Felicity

Ashna was making a list of cat names just before we bumped into each other for the first time.

I'd met her on a park bench one morning. Parched and panting from having run for over 30 minutes, I heaved myself on a bench just when I noticed a hand reach out and offer me a bottle of water. Ashna and I broke into a conversation which later turned into a banter.

She was easy to talk to, bright, friendly but most importantly she was all heart.

Ashna chose compassion over everything. She helped people without expecting anything in return. If she had one of something that someone fancied, she'd give it to them. If a person needed a hand to cross the road, she was the first to lend hers. She'd jotted down the list of names for people who offered a home to strays. “It's always their primary dilemma, what should we name them, they keep asking.”

“Do you know what is the best gift we can offer someone?” She'd asked once.

“Time?” I'd given a cliched reply.

“Happiness. You never know how a simple act of kindness would affect someone in return.”

Ashna lived alone. She'd lost her family a few years ago in a tragic accident. She understood loss and longing deeper than most of us did. And I learnt that one day when we were taking a stroll outside her house and saw a lady in her mid thirties panicking and asking passerbys for having seen her little boy who'd gotten lost on the street.

Ashna alerted the guards and added the two of us to the search party. I could see her grow impatient everytime we found a corner but couldn't find the boy.

It was a large tree just outside the park where we found him holding his broken arm. He'd reached there while chasing a stray cat. The guards reunited him with his mother. Needless to say it was his mother's happiest moment. A hoard of emotions filled Ashna’s face just when a stray cat leapt on her shoulder.

Ashna opened up her home to the stray.

She pulled out the list of names she'd jotted down to name her first furry friend.

“How about Felicity?” I asked.

“What does it mean?”

“Happiness,” I replied. An outcome of a virtue she always stood by - kindness.