Born Behind Bars

by Padma Venkatraman

He guides us through the crowded platform to the train to make sure we get on safely.

  “Be careful,” he says as we thank him. “Right now is a bad time for Tamil-speaking kids to travel to Bengaluru. Tension is running higher than usual between our two states, with everyone arguing about how to share water. And lots of men are just looking for an excuse to fight and take out their anger on anyone, even a kid.”

  44

  Saint Kabir’s Song

  Rani puts Jay in his cage, hands him to me, and then insists on sitting by the open door of the carriage.

  “You’re going to fall out!” I say.

  “You know I hate being inside boxes. I’m going to see if I can ride on top of the roof.”

  “No you’re not.” A man in a khaki uniform strides in. “You fall on the tracks, it’ll be my job on the line.”

  “Are you a policeman, sir?” I ask.

  “Sort of,” he says. “I check if you have tickets, and if not, I throw you off the train.”

  I remember what Bedi Ma’am said about conductors as I whip our tickets out of my pocket. The man punches holes in them and moves on.

  Rani chooses a seat next to an open window and sticks a hand out of it as if she needs to hold on to the fresh air. I sit in between Rani and an old woman whose hair shines like moonlight on the ocean.

  A loud whistle blows, and the train jerks forward. Sitting in a moving train feels as strange to me as when I sat in the police van. I clutch the bottom of the seat with one hand and put my other hand over Jay’s cage to keep it from sliding around.

  “Pretty bird you’ve got there,” the old woman remarks.

  “Pretty, pretty, pretty bird,” Jay informs her before sticking his head behind his wing for a snooze.

  “Very pretty.” She laughs. “What’s your name, son?”

  “Kabir, Aunty,” I say politely. In my head, I name her Aunty Silver for her silvery hair.

  A burly man sitting across from us butts in, “Kabir like a Muslim, or Kabir like a Hindu?”

  “Why do you care?” Rani turns away from the window for a moment to glare at him.

  The man looks muscular enough to haul her out onto the tracks. Hoping to avoid a fight, I say quickly, “Saint Kabir. You know, the one who wrote songs.”

  I sing one of Saint Kabir’s songs, and then, since the man probably doesn’t understand the words, I explain what it means, just the way Bedi Ma’am explained it to me: that people of all religions are equal, and God thinks caste is a cruel human invention.

  The rest of the people in the cramped compartment clap when I’m done, but Muscle Man just says, “Well, seeing as you are not a saint, I think it’s all right for me to ask your caste.”

  “Why do you care about his religion? Or their caste?” Aunty Silver demands. “Leave the poor kids alone!”

  “Why do you care about them?” Muscle Man growls at Aunty Silver.

  “Ai, she’s old enough to be your mother. Speak to her with respect!” a young man says, jumping into the quarrel. “Don’t you stingy Bengaluru people know better than to use that rude tone when you address your elders?”

  “Who are you calling stingy?” Muscle Man raises his voice. “We give you Tamil people more of our river’s water than we keep for ourselves.”

  “It’s our river too!” the young man counters. “And we’re careful with our water, while you people waste it!”

  Muscle Man shakes his fist at the nice young man. I wish Grandma Knife were here to break up the argument, like I’ve seen her do with angry women in jail.

  I try to catch Rani’s eye, but she’s gazing out the window as if her life depends on it and she doesn’t care what’s happening inside. She’s putting up with so much discomfort for my sake. I feel very lucky I found her.

  And when I glance at the men again, I feel a little bit lucky that they’re so busy arguing with each other that Muscle Man is leaving me in peace.

  Soon, everyone in the compartment joins in the argument, agreeing with the young man, and Muscle Man backs off.

  “Rest, boy,” Aunty Silver says. “I’ll keep an eye out for you.”

  I lean back, close my eyes, and pretend I’m asleep. What a mixed-up world. Bedi Ma’am was right—adults are terrible at sharing. They are even worse than the boys in jail school.

