Ma’am tries again, her strained voice climbing above the mother’s. “I promise you we will give this one last shot. It will be our best effort yet. We will take this appeal to the Supreme Court, I give you my word.”

  Tulsi scans Gauri Ma’am’s face. “How do I know I can trust you?”

  Who does she think she is, the Queen of England? As if they have a train station named Tulsi Prasad Terminus. As if Gauri Ma’am has anything to prove to her when she’s taking this case on for free.

  “Tulsi, it takes years to build trust. You have not known me for long. You don’t know my character. But when I give someone my word, I mean it. You see Rakhi over here?”

  Determined not to peek up at them from where I am crouched on the floor, I continue gathering up glass shards.

  “When she was only, what, sixteen? I told her I would hire her one day. Isn’t that true, Rakhi?”

  I stand up tall. “Ji, it’s true.”

  “And when she finished school, I did. I found her a place to live, gave her a phone, sent her to English classes, helped get her identification cards. Made sure she was well taken care of. She’s been with me for four whole years. So, you see, I keep my promises.”

  Five years. I’ve been at Justice For All for five years, though sometimes it feels like twenty.

  “We’ve come so far. We just need to give it a big push now,” Gauri Ma’am says.

  The Prasad family gapes at me. The mother nods, her chin trembling.

  * * *

  —

  Sometime after the Prasads finally leave, news spreads that sixteen tea plantation workers in Assam were shot dead, execution-style. One of them was known to Bhavana, and she begins frantically dialling every lawyer she knows in the Northeast of India. After about an hour, she slams her phone down, swearing.

  “Why are you so angry, Bhavana?” asks Utkarsh, one of the junior lawyers. Kamini whacks him on the arm because we all know how deeply Bhavana cares about the people in the Northeast. Not to mention she was born and brought up in Shillong.

  “What do you mean, why am I so angry? Not a single lawyer out there is willing to get involved,” she says. “Lazy cowards, all of them.”

  Kamini asks if she called all her law college batchmates in Kolkata, and Bhavana sighs. “Every last one. Sometimes I think I should have stayed out there instead of coming to Bombay.”

  Alex pulls up a chair to her desk. “Who were these people who got shot?”

  Bhavana winces, as though he’s asked a stupid question. “They’re…tea plantation slaves,” she says. “They’ve been trying to unionize for the past two years. I have no doubt the tea estate owner is behind this.”

  “Why can’t Justice For All get involved?” Alex asks.

  “We used to have a satellite office out in Assam, but it’s closed now. No money.”

  “But Gauri Ma’am said she was only closing the Northeast office until she secured more funding,” Kamini says.

  Bhavana raises her eyebrows. “Have you heard of any large transfusions of cash coming in to Justice For All recently? Because I haven’t.”

  * * *

  After the shops on M.G. Road closed up for the night, Devi and I huddled under the covered awnings where hawkers sold books and banana-shaped massagers. The skies were black and the rain fell down so hard it barely mattered that we had found cover. We wrapped ourselves in old newspapers, even though the rough, frilled edges scratched our cheeks.

  “This spot is the best to sleep when it rains,” Babloo said. “It takes a lot longer to get drenched.”

  Babloo was in charge of picking where we slept. Usually it was on the footpath near VT Station—whichever spot was as yet unclaimed by the older boys. But the cars proved to be dangerous. At night, when the roads emptied out, there were always drivers racing, weaving dangerously, at times jumping the curb. That’s how Pappu had wound up on crutches.

  Devi and I shivered, clinging to each other under the awning. The cooler temperatures were fine when we were running around, but harder to take when we were lying down to sleep.

  “You cold?” Babloo asked. When I nodded, he sprang to his feet and touched Kalu on the arm. “Come.”

  “I’m tired,” Kalu whined.

  “Get up, chutiya,” Babloo said, yanking Kalu to his feet. “We’ll be back.”

  They splashed away into the wet night with Salman and Pappu, returning an hour later with bundles of fabric.

  “Here,” Babloo said, thrusting some cloth at Devi and me. “To keep warm.”

  Devi squealed and unfurled it over our legs. “Where did you get this?”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Babloo said, running his hands through his damp hair.

