Born Behind Bars

by Padma Venkatraman

  “Menu?”

  “The list of food.” She points at the blackboard propped against the wheel of the man’s pushcart, with a long list of items scribbled on it.

  I read the menu. And reread it.

  “Well?” Rani says. “Can you read or can’t you?”

  “Yes, but—I’ve never had so many choices. Actually . . . I’ve never had any choices. In jail they just decided what we could eat. And wear. And even when we could go to the bathroom.”

  “Well, luckily you’re not there anymore!”

  “I don’t even know what most of the choices are. You choose. You choose for me, Rani.”

  “Okay, but next time you’ll decide. Please, sir,” Rani calls loudly. “May we have some soan papdi?”

  The old man doesn’t seem to mind that we woke him up.

  The two of them bargain. Rani finally agrees on a price, and the man fills a plastic bag with something flaky and yellow. She gives me a piece to taste.

  “Mmm . . .” It tastes like a cloud that has floated down to earth, airy and sweet, melting on my tongue. “This is even better than laddus.”

  “Cheaper too.” Rani grins. “Sometimes I work in the evenings, but you look like you need rest, so I’ll ask the boss if I can take a holiday. Can we go home, Jay?”

  “Yes! Yes! Yes!” Jay agrees.

  “Does he ever say no to you?” I ask.

  “Only if I want him to. I give him cues with my head. If I move my head down just a tiny bit like this and turn up my lips like this, he’ll say yes. If I tilt my head like this instead, when I ask him a question, he’ll say no.”

  That means, the first day we met, Rani made Jay say yes so that I could stay with them. She wanted me as a friend right from the beginning. That thought keeps me going as I trudge behind her.

  39

  Buying a Plane

  Before we get back to the tree, Rani stops again to buy some dried fish and some other food from vendors sitting on the sidewalk, selling things in baskets.

  Rani insists I should also taste a sort of fizzy water that she calls a goli soda.

  “My favorite drink,” she says. “Isn’t it good?”

  “Yes,” I lie. It is nice to have something cool rushing down my throat, but the bursting bubbles make me feel like little frogs are leaping around inside my mouth.

  “I’m glad you’ve found a good way to earn so soon,” Rani says, back at the tree. “Singing isn’t that different from telling stories, is it?”

  “Isn’t it?”

  “My stories make people happy. Your songs make people happy. Happy people share their money so that other people can make their stomachs happy.”

  “That’s true, I guess. Do you spend all your money on food?”

  “Mostly. Sometimes I get seeds or special treats for Jay. Why? You want to buy something?”

  “What if—what if I bought a plane? Then I could fly to Bengaluru to find my grandparents, and then we could fly to Dubai, and they could help me find my father, and then we could save Amma.”

  “You have a better chance of sprouting wings on your back than saving enough for a plane ticket, let alone a plane.”

  “My teacher told me a little bit about tickets, but I sort of forgot. And I guess I should know that only rich people own planes.”

  “It’s okay, Kabir. You’re doing pretty well for someone who just got out of jail. So, planes are expensive. There are cheaper ways to travel than flying. Trains don’t cost as much, especially third class. Bus tickets are cheap too. But I’ve never heard of Dubai, and if it’s far away, even bus and train tickets will be super expensive. Plus, remember what I said about pinning your hopes on your father?”

  I ignore her last question. “I can at least save for a bus or train ticket to Bengaluru, right? It’s close by. I saw it on a map once. Or maybe I could even walk there . . .” As I say this, I think about the blisters on my feet that make them look as bubbly as the soda we drank. But no matter how badly my feet might hurt, I want to start searching for my family as soon as I can.

  “Bengaluru isn’t that close. It’s in another state. When I lived with my family, we traveled a lot, so I know.” She laughs, but sadly. “And no way you could walk there. Plus, in Bengaluru, people speak another language.”

