Mission Mumbai

by Mahtab Narsimhan

“Something in that seat is trying to get out,” I squeaked. Visions of the humongous rat we’d seen outside Rohit’s flat in Mumbai, and the mouse at the Lolly-land flat, flashed through my mind.

  “Only the springs,” said Mrs. Lal. “This theater is old and will be shut down soon. I’ve heard a new one will be built by the end of the year but for now this is it. Rohit, change seats with Dylan, please. After all, he is your guest.”

  “Not a chance,” said Rohit. “My bottom has less padding than his.”

  Even in the gloom, Mrs. Lal’s glare was unmistakable. “Take my seat, Dylan. Or maybe we can find better ones, Arun?”

  “The place is full and there aren’t any more decent seats left,” said Mr. Lal, craning his neck to look around. “We’ll have to manage with these.”

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Lal,” I replied quickly before another argument broke out. “I’ll just sit to one side. It’s not so bad.”

  In fact it sucked! Scratchy seat guts rubbed against my thigh and the metal spring pushed against my butt, desperate to escape. But it was these seats or sit right up front with our noses touching the screen. I ground my teeth and tried to ignore the discomfort as the lights went out and the trailers began.

  More people trickled in, laughing and talking loudly. The fans set along the walls were completely ineffective and, as promised, there was no air-conditioning. The temperature in the theater climbed steadily. The spring under my bottom seemed even more determined to get out. I was so hot, I was sure I’d have melted away by the time the movie ended. I realized, too late, that Rohit had been absolutely right. If we weren’t fighting, I would have listened to him instead of suffering through the terrible theater conditions. But the alternative was to go back to the flat and mope. Not. Happening.

  “We can still walk out if you like,” Mr. Lal said, glancing at Mrs. Lal vigorously fanning herself with a newspaper. She never left home without one and now I knew why. Rohit sat glowering, his face shiny with sweat.

  “Yes, please let’s get out,” said Rohit. “I can’t stand this heat any longer.”

  “It’s not so bad,” said Mrs. Lal. “And we’ve paid so much money for the tickets—” She stopped abruptly as Mr. Lal put a hand on her knee, his eyes flicking toward me.

  A hot flush crept up my neck. I had asked to come. And now I wanted them to leave because of an uncomfortable seat and the heat. I felt terrible making them waste their hard-earned money, especially since it was causing so much tension already. I knew they’d never let me repay them.

  “Why don’t we take a vote?” I asked. “I’ll do whatever the majority wants.” This way the decision wouldn’t be entirely mine and I wouldn’t feel too guilty.

  “We leave,” said Rohit promptly. His eyes caught mine in a warning glare. Now he wanted me to side with him after butting heads all night. Not a chance, bud.

  “I’d like to stay,” said Mrs. Lal.

  “I’ll go with what my wife wants,” said Mr. Lal. “Stay.”

  Crap! That left me with the final vote. “I’d like to stay, too,” I said.

  Rohit’s eyes burned brighter than the Eye of Sauron. Then he looked away without saying a word.

  I squirmed in the seat to get comfortable but it was a lost cause. I reminded myself—I was a New Yorker. We could survive anything!

  The movie started and I sat back to enjoy it. The title burst onto the screen accompanied by eerie music. As the camera zoomed in on a girl being strangled to death, the heat and the spring warring with my butt faded away momentarily. Hoots and catcalls peppered the air. It was easy to follow the story even though I didn’t understand a word. The crying scenes got a bit tedious because everyone sobbed buckets, all the time.

  Barely ten minutes into the movie, the hero burst into a song. Clapping echoed around the room. The heroine danced around a tree in the rain, singing melodiously all the while.

  “Man, these songs make no sense at all,” I whispered to Rohit, unable to stop myself. “And they’re a real pace-killer. If Sam and Frodo had frolicked around the bushes with the elves every half hour, each of the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit movies would be six hours long. Thank God Peter Jackson, not an Indian director, made them!”

  Not a word from El Groucho by my side.