  “Is someone going to come looking for it?” I asked. “Will we get in trouble?”

  “This is how we live here, okay?” Babloo said. “You want to go back to Patna? Train station is right there.”

  I couldn’t imagine going back. Babloo, Kalu, Salman, Pappu, and Devi were my family now.

  Babloo and Kalu scrambled under the sheet as Devi held it up for them. Pappu and Salman followed. The six of us clung together that night, keeping one another warm and safe.

  * * *

  ♦

  Even though Babloo did his best to take care of us, he was still a kid himself. He had soft, tender spots, and though hidden deep, they came to light sometimes—like the time he got thrashed by a fisherwoman. It happened during monsoon season, after I’d been in Bombay for a couple of years. Kalu, Babloo, and I were weaving through morning crowds down the Dockyard Road Station platform, which was slick and dotted with puddles. Babloo was wearing flat slippers that skidded and slid during the rains. He kept looking back to make sure we hadn’t lost Kalu, who could never keep up.

  And then, smack! Babloo rammed right into a wiry fisherwoman’s right hip, sending her basket flying up in the air, and him flat onto his back. Medium-sized grey fish fell from the sky in slow motion, and for a moment all we could hear was the sound of them flopping against the platform, the tracks, commuters’ heads and shoulders. People cried out “Chi! Chi!” in disgust. Bones crunched and flesh squelched as dozens of feet trampled the fisherwoman’s catch.

  Kalu and I watched the scene unfold with horror. Babloo continued to lie there on the ground, covered in fish scales and the briny stink of fish-water. His eyes widened when he saw the fisherwoman bounding toward him. He tried to dash, but she was faster than him, grabbing him by the shoulder. “Phatka paahije ka tula,” she shouted before whacking him across his face. Marathi swearwords I had never heard before spewed from her angry mouth. Then she said something that made Kalu double over laughing, clutching his stomach. Babloo’s jaw was clenched and his eyes were red. I thought they might explode out of his face.

  When the fisherwoman was done slapping the shit out of Babloo, she scraped up what was left of her catch and boarded the next train.

  By the time Kalu and I reached Babloo, he was crouching near the wall. “Leave me alone,” he bellowed, standing up straight and swatting us away.

  We hung back a few feet behind him as he made his way to a nearby tap so he could wash himself down.

  “You smell disgusting,” Kalu snickered under his breath.

  “What’s that, bhenchodh?” Babloo swung his drenched fist in Kalu’s face, splattering fishy water on him. Kalu ran away, cackling.

  I chased after Kalu, asking him what he was laughing at.

  “That fisherwoman,” he replied. “She was saying Babloo’s mother farted in his mouth at birth.” And he burst out in laughter again.

  “Yaar, you know his mother killed herself,” I whispered while I kept an eye on Babloo, who was scrubbing his face under the trickling tap. “She ate rat poison in front of him.” He had told me the story once, and it was the only time I had ever seen him cry.

  “So?” Kalu shrugged. “It’s still funny,” he said, wiping the tears from his eyes.

  7

  The next week, Vivek beckons to me while in discussion with Utkarsh. They are huddled around Utkarsh’s laptop. Behind the cracked glass of the screen, a big black splotch sprawls out, like an angry spider. Gauri Ma’am will not take this lightly. She snapped at Jayshree a few weeks ago for chewing on the end of a pen, saying that she was defiling office property.

  “How did this happen?” I ask Utkarsh.

  “Arre, that’s none of your concern,” he says, flapping his hand to dismiss me. “Just go get it fixed.”

  “Chup, Utkarsh,” Vivek says, before leaning toward me. “Rakhi, the manufacturer is saying they’ll fix it for seven thousand rupees. That can’t be right, can it? Where do you usually go to get computer things fixed?”

  “Sir, there are some local shops in the next lane. Let me call.”

  “You always have the answer,” he says, patting my arm.

  “I’ll need to know what happened to it, though. So I can get the right quote,” I lie.

  “Something fell on it,” Utkarsh sputters, sliding down in his chair. “A…glass jar.”

  “Empty? Full?” I press.