  “No problem! I speak that language. My mother comes from there, so she taught me. And she showed me a picture of the mosque where my father worshipped, called the Juma Masjid. I learned all about it! My teacher said it was built by the great Tipu Sultan, out of a smooth white stone called marble.”

  “You really do want to find out what happened to your dad, don’t you?” Rani says. “I suppose I would feel the same way if I were you.”

  “My father told Amma that he looked just like my grandfather. And Amma said I look exactly like my father, so that means I look like my grandfather too. And their last name is Khan, like mine.”

  “Those are all good clues, Kabir.” Her forehead scrunches up. She seems to be thinking hard about something. Then she announces, “Let’s go to the mosque and find your family! Let’s go to Bengaluru.”

  “You’ll come with me? Really?”

  “Sure. If we work for a while longer, we can save enough to go there together.”

  “That’s great. I’ll feel much better having you with me,” I confess. “You’re so smart and brave. We’re kind of opposite. You know the names of ten ancestors, and I don’t even know my grandparents’ first names. You love sleeping under the sky, but I’m scared to sleep without a roof. You know so much and I know so little.”

  “You learn fast, though,” she says. “Like me. Right, Jay?”

  “Right,” Jay chirps in agreement. “Right, right, right.”

  40

  Caged

  Step up!” Jay’s high-pitched voice reaches me from the other end of the street.

  Resting my back against the gulmohur tree, I watch him and Rani at work. Jay struts up and down before he pecks at a card, while a woman waits to hear Rani tell her fortune.

  Despite the tree’s shade and the breeze, I’m sweating. But at least the air is moving out here. With the weather getting hotter, I worry about how Amma and the others are doing, and if the fan is working. I miss her so much, my throat squeezes up and I can’t breathe, let alone sing.

  Except I don’t have a choice. So I try to shove my sadness down as deep as I can by imagining I’m holding Amma’s hand and leading her out of jail. I imagine hard, until I can sing in a voice that’s strong and happy.

  The kind of voice that customers pay to hear.

  I get lots of visitors—a few of whom pay even without listening to a whole song. I feel quite pleased with myself until Rani tells me she told everyone who asked her for their fortune that they’d do well if they were generous to poor boys.

  That night, I eat Rani’s squirrel stew without complaining, although it still makes my stomach queasy. But the less money we spend on food, the more we’ll save.

  Rani lets Jay sit on my shoulder for a bit before we settle in for the night. I love the feel of his tiny feet digging into my shoulder. Just a little, but not enough to hurt. And I love it when he ruffles his feathers and they tickle my cheeks. And when he gives my ear a playful nip.

  “How did you find Jay?” I ask.

  “I think I told you about the old man who was like a grandfather to me, right? He was the first person I met when I came to the city. When he saw me, he said he’d tell my fortune for free. I said I didn’t care what was going to happen, because I already knew it couldn’t be anything good.

  “He proved me wrong. He shared his food with me and sort of adopted me. He taught me how to read the cards and tell stories. After he died, Jay was the only family I had left, and we made this tree our home because no one bothers us here.”

  “This tree isn’t a proper home, though,
is it?” I ask. “I mean, it won’t protect us when the rains come. Amma said a home is a nice place—a house with rooms—”

  “Fine. If your mother says that proper homes have to have rooms and roofs, then you go build one, Kabir,” Rani snaps.

  “Sorry. I didn’t mean it’s not nice here. It’s just—I’m still scared to sleep out in the open.”

  “I shouldn’t have been mean about your mother.” Rani’s anger only ever seems to last for a minute or two. “But I don’t think you need a roof to make a home. My people’s favorite roof is the sky.” Rani picks Jay up off my shoulder and sets him in front of his cage. “Sleep well, pretty bird.”

  “Pretty bird,” Jay says to himself, waddling into this cage. “Pretty, pretty, pretty bird.”

  I hate the sound of the cage door snapping shut. “Does he have to go in a cage? It reminds me of jail.”

