O: Oxford Dictionary (2022 A-Z)

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Oxford Dictionary

I stand in the queue at the US consulate, clutching myriad visa related forms, feeling exhausted already.

“Father’s name?” I hear the official ask the man standing behind me.

“Martin,” comes the response.

“Mother’s name?”

“Wren,” he replies.

Wren and Martin? Our English book from school? No way!

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I turn around laughing, and gasp as I come face-to-face with the man known for his well … sesquipedalian statements, Shashi Tharoor. In the flesh.

“Forsooth, it’s an exasperating farrago of distortions,” he laughs, raising his hands in mock surrender, “Incontestably, I do not have hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia!!”

O took a lot of thinking, as to what I could write about. The original choice was One Shot, an excellent fiction by Lee Child – one of my favourite fiction authors. But then it was just another fiction thriller. Somewhere I even considered One Night at a Call Center, for the simple reason that whatever state I had been in when I had read it ages ago, for whatever logic that fits, it had seemed to click. Now it seems hilarious. So no, not recommending! However, the one that finally stuck was the Oxford Dictionary, the Original ‘baap’ (father) of all books! And of course, Shashi Tharoor had to feature in it! The last 2 dialogues are based on his Twitter responses to some tags.

I have written this 100-word flash fiction for the 2022 Edition of the Blogging A-Z Challenge, a blogging event held every April. Click here to read more on the challenge! My chosen theme for this year is flash fiction driven book recommendations. Even if you aren’t a book reader, you might enjoy the flash fiction. And if you’re participating as well, do leave your blog site in the comments!