  45

  Bengaluru

  The train rocks me to sleep. But then it suddenly jerks and wakes me again. Muscle Man is snoring, and the young man who argued with him is chatting quietly with someone else. Jay’s head is still hidden behind his wing, and Rani has finally nodded off too.

  “Awake? Want an idli?” Aunty Silver offers me a fluffy white rice cake, which tastes like a salty cloud. “I made them myself.”

  “They taste better than anything I’ve eaten,” I mumble through a mouthful. “You’re a great cook, Aunty.”

  Aunty Silver gives me a few idlis for Rani when she wakes up, and I continue to gobble up as many as I can stuff into my stomach.

  “When I was young, we always had rain,” Aunty Silver says, motioning out the window at a stretch of cracked earth. “Fields were greener than your parrot’s wings. But the weather has been changing. Every year it gets hotter. The monsoon fails. Rivers run dry. Water gets scarce, and there isn’t enough food to go around. And when your stomach is empty, it’s easy to fill your soul with rage and start fighting for no good reason with other innocent people.”

  “The ground does look thirsty,” I agree, looking out at the landscape, full of straggly plants and trees with withered leaves.

  After a while, buildings start sprouting up outside the window, and soon we’re entering a city with buildings that are even taller than the ones in Chennai city.

  When, at last, the train chugs into the Bengaluru station, Aunty Silver warns us, just like Mr. Subramaniam did, “Be careful. And good luck!” Then she hops off the train and disappears into the noisy sea of people on the platform.

  Porters leap into action to help rich passengers with their luggage as we exit the train. They’re wearing red uniforms, just as in Chennai, and they’re bargaining just as loudly with the passengers, but in Kannada!

  The secret language I used to speak with just Amma in jail is spoken everywhere here. I love how it sounds.

  The crowd of people pushes us along, but I stop when we enter the station to soak it all in. Rani tugs at me and shouts, “Come on!” But her voice gets a little wobbly when she asks, “Hmm . . . how’re we going to find the mosque?”

  “I’ll ask someone.”

  “You will? How?”

  “My parents grew up in this city, remember? My mother and I always talked in Kannada—especially when we didn’t want others listening to us in jail.”

  But asking someone isn’t so easy. No matter whom I address or how respectfully, none of the people stop. It’s as if we’re see-through, and it doesn’t even help when I get Jay to sit on my finger.

  Finally, I walk over to a bent old man who sits cross-legged on the floor, begging. I wave a coin in front of the man’s face as I ask him my question. He answers, and as I let the coin tinkle onto his plate, I feel proud. In this city where Rani doesn’t speak the language, I’m the most useful member of our two-person-plus-one-bird team.

  46

  At the Mosque

  The mosque sits firm as a rock, rising above the river of noise and movement rushing around it. It’s as beautiful as the picture Appa drew for Amma, but much grander than the photo Bedi Ma’am showed me.

  “How easily we found your family’s mosque!” Rani says, her eyes gleaming with excitement. “Now we just sit and watch everyone who enters or leaves that gate!”

  “But there’s a million people here!” I say. “Even if my grandfather actually comes by, how will I ever know it’s him?”

  “Aiyo!” Rani rolls her eyes. “Didn’t you say your m
other said you looked like him?”

  “Yes—but I’m not sure what I’d look like if I had a gray beard and my face was all wrinkly.”

  “Leave that part to me, Prince of Panic. I’m good at recognizing faces.”

  “Okay, then how about you look at the people, and I sing?” I suggest.

  I don’t feel like singing, but I realize if I want to eat something more than squirrel stew, it’s up to me to earn cash now. Rani can’t speak Kannada, so she can’t tell anyone’s fortune in this city.

  The cool white marble of the mosque glows in the late-afternoon sunlight. I fix my eyes on it to soothe the worries wriggling around in my head. We take up our positions on either side of the gate in the square that surrounds the mosque. It’s much nicer than sitting on a roadside pavement.

