Endings

How should a story end? 

Happy or sad or with a trail of hope? Who decides the end, the writer or the reader?

Lately, my father found a new hobby, to write stories.

And this hobby has fueled his urge to read stories and narrate them to me.

It happened only after his retirement,

Because retirement gifted him 9 hours of extra life.

He cleared his study table, spread a new table sheet and arranged some books, a diary, and a pen stand.

Some stories he read to learn the pattern of writing and some he reads because I asked him to.

He narrates the story to me and asks if I liked the end.

He writes the stories and sends them to me asking if the end sounds fine.

In the process he unfolded many pages of his life; many emotions found their nest in the pages of his diary.

In the lockdown period, we got an opportunity to discuss on length about abruptly ended stories, stories with happy endings, open ends, sad endings and

Everything in between but we couldn't find any correct way to end a story.

So now we both write stories but we begin with the end.

Writing the stories backward, changing the course of time.

The activity is fun and I thank his retirement and this lockdown for giving me these precious moments with him.