The Christmas Gift

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" And thereafter the Genie granted Ali's wish. He ran into the ground to catch miraculous and extremely tiny white candies. The moment he caught them, they melted. It was a game. A game he had never played before. 
Genie watched the evolving happiness on Ali's face. Now the Genie's account had turned empty. There were no more wishes to be granted. He had fulfilled his term on this earth. It was his last to grant somebody happiness. He would then move back to 'Parilok'.
 Ali looked up and opened up his mouth wide. He could feel the cold porous candies into his mouth. Soon after, by the evening, the ground transformed into the view of an unbroken sheet of white. Ali made sure he does not slip on this grand mat which he had just put his foot on. 
               'Slow and steady, Ali.'      
Genie asserted. Ali felt a mild hit on his shoulder, of something, that split into pieces the moment it hit him. He glittered at how the 'big candy throw' by Genie broke into chunks.

Genie asked, 'So! How was that?' "

 Small hands touched the glass pane and the round eyes rolled outside to see whether the clouds would show some mercy. Chills from the glass sent shivers down the spine.
'Shahnawaz! Come little boy! You will catch cold.'
                                                                                Shahnawaz, 7, came in near the fireplace. As he sat nearby, Amma removed the small shawl he was wrapped up in, which Chachaji had brought from Kullu specially for the little kid. He was wearing sweaters in layers which Amma had knitted for him and a small round 'Kinnauri topi'. 
 Amma sauted the leaf-based-dish in a hemispherical black vessel with round handles. Simultaneously, a Roti, little thick and yellow, was kept over the 'woodcoal-turned-embers'. It was being baked. Amma was flattening the dough balls into a round shape one by one, pressing it between her palms again and again in a thumping motion. 
                                                         
The bell rang. Pari, Shahnawaz's elder sister was back from a cold evening stroll. She had been smoking white clouds in the fog outside. Shahnawaz had been waiting for her. Afterall, she was his story-teller, the builder of his fantasies.
                                                                                    The clouds turned heavy that night. Shahnawaz went asleep unaware of what was happening outside. The next morning when he woke up, he ran near to the chimney where he had left his socks to be filled by some gifts of Santa. 'Candies!' Shahnawaz jumped out of happiness. Amma called the little kid outside. Shahnawaz hopped to show Amma what had Santa left for him but as soon as he glanced out he was struck with muteness.
How was that possible? 
White? 
Candies? 
Big? 
White? 
Sheet? 
Voices of Genie echoed in his mind 'Slow and steady..... Nawaz.....Slow and steady!' 
And just as he stepped and tried to believe his eyes, he felt a mild hit on his shoulder, of snow-ball, that split into pieces the moment it hit him. He looked back. 
His eyes glittered in amazement. 

 Pari asked, 'So!...... How was that?'

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