  Snapping his head up, he glares at me. “Arre, I dropped a bottle of Old Monk, okay?” He folds his arms. “At least nothing spilled.”

  Vivek sighs heavily. “You know your laptop is for work only.”

  Utkarsh drags both hands through his bristly hair. “Sir, I’m sorry, sir. I was playing music from it and I had a few friends over. Just…please don’t tell Gauri Ma’am, Sir.”

  “We won’t tell anyone, will we, Rakhi?”

  “No, Sir. Just the computerwalas.”

  After calling the nearby shops, none of whom cared how the screen broke, I report back to Vivek that Kaycee Brothers will fix it for five thousand rupees.

  Utkarsh gazes eagerly at Vivek Sir. “We can pay for it from the petty cash, no?”

  Vivek and I glance at each other and then at Utkarsh. “No,” we say, at the same time.

  Utkarsh sits upright in his chair, gripping the armrests. “I can’t pay for this on my own. I don’t have that kind of money lying around.”

  “Maybe we can take it out of your wages.”

  “Sir, then Gauri Ma’am will find out, and on top of that you know how little I make here—”

  Vivek rubs his eyebrow. “It’s okay, it’s okay. We’ll split it. Twenty-five hundred each and we don’t speak of it again, teek hain?”

  Utkarsh clasps Vivek’s arm. “Thank you, Sir, thank you so much. If you cover my half, I can pay you back in instalments. I promise.”

  “Sir, what about your daughter’s wedding?” I say as Vivek and I leave Utkarsh’s desk. “Utkarsh broke the laptop, not you.”

  “It’s okay, Rakhi. We’ll manage,” he says through his pained gaze, like he’s trying to convince himself.

  When I get back from Kaycee Brothers Computers, who tried to charge me another five hundred rupees when they saw the laptop, Alex is crouched over the stacks of books in the library. He glances up at me.

  “There’s a book called The Right to Housing in Law and Society by someone called Sharda. Gauri said you could help me find it.”

  I squat beside him and start scanning the piles on the floor.

  “Gauri told me to read up on landmark housing rights cases in India. You know, build a better foundation while I’m waiting for my assignment tomorrow.”

  “I think Kamini is having the book,” I say, after rooting around.

  “Great,” Alex says. “I’ll go ask to borrow it.”

  From behind the bookshelf, I watch Alex pointing at a book on Kamini’s desk. At first Kamini shakes her head no, pushing her shoulders back. Then, when Alex points to Gauri Ma’am’s office, her shoulders slump, and she hands the book to him carefully. As he makes his way back to his workstation, Kamini sits in her chair, glaring at Alex, her lips pinched together, her eyebrows pulled down with worry.

  * * *

  —

  That evening, Tazim unwraps a packet of mirchi ka salan and peas pulao.

  “Arre! Such hi-fi food?” I marvel at the thick peanut gravy clinging to the sides of her metal bowl. “Have I come to your wedding?”

  She slaps me on the arm, beaming. “I made all this food for Memsahib yesterday, but today she told me to take it home.”

  “That’s new,” I say. “When has she ever sent you home with her food?”

  “Never. She said she and Sahib went out last night instead of eating all this, and that it shouldn’t go to waste.” Tazim gently stirs the mirchis around in the rich gravy. “She said their nephew insisted I take it.”

  “So strange,” I say, laughing nervously.

  Shit. How long till Alex says something about working with a curly-haired slum-dweller named Rakhi? Knots tighten in my belly and I can barely stand to look at the mirchi ka salan. When Tazim turns her back, I scrape most of my food onto Ayub’s plate.

  Later that night, my empty stomach growling, I lie on my mat, listening to the steady hum of the nearby Western Express Highway and the occasional bleats of the goat who lives one lane over. My eyelids feel heavy, and I drift into a short dream. Babloo and I are still kids, curled up in a dark alcove beneath the footbridge over the tracks. “This is where the street children sleep,” a voice announces. It’s Gauri Ma’am, leading a tour of Bandra Station. A cluster of white tourists crane forward to hear her voice above the roar of the trains. Babloo and I crawl out from the alcove, peering up at the visitors, curious. One of them is Alex but he doesn’t recognize me, just pauses to stare at us while Gauri Ma’am asks if there are any questions.

