Jolly ran for his life. A stone nearly hit his head. He had no option but to run. It was raining outside and deserted. It was quite warm in there and the food was tasty too. But to his ill-fate, somebody saw him barking to a small kid. Jolly was inside the bin. Jolly knew he was cursed by his friends as he had secretly planned this trip to Mr. Patil's wedding.
He was a little puppy when a rag picker's son had named him Jolly. Then, all children used to run after him, hold him, feed him. (In those blissful days, the children played with him, shower him with love and fed him much more than his tiny tummy could hold.) He used to get a share of meal from the rag picker family and an old rug to lie down. He never missed to bark at any sound that would come up near the house. But, as he grew young and strong, his appetite increased and he ate as much as the rag picker . Rag picker's son was very fond of Jolly. The reason given by the mother was that she gets disturbed while sleeping by Jolly's barks. One day the father, forcibly pushed Jolly inside a jute sack and threw him to the carrier of a moving truck. Since then, Jolly's had faced many ups and downs in life.
Mr. Patil's wedding was not a surprise to Jolly. He had been observing the crowd at Mr. Patil's house for many days. Jolly visited the waste bin near Mr. Patil's house once a day. His friends avoided venturing into that bin because Mr. Patil was very particular about the waste management. He hardly threw any food in the bin. Jolly was in love with the bin because once a week he got to eat chicken. Mr. Patil's family was a vegetarian family. Every Wednesday Mr. Patil secretly ordered a whole tandoori to gobble up hurriedly and throw half of it to the bin, so that nobody comes to know about it. Jolly had not revealed this secret to anyone. Since, ten days Jolly has been eating a lot. His friends were pretty upset with him because he avoided going out to the dustbin hunt in the middle of the night.
Jolly was pretty upset that day as he couldn't enjoy the delicacy. Even though his tummy was almost full his mouth was still watery. He didn't dare to go back as he feared the stones. One hit and he'll fall ill for many days. Jolly decided to wait in the front gate until the wedding got over. The guest started moving out, one by one. It was a huge crowd. Mr. and Mrs. Patil also drove off along with their family. The house seemed to be empty. Only people to be heard were caterers and the pandal contractors. Jolly decided to move in but to his shock he couldn't find any food. The waste bin was loaded on a truck. Jolly couldn't do anything but see as the truck moved out of the gate.
Jolly ran with all his energy to see if he could find his friends so that they can chase the truck and figure out where the food would get dumped. Jolly ran faster than the truck and checked all the waste bins in the area but could not find anyone. He tried the last bin which was the common bedroom for all of them. There, he found all, sleeping, hungry. The bin was emptied by the Municipal guys in the morning. Jolly narrated the story to his friends. They were furious. Jolly apologized, he was genuinely felt guilty to see all his friends hungry. He lied down finding a space for himself in the corner.
BANG! There was a sudden sound. While all the others ran in fear, Jolly raised his head in alert to examine the situation. Every dog has his day and that was surely Jolly's. He saw a man pouring plenty of his desired garbage into the bin . Jolly ran and sat on the top of the bin smiling at his buffet. “Hey!”, he called his friends with pride, “The dinner is served.” While all the dogs began to eat, Jolly paused. Never had he seen the garbage being re-dumped into the bin. In astonishment he turned to looked at the man. The man hopped onto the drivers seat of a garbage truck and waved at Jolly.
The young boy who once gave him his name, gave him his dinner as well as pride today. The rag picker's son drove away.(Sagarmani)
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