“Surviving.”
“I wondered if you got a chance to go through the bulletins?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I did.” She looked over her notes. “Kidnapping, kidnapping, kidnapping, spurious ghee, another kidnapping, an altercation at a paan shop, yet another kidnapping, some ransom demands but mostly they’re missing with no trace.” She flicked through her notes. “This one was interesting. An ‘interstate car-stereo gang.’ They were targeting Marutis, mostly. Remind me not to leave my stereo in my car.”
“Don’t leave your stereo in your car.”
“Thanks.”
“You want to get a smoke?”
“Sure.”
* * *
—
Standing out in the corridor, she took a cigarette from Sunny’s pack, lit it with his Zippo.
Dean motioned to the lighter. “May I?”
She handed it to him, he examined it all over, opened it, closed it, checked something on the base. He made a grunt of approval. “Seems legit.”
“I wouldn’t know.”
He pointed to a detail. “There’s a code right here.”
“I really, really wouldn’t know. I’m just holding it for a friend.”
“Lucky friend. It’s probably worth quite a bit.”
“Maybe I should sell it?”
“In Manhattan, sure. Here it’s just scrap metal. Anyway, the more you keep using it, the less it’s worth. Tell your friend he should lock it away.”
“You’re assuming it’s a he.”
He gave her a look that said “Come on.” “Anyway,” he said. “What’s new?”
“Nothing new. You?”
“I was at Nangla this morning,” he said, frowning. “The high court put through another demolition order. It’s just a matter of time before they execute it, rip it all down. They don’t even name the settlement in the documentation. It’s just called ‘the obstruction.’ The Obstruction. It’s people’s lives, their homes. Anyway, I might need you to transcribe some interviews later, if you’re not too busy.”
“Sure.”
“Your Hindi is better than mine.”
“Anyone’s Hindi is better than yours.”
“I’ll leave them on your desk. I’m heading out to the Pushta now.”
* * *
—
Yes, the Pushta. The Yamuna River and its banks and its “illegal” settlements, tens of thousands of households living on the edge of existence, tens of thousands of households already demolished, lives resettled, displaced. Dean was obsessed with it all. The slums, the demolitions. The courts were ordering demolitions all over the city, tearing down the poor, unplanned settlements that had grown up and become communities over decades, but the epicenter was the riverbanks, the Yamuna Pushta.
All Neda’s life, this was a part of Delhi that she saw and didn’t see. The slums had always been there; every time she crossed the river she looked down on the ramshackle city clinging to the banks. They were inevitable, they were ugly, they induced shame, guilt, in momentary flashes, but their people were submerged in her mind. If she thought about any of it at all, she thought it was Delhi, an eyesore, a sign of failure. But Dean saw the slums as people, and he saw their destruction as a tragedy.
She listened to him talk, indulged him, tried to learn from him, never spoke up herself. He said the Yamuna was seen as a “nonplace,” a place without history or culture that flowed empty through the heart of commerce, that it was seen as a wasted space in the eyes of global capital, but the Yamuna and its banks were neither wasted nor dead nor empty, it was all alive. He’d been doing a series of reports from there, along the floodplains, among the fishermen and the subsistence farmers and the slum dwellers who made up the laboring classes, who made up the maids and servants and drivers of the city; he was tracking the government’s eviction efforts, their plans of relocation. There were plans afoot for a World-Class Delhi, plans to turn Delhi into a “global city.” The courts called it “the showpiece of the country.” The riverfront should be a window to the world, a “public” space, a recreational and cultural landmark. There was a buzz of excitement about the future river. But all Dean saw was the damage done.
* * *
—
“So tell me,” he said, walking back from the smoke. “How’s the head? Because I know a hangover when I see one.”
“It’s that obvious?”
They entered the newsroom. “You know what, don’t worry about the interviews. I’ll get someone else to transcribe them.”