  “It’s me,” I say in the dream. “It’s Rakhi. From the office.”

  Alex squints. “Trust me, we’ve never met.”

  I am awoken by the rattling of the little table beside my mat. It’s my mobile buzzing. GAURI VERMA flashes on the glowing screen.

  I answer it, rubbing my eyes. “Ji, Ma’am.”

  “Be at the office tomorrow morning at seven sharp.” Cars are honking in the background. It sounds like she’s leaving work.

  I prop myself up on my elbow and try to swallow a yawn. “Yes, Ma’am. What happened?”

  “Rubina Mansoor is coming to visit tomorrow morning,” Gauri Ma’am huffs, sounding annoyed. “You will have to come early and tidy the office. I want everything put away, everything in order. Kitchen, library, the waiting area. And wipe those cobwebs off the bloody ceiling fans. The office should be spotless.”

  “Rubina Mansoor, Ma’am?” I switch on the lamp but the light doesn’t help make any sense of what Ma’am is saying.

  “I’ve called all the lawyers to tell them to be there on time and to dress in formals. They don’t know that Rubina is coming.”

  “How come they don’t know?”

  “Arre, this plan all came about so suddenly. I’ll explain everything tomorrow. Oh, and make sure the kachrawali empties every last dustbin when she comes in. Don’t just take her word for it. Check with your own eyes to see if she’s actually done it.”

  As Gauri Ma’am rambles on about the kachrawali, I fiddle with a thread coming loose from my sheet. What could Rubina Mansoor want from Gauri Ma’am, anyway? Legal advice? Is that how desperate we are for money—she’s taking on film stars as clients?

  “Ma’am, Vivek Sir knows about Rubina?”

  She doesn’t say anything for a moment. “No. I told you, it came about so fast.”

  Gauri Ma’am never used to make decisions without first consulting Vivek. Not that she always followed his advice, but she would seek it, at least.

  “Just make sure you wear a nice, clean salwar kameez, teek hain? I’ve given you so many of Neha’s old clothes, there must be something smart in there. No wrinkles, no stains. Check the legs of your pants before you put them on. Inspect every fold of fabric. And fold your dupatta nicely.”

  “Teek hain, Ma’am. And you called the interns?”

  “Arre,” she mumbles. “I don’t even have their numbers on me. Call them up first thing tomorrow morning. Tell them to dress nicely. No shorts-teeshirt nonsense.”

  Last year’s British intern wore ripped denim shorts, a T-shirt, and scuffed sandals to the office every day until Bhavana told him to stop dressing like he was on holiday in Goa.

  “Okay, seven o’clock in the morning I want you in the office. This is important, understand?”

  After she cuts the call, I switch off the lamp, lie back down on my mat and stretch my arms out. It’s almost one in the morning. I should go back to sleep, but instead I reach for my phone. The darkened room glows an empty green. ALEX INTERN is now the first name in my scant contact list. It’s mostly people from the office and Munna, but still long enough to make it seem like I have friends. People to eat an ice cream with on the weekend. Imaginary cushioning to muffle the quiet roar of constant loneliness.

  Perhaps I should just call the interns now. I bet Saskia and Merel are still awake. I write both girls a text message. Meseg 4m Gauri Mam: Pls b at work 9am. Dress in nice clothe. I add a generous Thnk u to the end of the message, even though they don’t deserve it.

  I copy the same text message to Alex, then pause. I wonder if he already knows that his aunt’s friend is coming tomorrow. Maybe I could just call him to find out. No, that’s a bad idea. It will look like I have an urge to speak to him late at night. I could call him tomorrow morning, but what if he’s in the bath or having breakfast and then I miss him and he shows up looking like some Colaba Causeway firanghi? What will Ma’am say then? Or worse, what if Tazim’s there tomorrow morning and she somehow overhears Alex on the phone with me?

  At this hour, I know I should just send a text message, but my thumb presses down on the CALL button. Shit. I draw a sharp breath and hit the END button ten panicky times, then throw the phone down on the floor. My heart is pulsing. Maybe the call didn’t go through.