The Genetic Code

Riya, a young little girl, known for her exuberance and curiosity had a knack for fiddling with every piece of technology she could get her hands on, usually when her busy parents, who used to work around the clock, were not around. Unbeknownst to her parents, Riya was incredibly talented at programming and had learned to code by herself, endlessly scrolling through hours of educational content on YouTube whenever she got the opportunity.

One day, Riya’s father, a seasoned software engineer, returned home much earlier than expected, and her mom was already out of town attending a family event. The moment he entered the room, he observed that Riya was deeply engrossed in the world of computing, writing long, fancy codes on the desktop.

Furtively, he hugged her from behind, asking, “How could you write such complex functions? Have they started teaching coding to kids in the second standard now? Riya smiled. “Simple it is; I’m your daughter; so, it came to me naturally.”

“However, But…”

“What, but!,” asked Riya with furrowed bro, anticipating an element of grand revelation in the undertones of her father’s spoken words.

“Sorry beta, have to break it you to now, I cannot keep this from you any longer”.

Riya’s pupil dilated with fear as if she had a foreboding sense of something inauspicious waiting to reveal itself at that instant.

“You are adopted, my child”

A sudden silence cast spells of confusion and jabberwocky thoughts in her mind, rendering her unable to process whatever her father had just introduced to her ears.

In that brief state of mental entrapment, she mustered some courage to look up into her father’s eyes; only, to find those eyes sparkling with playfulness and filled with hijinks.

And they both couldn’t resist the temptation to laugh hysterically at that moment, filling the house with bursts of laughter.