  Rani eats the idlis I saved for her while Jay whistles as if he’s enjoying himself. I look up hopefully at every passerby, but after what seems like hours, I haven’t seen anything encouraging except Rani’s smile.

  Her enthusiasm doesn’t dim. My voice starts sounding so pitiful that no one stops to listen. I’m ready to give up for the day when Rani jumps up and drags me to my feet. “That’s him. He’s got your face!”

  The man must feel our stare, because he glances back at us. I’m not sure what I expected, but this man’s face, with its neatly trimmed beard and round glasses, is nothing like my reflection. “He can’t be my grandfather. He’s too young!”

  “So what? Maybe he’s your uncle. And see how scrawny he is? You have the same body type too. What more do you want?”

  I want Amma more than anything else.

  Also, I want Rani to be right. But I’m scared she’s wrong.

  Rani is the one who warned me not to hope too much. But now she’s skipped over the hoping part and is acting totally sure that this stranger is my relative after one quick glance. She takes me by the arm and pulls me along. “Don’t let him out of your sight.”

  I can’t take my eyes off him anyway as we dodge through the crowd, a few steps behind him. I stare at the back of his head. Is it really shaped the same way as mine?

  And maybe Appa does have a brother after all, and this man is my real uncle. A good, kind uncle.

  No. Out. I try to fling away my hopeful thoughts. But though I can control my head pretty well, my heart hops about as if it wants to jump out of me and follow him on its own.

  47

  Spying

  We follow the man all the way to a tall concrete building. Off to the side of the building is an open staircase. The man climbs the stairs. I lose sight of him. “Now what?”

  But Rani doesn’t answer. Instead, she finds a tree behind the building and shinnies up as I watch from below, holding Jay’s cage.

  “Great! They live just one floor up,” she reports. “Come on. You can get a great view from here.”

  Rani is so excited she tells me to hang Jay’s cage on the tree, and then she helps me climb onto what she says are low branches, though it’s higher than I’ve ever climbed before.

  When I look down, I’m scared I’m going to fall flat on my face. But when I look straight in through the open windows, I feel like I’m watching the end of a happy TV movie.

  The man is sitting on a chair in front of a table full of food. A curly-haired toddler climbs into the man’s lap and they laugh, while the woman watching them smiles. A boy sits with his back to me—but I’m sure he’s smiling too. I’ve never seen a room so full of joy. This must be the kind of home Amma told me about.

  “I hope he’s your real uncle,” Rani whispers.

  It’s scary to hear her say my wish out loud.

  The spicy scent of the food wafts through the open window, right to my nose. My mouth goes watery, as if the food is mine.

  Silly mouth. Hoping for food. Silly me. Hoping this happy family is somehow mine.

  48

  Happy Family

  I strain to catch snatches of conversation. When I realize the family is speaking in Tamil, my heart turns from a hopping frog into a heavy stone.

  “They can’t be my family! They aren’t speaking in Kannada.” I spit out the words.

  “I—I’m so sorry. Maybe they speak both? After all, you and your mother speak Tamil and Kannada, right?” Rani pats my arm. “D’you want to get going?”

  But I don’t move because I can’t stop watching this family. Now the father is trying to feed the toddler, who keeps turning away.

  “Aha! Look, it’s an airplane!” the father cries, making his hand swoop around before bringing a spoonful toward the little girl. She giggles and opens her mouth wide.

  “Very good,” he says. “Can you open your mouth again, little crocodile?”

  Would my father have been as patient as this little girl’s? And would he have called me his little crocodile?

  “You ready to go?” Rani tugs at my arm. “If someone spots us, they might think we’re thieves and call the police to come beat us up.”

  But I can’t leave yet, because the boy is telling his parents a story that upsets me. “A man climbed onto our school bus today. He had a huge stick . . . Threatened to crack open the heads of anyone from Chennai.”