  “It’s not a jail to him,” she says. “He likes it, and the bars protect him from other animals. Bars aren’t just for locking people up, you know. Lots of people have bars on their windows to protect their stuff, because they’re scared other people will steal.”

  I think about the tall wall around the house where Amma and Appa worked. All the mansions in that neighborhood had iron grilles on the windows. Funny to think rich people, who can be free, build fancy cages to live in. Probably because they’re afraid of poor people like us.

  And not so funny to think how they’re so afraid that they lock up innocent people like Amma. My heart clenches as tightly as a fist when I think about how much she’s suffered. How much she’s still suffering every single day.

  41

  Like the Moon

  Even though my throat feels sore from singing, our pile of money has hardly grown in the last few days.

  “By the time we save enough for a ticket, I’ll have a long white beard,” I call up to Rani as I shift uncomfortably on the ground.

  “Stop complaining and sing us a song, Prince of Worriers!” she calls.

  So I sing her the lullaby about the moon, the one Amma sang to me my last night in jail, but it makes me miss her so much, I choke up and can’t even finish the second verse.

  “What’s wrong?” Rani asks.

  It’s too hard to talk about Amma, so I say, “How are we ever going to find my grandparents? Cities are so full of people. Isn’t it going to be impossible?”

  “No. We have lots of great clues, and we’re going to follow them. Your mosque is a big one. We follow it and see where it leads. Come on. Finish the song.”

  I do my best. When I’m done singing, Rani says, “You’re so funny, Kabir. You sing about the moon and you don’t see what it does? It never gives up.”

  “What do you mean, the moon never gives up?”

  “Each month it gets whittled away and has to start from nothing and build itself up again. It returns, full and shiny, every month. You shouldn’t give up either.”

  I wonder if Amma’s lullaby about the moon climbing over mountains to bring us flowers was a message about how the moon never gives up too.

  I wish I’d asked her if the words had an inner meaning, the way some of the poems Bedi Ma’am taught me did.

  I wish I knew when I’ll be able to speak to Amma again.

  42

  Falling Stars

  The weather’s getting hotter and hotter, and my skin is sticky with sweat when I wake up. I drink all the water in my plastic bottle, but I’m still thirsty. If it’s so unbearably hot out in the open, I don’t want to think how awful it must be inside the jail.

  When we go to the public bathroom to wash up, not a drop of water comes out of the faucet.

  An old man entering the bathroom after me shakes his head when I tell him there’s no water. “Surprise, surprise,” he says. “First thing they do when there’s water scarcity is turn it off in places where people like us live.”

  “There’s a water pump not too far away,” Rani says, and we head over to it and join the line of people hoping to fill their water bottles. I do my best to freshen up, though I figure I’m going to sweat more anyway.

  Before I start my first song, a rich-looking woman glides by. She looks right through me, the way passersby usually do, as if I’m no bigger than the beetle crawling in a crack in the sidewalk. Her earrings flash like daytime stars. They’re golden and dangly, set with tiny red stones, and I’ve never seen anything like them. They sparkle as she runs a hand over her shiny black braid—and then I notice, with a shock, that an earring is coming off.

  For a moment it’s caught in her hair, and then it falls onto the pavement, but she doesn’t notice.

  Rani watches as I leap up and snatch the fallen earring before anyone can step on it. I close my fist over it.

  The earring is surely worth more than two train tickets. But I promised Amma I’d make her proud. More than anything, Amma wanted me to be good.

  “Ma’am! Ma’am!” I chase after the woman, but she keeps on pretending she can’t see or hear me.

  “Ma’am?” Rani catches up to us and plants herself right in the woman’s tracks. “You may not see us, but we saw your earring fall off, and my friend rescued it.”

  The woman actually meets our eyes at last. She gives us an embarrassed smile when I dangle the earring in front of her. “Oh my goodness!” she says. “I can’t believe it! I’ll never go back to that jeweler. It cost me—Thank you. Thank you both, so much.”

