GOLDILOCKS AND THE THREE BEARS – REDUX

Wrinkles of worry dug deep into the furry foreheads of Mama and Papa Bear. Mama Bear held the letter gingerly in her hands. Anger or Shame? What should she feel? She wasn’t sure. Maybe reading the letter once again could help her to make up her mind:

Mr. Bear,

We would like to bring to your kind notice that Baby Bear could require therapy for a very strange habit of his. We are sure it already existed before he joined our esteemed school because his class teacher brought it to our notice on the very first day. Baby Bear is charming, intelligent and a vivacious child. Unfortunately, he has a habit of eating; or rather over-eating.

We wouldn’t have minded so much if he was over-eating at home. But this strange habit has spilled into all his activities in school.

Cook from the Mess found him the other day, gulping down honey, wiping out clean the last of the 12 jars the school keeps in store for the students during the year. As you can understand, we are now honey-less. We are expecting a lot of flak from other parents for this.

Baby Bear’s class teacher, Miss So Knotty Bear (yes, she is Korean, we pride ourselves on having the best international faculty), caught him swiping food from his bench-mate’s tiffin-box. And that too during the surprise mental maths test. His bench-mate had to go hungry that day. Baby Bear had already eaten his own tiffin in the first period and seemed eager to taste other children’s tiffins during the break.

It is now mandatory for Baby Bear to be kept in isolation during lunch breaks, he seems to go berserk during mealtimes, and often at other times, too.

Our child counselor, Ms. Owise Bear, is of the opinion that Baby Bear is suffering from Gluttony. He needs help immediately if we want him to become an upright citizen of the country.

Please visit us tomorrow at 10:00am and we strongly advise you to bring Mrs.Bear along, too (Ms. O. Bear insists that we add this quote here, “the hand that rocks the cradle,” and says Mrs. Bear will understand).

Yours truly,

Mr. T.T.L.Y. FedupBear
Principal
The Best Bear Baccalaureate

If not for the fur, the crimson on their faces would be quite apparent. Mrs. Bear now decided, finally, that she was quite angry with the school for pin-pointing such silly faults in her darling baby. Such a handsome boy, too. He towered over his classmates. More breadthwise than lengthwise, is what she sort of overlooked. She recalled how she had to run after him, when he was a baby, trying different tricks to get him to eat. He always seemed more interested in playing than in eating.

Now that he had finally shown interest in eating, there were these insufferable bears from TBBB, trying to find faults with it.

Mr. Bear was made of more stoic stuff. His hand, you see, didn’t rock the cradle. So he had more time on his hands to think practically. And he did remember that Baby Bear had finished off their yearly store of honey, too. The Bears had been indulgent about it as it made them so happy to see him enjoying his food. They might have to just hibernate a bit more, this year or else buy the honey from The Ant House.
It was time to face facts, both finally agreed.

New-age counselors could not be really trusted for such matters. Children’s matters required a keen perception and sensitivity. And only a witch-doctor could help them.

*****
“Batwings, batwings and more batwings
Are really some of my favorite things
Masala and curry and throw in some kedgeree
With robin’s blood and beaver’s hair
So much iron and so much protein
Young I shall always remain, inspite of that curry.”

Jet black hair swung around an innocent-looking wide-eyed face in tandem with the singsong voice that warbled with joy in anticipation of a sumptuous low-calorie but tasty meal.

This was The Typical Witch, but one who relished Indian food, as well as Chinese. She often said, to those who had strong enough a stomach to listen, Curry tasted best when served with frog intestines and worm tails. A by-stander not in the know could be forgiven for thinking this was an innocent ten-year old but she was actually a 110-year old witch. No magic potion or cream was responsible for this anti-ageing effect. A growth error gave this Typical Witch the advantage to put hexes and spells on people (all for money) and then give them the wide-eyed, “I am such an innocent-bébé -in-the-woods” look.

Her fame was quite widespread in Bear Town and it was to her that the Parents Bear came to find solace to their filial problem.

“He is a glutton, did you say? Has he finished all your honey stores?” She asked them.

The overwrought parents nodded in unison.
“Do you wish he was as tall as he is wide?”

The parents blushed crimson in their bearish hirsuteness and nodded, feeling a wee bit disloyal towards the apple of their eye.

“Did you get a letter about it, from the school?”

The beary parents smiled widely. They had come to the right place. The Typical Witch was a magician, too. She would save their son.

The Typical Witch had seen a lot of such cases. They had sprouted almost overnight and one of the reasons was each family had not more than one baby bear. She had learnt a lot of things in these cases.

She smiled at the latest case.

“It doesn’t come easy. The solution. You see, the children are involved.” The typical Witch began her spiel. Her dream of attaining the ‘New Sensual Bed-side Set’ by Victoria’s Secret was going to come true. This patient would fund her EMIs.

“These types of cases take almost a year to a year and half to get solved.” She continued. Fifteen EMIs of one honey jar a month would probably cover the set. Of course, she wasn’t going to be eating that honey, she had enough of a problem keeping her figure in shape with her overwhelming predilection for the Masala Curry and all. She was going to be selling the jars to The Ant House or rather, re-selling it to them, if she had understood the case correctly.

