Darn! I lost my purse. It was the most seductive piece of leather I ever laid my hands upon. You gotta have touched it to know what I mean. It was my confidante and it would just never let out anything that I wanted it to keep for me, kept it tucked, kept it handy. I will just slide my hand and it would have it ready for me, like a scalpel to be handed to the surgeon by the assistant. And I would sculpt, with those eyeliners, lip liners, mascara and lipsticks which it kept handing over like a virtuous friend whispering – ‘Get ready Victoria, it’s that time again’.

I don’t mind being devilish at times. I conspired for it the moment I saw it on the store window since I knew it belonged to me there are then. I made sure he heard the nearly inaudible whimper I so deliberately let out at its sight. What all does a girl have to do to get a man to know what she wants. Sigh! It’s almost profane. But its all worth it when it works and work it did! However you then get this sorry feeling for your poor man. But don’t you worry; it’s only fleeting. The joy of that gossamer touch of leather between your fingers is what will go down in eternity.

And then it all began to change. I was soon sashaying with the prized possession dangling by my side, with a spring in my stride. I was smiling secretly, pitying people furtively. ‘I have something that you don’t have, something so beyond you. You should envy me and feel sorry for yourselves’. Vanity can be a so tipsy. I soon found myself tailoring my contact list, polishing my words, choosing my friends and jibe my wardrobe. A bewildered little voice inside exclaimed – ‘But it’s just a purse!’ I smiled and replied – ‘Keep quiet, I am just matching up to it’. One find day I found myself sitting in the window and making a secret confession to myself – ‘You will never be the same again’. The purse sat there on the coffee table and winked at me as it always did. I loved its mischief, the ostensible smugness glaring through its brilliant silver rings.

And then it was all gone, in a flash. Somebody took it away, just like that, behind my back and all I could do nothing. I thought it would be okay at first but I was wrong. An inexplicable feeling of falling down from a cliff just hung in the air. The gloom just lingered on. A bewildered little voice inside exclaimed – ‘But it was just a purse!’ I replied ‘I wish’. Only then I knew how it had come to possess me. How it had hypnotized me with its incredibly velvety touch. How it had stippled me into someone I never really was, someone who I loathed and admired at the same time. Someone I was in awe of when I did not have the purse. As I hushed that little voice for the umpteenth time, it all lit up in my mind – how every time I had plucked a bright shiny star out of the mysterious night sky, I had burned my fingers only to see them after the dazzle had faded away from my palms. But you know what? I still lie wide awake under that starlit sky browsing for that farthest and brightest star. That’s the way I am. That’s the way I will be. © Suv