At Six

‘I am Hamza and I am six’, he chirped.

‘Beta auntie ko salam karo’, he was instructed.

Auntie?! I already feel old, dont rub it in please, I joke with the coach.
It is his second week at the club, I am told. I look at the scrawny little kid holding a racket several sizes big for his height. We shake hands and begin our game of squash.

I am unable to return his first serve and then the next one and the one after that and many others later on. He is intelligent, he is witty… and he is sprinting off in all possible directions. Before I know we have a crowd behind us, watching me getting battered, so shamelessly. I lose quite magnificently by 4-15. It seems like we have a champion in the making.

I retreat back to the bleachers, thinking about the sign outside the court which says Jansher vs. Jehangir khan. Signs… I am thinking. Atleast, some years down the line I can claim that I played with the prodigy when he was only six.
Pray, if his last name is Khan? That should bring him some good luck!