  Just as the song was coming to an end, the image on the screen wobbled and went fuzzy for an instant. The temperature rose. I was glued to my seat with sweat. The Lals would have to scrape me off when it was time to go. The image shuddered again. A prickle of fear started at the base of my neck and crept toward my extremities. Something was wrong.

  Suddenly the electricity went off, even the emergency exit lights. The darkness was so complete I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. Hoots and shouts echoed from every corner of the theater as the audience demanded a refund. My heart pounded. I couldn’t breathe.

  “Power outage?” I asked, trying to keep my voice from trembling. I needed to say something, anything, or I’d start screaming for help.

  “Yes,” Mrs. Lal said, affirming the obvious. “Let’s all stay calm.”

  “I told you we shouldn’t have come,” snapped Rohit. “But does anyone listen to me? No! You all listen to this idiot who doesn’t have a clue about a movie theater in a small town in India.”

  “That’s enough, Rohit,” his dad snapped. “We’re here now and there’s nothing we can do. The lights should be back any moment now.”

  Five scorching minutes limped by. Nothing happened. Around us people shifted and chattered as if they were quite used to it. Wanting to get their money’s worth, I guessed, most stayed in their seats. I wanted to get out, like, last year.

  “Arun, we should leave,” said Mrs. Lal in a shaky voice. “It’s taking too long. I think something’s wrong.”

  “Relax,” said Mr. Lal. “In India everything takes time.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut, rested my head against the back of the seat, and took deep breaths. Not again, never again would I insist on doing something I had been warned against. This was my punishment for not listening to Ro. I’d get down on my knees and apologize to him if only the electricity would come back on, or if we could escape this stinking darkness.

  And then someone yelled out a word that had exactly the same reaction around the world.

  “AAG!” Fire!

  MY HEART STUTTERED. I GRABBED THE ARMRESTS as the world around me spun crazily. A sudden flash of orange light from the back of the theater illuminated hundreds of heads turned toward it. Smoke and flames crackled behind the glass plate of the projector room and it shattered. Agonized yells erupted and the stampede began.

  “Run!” Mr. Lal yelled.

  We ran toward the exits. People hurtled past, trampling our feet, climbing over seats, over us, in their hurry to get out. I yelled in pain as someone elbowed my stomach but no one was listening. Everyone was too busy trying to escape. Rough hands pinched and pushed and grasped in the darkness while the ominous orange light grew steadily brighter, and the theater became a furnace.

  “Dylan, Rohit, stay together!” shouted Mrs. Lal. Her fingers dug into my shoulder with a reassuring ferocity.

  The stench of smoke and burning plastic started to fill the room. The smell was so foul, I could barely breathe. I gasped for air. There seemed to be none.

  “Whose brilliant idea was this?” snarled Rohit as we were pushed along with the crowd. But under that anger was deep fear. “Dylan, when we get out of this mess, I’m going to kill you.”

  I didn’t bother to answer. Instead I grabbed his arm as we ran toward the exit, trying not to stumble over seats and other people. I could only think about getting out into the open where I could draw a lungful of clean air.

  Shadows converged at a door that had been forced open. Someone shoved me hard and I went down. Feet pummeled my head as people climbed over me, not bothering to see what or who they were running over. I screamed but it was drowned out by hundreds of panicked cries. I tried to get up but the tidal wave of people kept co
ming. Everything around me started to dim and I fought to stay conscious. If I fainted, that was the end of Dylan Moore.

  “Rohit, I fell,” I yelled out with everything I had. “HELP!” Even as I called out his name I had a horrible feeling he’d ignore me. Our friendship was over. Why would he bother to save me?

  I don’t know how, but Rohit heard me. Through all that commotion, my bud heard me and came back.

  “Where are you?” Rohit yelled. “Keep talking!”

  “Here, on the floor,” I called out. Something furry brushed past my face. Rats!

  Rohit shouted at people in Hindi, his voice drawing closer. I fought to sit upright, waving my hand in the air. Finally his hand clasped mine and he hauled me to my feet. I almost bawled right there.

