and laughing like a hyena as I sped to my own house in my old beat up car, to my smaller but safer house, complete with grills.