  She puts her earring in her purse and sighs. “I’m sorry I ignored you both. It’s just there are so many poor kids in this city. This country. This world. You have to look away. You understand, don’t you?” Her pleading eyes gaze into mine. “If only the whole world were filled with people as honest as you, we’d be better off.”

  “Thanks, ma’am.”

  “No, no. I need to thank you. Anything you’d like me to get for you? Clothes? Food?”

  “We don’t need anything from you.” Rani marches away.

  “Wait! I’m sorry,” the woman cries. “I’m really sorry!” She turns to me. “I’m so grateful for your honesty. Please let me give you something.”

  Rani stops, turns around, and looks at me. I guess she thinks it’s my decision.

  “Please?” the woman begs again. “It would make me feel so much better if I could help you a little.”

  Rani may be too angry to take anything from the woman, but I’m not that proud.

  “Money for us to travel to Bengaluru by train.” I hope it’s not too much to ask for.

  The woman’s eyes brighten with relief. She reaches into her purse and pulls out more money than I’ve ever seen in my whole life. “Great, here you go.”

  “Thank you, ma’am!”

  “Thank you,” Jay trills. “Thank you.”

  For a moment I’m scared Rani is still irritated with the woman, but as always, Rani’s anger bubble has floated away. She runs over, looking as excited as I feel.

  43

  Calling the Police

  Can we leave for Bengaluru right now?” I ask.

  “No, I have to ask my boss for permission first.” Rani grins. “Of course we can!”

  Jay catches our excitement and whistles happily. We return to the tree, where Rani converts the sheet I sleep on into a kind of sling and bundles our few things into it.

  Rani knows the way to the station, so all I have to do is follow her, which is a good thing, since my brain feels all fuzzy, as if I’m dreaming. By the time we reach the station, my whole body has turned into a sort of cloud. But I come down to earth when Rani tries to buy us a ticket.

  “We don’t let your kind on our trains,” the man at the ticket counter announces. “You stink so much, your whole compartment will empty out.”

  “We don’t stink!” I’m angrier than ever, but my voice surprises me, bursting out so fierce and strong. “You sell us our train tickets or e
lse—”

  “Or else what? You’ll call the police?” The man laughs.

  A wiry old man interrupts us. “What’s the problem here?”

  “We did nothing wrong!” I exclaim.

  “Exactly. I saw that you did nothing wrong. But this fellow did.” He steps up to the counter. “You sell those children a ticket. Right now.”

  “Who are you, mister? The prime minister?” The man sneers.

  “Mr. Subramaniam, retired Indian Police Service officer. And if you don’t believe me, I’ll just call one of my former colleagues, and they’ll bring a pair of very fine bracelets made especially for your wrists.”

  The ticket man’s face twitches like he’s been stung. “I was going to give them a ticket, sir. It was just a joke, sir.”

  “I don’t share your sense of humor,” Mr. Subramaniam says.

  “Next train to Bengaluru is the Brindavan Express, leaving in a few minutes.” The nasty ticket man is all polite to us now. “Or you want the overnight mail train? Or—”

  Brindavan! My heart skips when I hear the name of the next train. It feels lucky. Brindavan, in Amma’s story, is where Lord Krishna spent his childhood.

  Mr. Subramaniam watches over us as we buy our tickets, but I still double-check the change. Bedi Ma’am warned me to be careful, after all.

  “You’ll be all right in Bengaluru?” Mr. Subramaniam asks. “Someone will meet you there?”

  “My grandparents live there, sir.” I avoid telling the truth, but avoid lying too.

  His eyes flicker over me and over Rani, as if he can tell there’s more to our story—but he doesn’t ask any more questions. Instead he says, “My childhood wasn’t easy because I wasn’t rich, but it helped that I wasn’t an outcaste. I’m sorry people treat kids like you so badly.”