Hindsight

It was her favorite pastime. Reading. She always found it so exciting. It felt like people from the days of yore were conversing with her through those printed pages.
One such book was holding her enthralled. Her eyes flew over the lines, taking in every word, '...on hindsight, I realise that...'

"Hindsight? What can that mean?", while she was looking it up in her trusty dictionary, her agile mind was busy offering its own meanings. "Maybe it's looking at what's behind. Or maybe it's looking through the behind. Oh what nonsense am I talking? Here it is. Dictionary says 'Hindsight n. - recognition of the realities, possibilities, or requirements of a situation, event, decision etc., after its occurrence.' So that's hindsight huh? Well."

Back to reading it was. But there was a quitely nagging thought at the back of her mind - 'Looking through the behind? Why on earth would I get such an idea?'

It was while she was lying awake at night after switching off the lights, that the old story she had read came to her mind. "If that man can look through closed eyes, why can't I look through the back of my head?". The idea took her fancy strongly. She got up, rummaged her bookshelf for that book. "Aha, there you are", she read the story again giving special importance to the measures the hero of the story takes to see through his closed eyes. He had spent years in the effort.
"Can I make the story come true?", she wondered. "Oh, go sleep you idiot", she chided herself, "This is a not a story book. It's your real life. Stuff like these don't happen in real life"

The idea persisted. She could not make it go away. She started practising the same methods. She put a candle behind her and tried to see the flame while closing her eyes. Though she could easily imagine it she could not see it. Everyday, she used to sit for a couple of hours and try.
"Oh I give up", she was exasperated. "It's been three whole months and I see not a thing".

But she was vaguely familiar of an impression of the flame when she closed her eyes. "Am I seeing it or imagining it as usual? Well it won't hurt me to try a li'l longer".

Stronger and stronger became the image, until one day when she screwed up her eyes tight, she saw an orangish oval. "Is that the flame?", She was excited. And lost her concentration. The image vanished.

Months sped by. She had used up more candles than a church. "Last day today. I give up if I don't see", she decided. She shut her eyes tight and started concentrating. The orangish blur slowly began to take shape. In a few minutes, it was the flame!!! She could even discern the blue part of the flame.

From that it was but a step to see other less brighter things. Slowly but steadily she practiced until one day her tremulous idea became real. She could see through the back of her head! She had developed a 'hindsight' - true to its literal meaning! But she revealed the secret to none but a trusted few of her cronies. Her extraordinary ability helped her become what she is today - an ultra successful undercover agent.

Even now, as she walks away from me after reading the above, what I have written about her, she knows that I'm smiling at her. I wave at her and she waves back....without turning.