THE DEGREE OF HAPPINESS

29

Dear....Pink Journal

I will figure out a name to call you later. For now, let us roll with this?

This was given to me by Soroush and honestly, I am in love with this! I gave it a password: my birthday code, 0229 and.....wow! The pages are so smooth.

Thank you Soroush. March Twenty Ninth is your birthday, huh? I will have to give you a present, then.

Soroush Hakeem. Soroush Hakeem.

It's been ten years since I last met him. I remember that day. The first day of school. And mom had enrolled me to IDA, London branch. I was nervous and at the same time, excited for first grade. I had seen it in the movies and for it to finally happen to me.....

My uniform consisted of a white shirt and a blue skirt with a blue and white tie. The day was slightly chilly, there were no clouds in sight. The scent of the air was clear too, very fresh, as though pollution just didn't exist.

It was going to rain that day. And for that, I was happy.

Anyway, mom dropped me off to class and I ended up sitting next to Behrooz. We both didn't talk to one another at first. Behrooz was a very shy person and I, wasn't used to the environment. Behrooz was also quite similar looking to his brother, except for the fact that when he smiled, he had two dimples. He was also slightly darker than his brother and his hair of a shinier quality. He also had those large, shrewd eyes that immediately reminded you of foxes.

Being a talkative person, I was unable to tolerate not talking to Behrooz and so I fired him rapid fire questions:

What is your name?

What is your father's name?

What is your mother's name?

With these three questions, we realized that our parents knew each other. Because his dad would talk about my mom and my mom would talk about his dad a lot. And his dad would always mention my mom in dinner tables, during adult talk. I told him my mother never did that, because it was just the two of us. He had asked me what my father's name was, but I couldn't reply. I always forgot what my father's name had been. It stuck to my head very later on that his name was Mr. Ahmed Hashmi.

Anyway, we continued with other questions:

What is your brother's name? (I was shocked when he said he had two)

What is your sister's name? (I was even more shocked when he said he had none)

What is your pet's name? (He had a goldfish. I had a cat.)

What do you like to do?

What is your favorite color?

What is your favorite movie?

What is your religion?

What part of the world do you come from?

He asked me questions too, and we bonded pretty quick. I ended up telling him my life's ambition. Which was to be a scientist. I would be like Marie Curie and win two Nobel Prizes.

Behrooz did not know what Nobel Prizes were. And so, I had to explain it to him. The history of Nobel Prizes and who invented them and also, I ended up telling him who Marie Curie was.

After hearing all of that, I asked him what his ambition was.

He wanted to make video games. Like the kind he played with his brother. He also wanted to be a YouTuber like the YouTubers his brother saw.