Flash Post 81!

“Button, hope you had been around when I played a prank on my younger daughter the other day.

I think you remember that she is terrified of insects (the flying ones, in particular) including the smallest mite in living history!

The family had just finished dinner where we had had a discussion on bedbugs, dust mites, fleas, termites, ticks and a whole array of such exquisite pests. I’LL TELL YOU WHY THIS DISCUSSION TOOK PLACE ONLY IF YOU COME BACK HOME. Once dinner got over and we all got up to disperse to wherever we intended to, I noticed a dark red (almost black) speck on the white wooden floor beside the dining table that looked very similar to a bedbug! For a second I thought that we would all be finished if bedbugs had made their way into our home! I bent down, picked it up, felt it between my fingers, flipped it this way and that way and finally figured that it wasn’t a bedbug but a tiny watermelon pip!

A naughty idea struck and made me giggle! I decided to place the watermelon seed on the sofa in the living area which she occupies and shared this prank with my husband, who is always game for pranks, and my other daughter whose eyes sparkled at the thought of her younger sibling’s reaction to this prank.

Since all the lights were blazing, there was not a chance in hell for her to miss the er…bedbug aka watermelon pip. One look and her eyes popped out! What on God’s earth is that? She screamed. Both the husband and daughter feigned ignorance and made it very clear that it looked like a bedbug and was indeed a bedbug! But where did the bedbug come from? She enquires hysterically! Again the husband and daughter feigned ignorance and surprise without the slightest whimper or any kind of give-away! The way the two acted out the scene was nothing short of brilliance!

The prank was cut short the minute I was called in since I burst out laughing the second I saw her! My daughter was actually trembling and trying to explain to me in a somewhat garbled manner that there was a bedbug on her sofa!

That expression of fear coupled with surprise, and the we-are-all-finished look had me run to her and hug her and burst out laughing. I revealed to her that the prank had been plotted by none other than me!

Of course, the husband and elder daughter has banished me from being part of a prank forever.”