  “What?” the mother cries out. “He threatened to beat up the Tamil children?”

  “Yes . . . but the bus driver lied and said none of us were from there . . . He’s a hero, isn’t he, Amma?”

  “Thank you, Allah, for looking after our children.” The father’s voice shakes.

  The mother bows her head for a minute. Then she tells her son, “You are not going to school tomorrow.”

  “It’ll be okay.” The father raises his voice. “Tensions rise every summer. It always blows over. And our shop is in a safe part of town!”

  “You are not going to work! The tensions are high now!” the mom shouts back, and the little girl starts crying. I look away. I don’t like listening to the couple argue.

  “You ready to go now, Kabir?”

  I’m ready. I scramble down to the ground. I’m not family, and I don’t belong here.

  49

  Taking Charge

  Rani picks a tree by a small lake, not too far from the building where the family lives, to be our new home.

  She offers to fish for dinner—so we can save money. But she looks so tired, I offer to buy something with our remaining money instead.

  I find a man with a pushcart who is selling roasted peanuts, and I get a good bargain—he gives me two large cones filled with freshly roasted peanuts wrapped in newspaper. If Grandma Knife was watching, I’m sure she’d be proud.

  I put one of the nuts on my palm and offer it to Jay. He pecks at it cautiously, but Rani snatches it away, saying it’s bad for him, and feeds him a handful of seeds from her shoulder bag.

  “Sorry.” I pop a handful into my mouth instead. Crunch. The peanuts fill my mouth with warmth. I chew them into a smooth paste. “This is the best thing I’ve ever tasted.”

  “Is that so?” Rani raises her eyebrows.

  “Except for your cooking, I mean.”

  “It’s okay.” She grins. “I like peanuts better too.”

  I wonder what Amma’s favorite snack is. All these years with her, I never thought to ask.

  We save some peanuts for the morning, and then, with Rani’s help, I climb the tree. It’s scary, but clinging to branches and putting my foot where she tells me, I manage to get high enough to hide. Rani gives me a rope to tie myself to the branches.

  “So let’s talk to that man tomorrow,” Rani says.

  “Why?” I ask her. “He’s not my uncle.”

  “Maybe he knows your grandparents. After all, they worship at the same mosque, right?”

  “Or maybe . . .” Sad ideas start biting me like tiny ants. “Maybe they don’t worship there anymore. Maybe—”

  Rani turns to Ja
y. “D’you think Kabir actually threw hot coffee at his pretend uncle? Or was he lying about that?”

  “I wasn’t lying! I never lie!” I glare at her.

  “Never! Never! Never!” Jay agrees.

  “That’s better!” Rani laughs, and I scratch Jay gently on the head to reward him for agreeing with me.

  “Remember, Kabir—we chuck hot drinks or hard stones at life when it’s trying to beat us down.”

  Rani’s right. I have to be strong. In jail, Amma looked after me, and after that, Rani did. But here in Bengaluru, I need to prove I’m able to take charge.

  50

  Hanging On to Hope

  I try to hang on to hope, but it’s the worst night ever, because I also feel like I have to hang on to the tree to keep from falling. I keep nodding off and then jerking awake with a start.

  At last, tiny fingers of sunlight poke at my eyes. I wake Rani. “I’m ready to talk to the man. Let’s go!”

  “All right, all right,” Rani murmurs sleepily.

  Jay doesn’t seem to mind rising early. He hops onto her shoulder jauntily when she lets him out of his cage.

  Munching peanuts, we walk along the streets. Some buses are honking already, and a few cyclists are tinkling their bells, but the city isn’t all woken up yet.

  We stop in front of the building where the family lives, and before we can figure out how we’re going to make our approach, the man comes hurrying out and quickly walks down the street.

  “Looks like he’s going to work instead of staying home like his wife wanted.” Rani laughs softly. “Want to go talk to her?”

  “No. Let’s follow him instead. His wife might be in a bad mood after losing the argument.”