“Make a wish!” Shikha said and the others took up the chant.
“Make a good wish,” my sister Priya whispered. “Remember, it will come true!”
Hah! I thought, looking at the 13 candles on my cake. The last time I had wished on a cake had been six years ago, when Amma told me she was going to have a baby. I had wished for a sister and that part of my wish had come true. But I had wished for a sister like me and instead, I got Priya.
“Make a wish,” my friends said again, while Priya danced in the middle of the circle they had made. I hadn’t wished for a dancing sister; the sister of my dreams played the violin, while I played the tabla. But Priya didn’t want to learn music; all she wanted was to dance to it.
Wishes
Someone turned off the lights, and the candles glowed golden. There had been six candles, the last time; and I had made six wishes. One of those wishes had been that my sister would hate the vegetables I disliked. The two of us could have teamed up to fight Amma. No more cucumbers or beetroot, I had thought then. Instead I got a sister who is the only vegetable loving child in the world! She crunched carrots and cucumbers, ate green peas by the handful and begged Amma for brinjal. She was the one who had asked for vegetable sandwiches for my party when I would have demanded fries and chips. The only advantage to this was that Priya helped me finish my vegetables so I didn’t get into trouble with Amma. All she asked for in return was that I read stories to her. And that was another of my dreams...destroyed.
I had wished for a book crazy sister so we could have discussions about our favourite books. But Priya was only interested in tearing up my books. Some of them she had even tried to eat up. Then, fortunately for me and my books, she had discovered vegetables. Since then, she had stopped tearing up books. But she still did not like to read. What she liked was listening to me reading to her. She would sit for hours, while I read aloud my favourite stories to her.
“Neha,” someone jabbed me so I jumped, “make a wish so we can cut the cake!”
It was Priya.
Priya who would happily hand over her slice of the cake to me, Priya who would keep me awake so I would read my new books to her. Priya, who was not the sister I had wished for. But who had, over the years, become the sister that I wanted very much.
“What are you going to wish for?” she whispered.
What could I wish for? “Nothing,” I said and blew out the candles.
