An incomplete story

I am - rather – I was writing a story. I left it midway. I now don’t know what to do with it.

It always happens with me.

But today after readin that incomplete story one of my friends said, he will adopt my story and complete it! I am not sure about my reaction to this.

Should I be happy as my story would be complete now? Or should I be sad that my story will be parented by somebody else? Precisely, even if the story completes, will that be my story? Or it will be his? What will happen to the characters in the story? They suddenly will have a different master holding their strings in hand. Will they be aware of this shift in hands or will they just continue to dance to the tune of the master without even bothering about their destiny? Won’t they revolt? Will they not be upset to see that their destiny is being altered?

I suddenly hate this feeling of submitting my story to be completed by somebody else.


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It was I think 7 years back! I was in full bloom and used to write poetry. I distinctly remember, cherish, and envy the disposition of mine during that period. I was always in a lyrical mood. I was popular in college for reciting poetry with a style! Eventually I and my friend staged a show of our own poems! We put in a lot of effort on script, music etc. A renowned critic who wrote on cultural programs in the city for a local newspaper attended the show. My partner in the show who also was (is) a dear friend of mine invited him to the show as one of her teachers knew him personally and thought he could write about the program in the newspaper. I had least idea about this. I saw him coming and sitting at the back when we were about to end the program in ten minutes. I was a bit upset that he could not listen to all of our poems, but still was happy that he came.

He said he will surely write something about the program as he was impressed by a small part he could hear towards the end. We were happy.

Next day morning I woke up to see a nice review of the program in the newspaper. He had crafted his article using some of the lines from our poems that we had printed on our invitation brochure.

But, I was totally broken to see the credits for the poems. He had used my poems in the article but the credits were given to my friend. In the entire review, he never mentioned my name!!! He was under the impression that we staged the program of my friend’s poems and I just accompanied her in reciting her poems.

For half an hour I didn’t know what to do. My friend called me up to say sorry saying that she never knew he would write something like this. I believed her.

It was 7 AM. I had my lecture at 7.20 AM. I set out for the lecture. But I just found myself ringing the door-bell of Mr. Critic in the next 20 minutes. He opened the door himself and greeted me. I could see from his sorry face that he already knew what he had done!

I still don’t know why I went to him. I still don’t recollect the words I spoke to him. I am not sure if I yelled, complained, cried! I don’t know what I did then.

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But I am getting the same feeling again when I got this proposal from my friend to complete my incomplete story!