“We are ready for anything. Please, please, we just want our little boy to be cured.” The parents were ecstatic. They had come to the right place.

“I have a plan.” The Typical Witch laid out the details as the distraught parents listened, over-awed at her expertise.

*****

The Typical Witch was a thwarted actress. Bearwood did not have much scope for young girl roles. They focused more on Friendship between Bears and Tigers; or then on Bears as Forest Rangers. And so, the Typical Witch found her calling dressing up for these sorts of cases. She was always a success and well-paid too. But, like all great actresses, she still felt her best was yet to come.

“Let me see, which wig is calling to me.” She let her sixth sense guide her.

She stared at each one of the wigs. Why were they so silent today?

“Damn! Of all the days, my intuition decides to take a holiday today. So what to do?

The blonde look was quite in, now. Well. Was it ever out? Let’s go with the flow.”

The golden ringlets would accentuate her sleek jawline well and even highlight her complexion. Yes, this could be the key to her success in this case.

*****

At first, the Parents Bear couldn’t recognize this young girl of ten, golden ringlets framing her innocent face and the frilly frock that ended six inches above her knees.

“I am Goldilocks and I have come to solve your Baby Bear problem, remember?”

They couldn’t take their eyes off Goldilocks. The Typical Witch was a genius.

And when Baby Bear came home from school, he was unhappy to see that there was no porridge for him, his bowl was empty. His mother had promised him she would give him chocolate porridge today, his favourite flavour.

Never mind. He would relax in his chair and watch his favourite programme accompanied by the extra-large packet of chocolate pretzels his mother had brought home the last evening, from grocery shopping.

“Who sat in my chair and broke it?” His scream of agony rent the air, and just to the air, because no-one seemed too keen to understand his plight.He sulked. He would not talk to anyone. He would lie down in his bed. His mother would, as usual, come to cajole him and soothe him. He would refuse but ultimately he would give in, but only after she had promised him two extra-large packets of pretzels, honey and chocolate flavored. Yum!

“WHO IS THIS, IN MY BED?”

This scream seemed most effective.Mother and Father Bear came running into the room and the golden apparition lying in the bed jumped up, having been roused from a deep, satisfying sleep.

“This is your far-off cousin, Goldilocks, and she shall now remain here, with us, “explained Father Bear.

“Why?” Baby Bear’s wan question almost broke Mother Bear’s heart but she had promised to work according to plan.

“They don’t have good schools where they come from so her parents have sent her here for better opportunities.” Father Bear’s words fell like a ton of hot bricks on Baby Bear. The future looked like a dull red and grey blob to him. He had seen the beginnings and so the end was not too difficult to visualize.

And he was right.

“Goldilocks is so trim and slim. How active she is. So energetic! She is so careful about her diet. She looks so good. She is such a darling. So helpful and so thoughtful! How we wish Baby Bear was like her.”

The Parents said these words, everyday, to Baby Bear’s face. And when they started saying such things to his back too, he knew he had lost them to the latest hype of six-pack abs for children. He secretly did wish to have them, ever since he saw Santino Rockstar Kallis Bear do the six-pack-abs dance in ‘Oh! Shite! Ok!’ He would show them.

The situation demanded drastic measures and Baby Bear did not lag behind. He jogged every morning, he walked in the evenings. And he ate meager amounts of food.

Four months passed since Goldilocks first slept in Baby Bear’s bed. She continued to do so, while he had been banished to the couch in the living room. In the mean-time, a brand-new Baby Bear emerged from the chrysalis. Slim and sleek, and of course, with the beginnings of the SPAs(six-pack-abs). Each one of his class-mates now wanted to be his friend. And they insisted on sharing their tiffins with him (which he politely refused even as he admired his new figure in the glass of the bookcase).

The Parents Bear and Goldilocks (the Typical Witch in disguise, in case you have forgotten) congratulated themselves on their success.

Oh! You are thinking I got my math wrong, aren’t you? If Baby Bear is cured in four months how will Goldilocks aka The Typical Witch finance her seductive dream apparels? This question of yours is valid and the Typical Witch is nobody’s fool. So read on, to know the truth.

Baby Bear looked like a rock-star. He felt like a rock-star. And to keep on feeling like a rock-star he continued jogging and exercising for hours on end. And the day his resolve weakened and he ate more than the fist-sized portion he allowed himself, strange gurgling and flushing sounds emerged from the bathroom immediately after the meal.
This continued for another six months.

Goldilocks went back to her home. Baby Bear (how he now hated that term) carried on his obsession with his body.

The flushing in the bathroom became more and more frequent, the hours in the gym became longer and longer. Grades fell. Friendships broke up, sacrificed to the deity of A Flawed Self-Image. The image in the mirror seemed too big. Just a few more inches less. Baby Bear pounded the footpath and the treadmill, hoisted the weights and continued to throw up in the bathroom.

Baby Bear had lost himself. He never had found himself. But he now tried to find himself on Social Networking, through his virtual friends, over hours and hours spent there. He did not want to meet anyone else. From 100kgs to 30kgs. From Hunky to Scrawny. The road was rocky and could become fatal.

Mama and Papa Bear, in tears, knocked once again on The Typical Witch’s door. Within, the witch smiled her evil smile.