The boy returns to the tandoor, and now Ajay sees he’s a stranger. Just another boy who couldn’t escape. What would be the use, he thinks, in freeing him. I have my own business to attend to.
He drifts back to his table with this thought in mind, and for the first time he thinks, I am me.
Chai is brought, along with a plate of rajma chawal slathered in desi ghee.
“From the boss,” the waiter says, indicating a well-dressed man at ease at one of the tables near the cash till. “No charge.”
* * *
—
The trucker waits patiently for Ajay to be done. When Ajay stands, he stands, and they are on their way. Before dawn the trucker says they’re approaching town. “Pull over,” Ajay says. “I’ll walk the rest of the way.”
He takes a moment to get his bearings as the truck pulls away, then he walks. He follows the sewage ditch into the slums, the unplanned colonies. He crosses a bridge made of metal sheeting to a scrappy cricket ground where goats graze. The day begins to show in the sky. He finds a group of men huddled beside a concrete building, warming themselves around a kindling fire. He shows them the sheet of paper he has. Asks where this colony can be found. They eye his clothes, his bag, his face, point out the way, but tell him, “You don’t want to go there, those people are a waste.”
He skirts the field where kids are playing cricket in the morning light. A shot goes for a four, rolls toward him, comes to a stop. The kids call out to him. They want him to throw it back to them. He finds he cannot.
2.
The colony is a wretched place. Rows of hovels of brick and wood, roofed with corrugated metal and tarp, built on dirt ground, surrounded by garbage dumps. Women cook on small fires outside their miserable homes. He stands among them, appalled. Appalled at himself for expecting anything more. But it will change now. It will all change. He walks down one of the rows, picking his way around the fires and the children and the dogs. Men and women look up at him with fear, contempt. They withdraw into themselves. He tries to smile. He tries to look out for her. It’s supposed to be a surprise. It’s not supposed to be like this.
A woman in an immaculate blue sari calls out. “What do you want?”
Ajay stops to look back at her.
He thinks about the words he’s about to say.
Like trying to fling oneself off a cliff, the body won’t obey the mind.
He must force himself.
“My mother.” The words seem frail on his lips.
There’s a hush, then muffled words, his words repeated, then a ripple of comprehension runs through the crowd.
Not entirely friendly. Not entirely welcome.
“So, you’re the one,” an old man lying on a charpoy says.
Another woman climbs to her feet, steps forward, examines him on all sides with contempt, derision. “They said you were looking for her.”
“She’s here?” is all he can manage to say.
“You have no shame.”
He looks at her in bewilderment.
“Where is she?”
“You should have stayed away.”
“Ma!” he shouts. He turns to the growing crowd. “Where is she?”
A gang of young men approach but keep their distance.
It’s the old women who show their feelings.
With hostility, one woman points toward a small, low concrete hall at the end of their row, with a crowd spilling outside.
“She’s there. But Mary doesn’t want to see you.”
“Mary? Who’s Mary? My mother’s name is Rupa,” he says.
“Not anymore.”
* * *
—
He stands on the threshold of the low hall. He has to stoop just to look in. Inside there are many chairs facing the front, where there is a platform with a lectern, behind which statues of Shiva and Krishna flank a large painting of Jesus Christ seated in the lotus position, his hands forming a mudra.
A church. It is a church.
He scans the crowd, his breath quickening, his heart throbbing in his temple. He cries out “Ma!” He cannot see her. But those inside turn, they gasp and whisper, a commotion builds. Almost every head now, watching him. Every head.
All but one.
He sees the back of it, the gray, thin hair, the bony shoulders, strong but shrunken.
And the young girl beside her, thirteen years old, locking eyes with him, pained. In her eyes he recognizes his own.
The sister he never saw, born after his flight.
“Ma,” he calls out and begins to shove his way through the crowd.
The priest has not yet arrived. The service has not yet started.