Four days a week, for two hours at a time. But while Ajay trains diligently, following Eli’s instructions to the letter, Eli is frustrated. Though Ajay can handle firearms, can make the metal objects sing, he lacks fluency with his own body. Though Ajay can follow each technique, can master the sequences and combinations, he lacks the spark.
“You too much hold back,” Eli says in his broken English. “You have to go to the violent place. In here.” And he slaps his heart. “Again.”
* * *
—
Ajay drives Sunny around Delhi alone—his driver, his butler, his everything. He clocks up hours in the Audi, the Toyota Land Cruiser. He becomes familiar with their handling, their speed, they become extensions of his body, he takes pride in the way he can maneuver them through the city, he bullies other cars, feels extraordinary. Ajay is sent out on errands in the Land Cruiser. Mostly, he is sent to ferry other people, friends of Sunny’s. Mostly these are girls, and mostly he recognizes them from Sunny’s parties in his apartment. He’s good at memorizing names, faces, favorite drinks, moods. He picks these girls up from wherever, a market, a restaurant, the entrance of a park, and delivers them, mostly, to the front entrances of five-star hotels, drops them off without a word. Picks them up several hours later unless Sunny tells him otherwise, takes them wherever they want to go. He speaks of this to no one. He hears other drivers gossiping about their masters and mistresses and what they’re up to, but Ajay never says a word.
They travel out of Delhi more and more. Sometimes in a private jet. Ajay is the beating heart of Sunny’s world. Wordless, faceless, content.
11.
After two years, a new girl enters the scene. She appears abruptly. Turns up one afternoon with Sunny at his apartment, and this is strange—he never brings girls back in the middle of the day. Masking his surprise, Ajay bobs his head and namastes, then slips away to the kitchen to fetch drinks.
The girl is different in many ways. She’s unglamorous and not in Sunny’s thrall. And what’s more, she speaks to Ajay directly, looks in his eyes, asks questions. It unnerves him, to be made so apparent in the room. He makes drinks and snacks, then stands in the kitchen, at the edge of the door, eavesdropping as best he can, trying to figure out what’s happening. She leaves after an hour. He learns her name, Neda. Neda Madam. Ajay escorts Neda Madam to her beat-up car. He sees the PRESS sticker on the back window and feels relief when she’s gone.
He’s waiting for Sunny outside the Park Hyatt several weeks later when he sees her again, exiting the hotel, distracted, waiting for the valet to fetch her car. She doesn’t see him, she’s preoccupied, pulling on a cigarette, talking on the phone. He recognizes a certain look on her face.
Soon after, she becomes a fixture in Ajay’s life. She has succumbed to Sunny and he is the ferryman, from hotel room to home. From her place of work near Connaught Place to whichever five-star hotel Sunny is waiting in. She relies on Ajay. Conspires with him. Thank you, Ajay, stepping out of the rear door of the car at the end of the night.
* * *
—
About six weeks into this new phase, Sunny is watching TV at home. The news is on, there are disturbances in the city, some poor colony is being demolished. Sunny sits up and leans forward, stares at the screen with his hands clasped. He turns the TV off and just sits on the sofa in silence with a frown of puzzled concentration.
In the evening, Sunny goes out alone, but tells Ajay to head to the farmhouse on the edge of Delhi, the place where he learned to shoot, where a new mansion is quietly being constructed.
Sunny arrives with Neda several hours later, a somber mood between them. Ajay brings ice and vodka and is told to wait outside.
He feels it—something strange is happening here.
He paces the trees in the dark, holding his phone, watching the deserted construction site.
Shy of an hour, the headlights of three other cars approach from the end of the driveway.
They pull to a stop some distance from the villa.
He knows instinctively he must warn Sunny. He dashes in the dark; as he does so, many powerful lights turn on, illuminating the construction site outside. When he glances back, he sees Sunny’s father emerging from one of the cars.
A race against time.
By the poolside.
“Sir, your father!”
Neda and Sunny are in the water.
No time to wait. Panic now.
Sunny orders Ajay to pull her out, to hide her. She’s thrown inside the outdoor bathroom, just in time. Ajay retreats inside the villa and out a side door as Bunty Wadia and his unknown guests walk to the rear.