  “Run, Dylan, this place could go up in flames any minute,” he said in a choked voice. “I didn’t see any fire extinguishers.”

  Dripping with sweat and gasping for air, we ran like a couple of crazed animals escaping a forest fire. “Where are your parents?” I asked.

  “They must be ahead. Keep going!” said Rohit.

  We were swept along with the crowd. I came close to losing my balance again but grabbed someone’s shirt to stay on my feet. There was a lot of shoving and punching and for once I gave back as good as I got without feeling guilty. I knew if I went down one more time, I wasn’t getting back up.

  “Don’t you dare fall again,” said Rohit, echoing my thoughts. “You’ll be trampled to death.” His face was close to mine and twisted with fear.

  “Yeah, I know,” I said. I was so tightly wedged in the crowd, I couldn’t breathe. My legs were like rubber and my heart was ready to call it a day. Fear kept me going. I didn’t want to die—not here and not today.

  At last we were out in the open. The crush of sweaty bodies eased a bit. I sucked in a lungful of night air. It was tinged with the smell of burning wood and something so foul, I gagged.

  Around me, all of Lolly-land was dark. I guessed the power outage must have shorted something at the decrepit theater and caused the fire. Someone had placed kerosene lamps along the road so we could see where we were going.

  More people poured out of the theater as we moved farther away. Orange flames leaped out from a hole in the roof and the thought of being trapped inside made me retch. Shrieks of pain and anger and panic filled the air as parents looked for their children, wives for their husbands, and lost kids for a familiar face. Rats in every shape and size scurried for cover. I coughed and gasped, trying to get the smoke out of my lungs.

  “Now we’ve got to find Ma and Papa,” said Rohit, scanning the crowd.

  In the light of the lanterns he looked small and scared. Grimy streaks crisscrossed his face, and his T-shirt had torn in several places in the struggle to get out. I looked down and realized I didn’t look much better, though thankfully I hadn’t lost my camera. And we were alive. Now all we had to do was find Rohit’s parents and go home.

  “I’m sure they’re looking for us, too,” I said. “Let’s walk around a bit.” Neither of us said the one thing that made me want to barf just thinking about it.

  The fire department arrived. Even before the truck rolled to a stop, men jumped out with hoses and started spraying the remains of the theater still being devoured by flames. Shortly after, the ambulances and police arrived. Paramedics tended to the people who’d inhaled the most smoke, while the police kept the crowds away and told those who were unharmed to clear the area. Unfortunately curious passersby had now gathered and the crowd around the theater swelled.

  Thunder and lightning lit up the sky. I prayed for rain to douse the smoldering wreckage.

  I drew in a deep, shaky breath, staring at the ruined shell that had been a theater less than an hour before. We’d been incredibly lucky to get out alive and unharmed. I refused to let myself think about what might have happened if Rohit hadn’t come back for me. We wove through the crowd, calling out for the Lals. There was no reply.

  We grabbed a passing paramedic. “Please, have you seen my parents?” Rohit blurted out.

  “Let me talk,” I said, squeezing his shoulder. I quickly described the Lals and what they were wearing. “Have you seen them?”

  The young paramedic shook his head. “Sorry, no, but three ambulances answered the emergency call. You can check with the others.”

  We did. No one had seen them.

  “What if they …” Rohit started to say. He gulped and stopped, his lower lip trembling.

  “Don’t be an idiot, Ro. They were ahead of us. I’m sure they got out. They’re somewhere around looking for us just like we’re looking for them.”

  We wandered for another half hour, circling the theater, calling out their names, grabbing policemen and pedestrians, describing them till we were hoarse. No one had seen them and no one replied to our calls. A cold hand squeezed my heart as reality started to sink in. Suppose they hadn’t managed to escape? Rohit must have reached the same conclusion because he suddenly whirled on me.

  “This is your fault!” he snarled, tears coursing down his face. He didn’t even bother to wipe them away. “If you hadn’t insisted on watching a movie, we’d still be at home. Ma and Papa would have been safe and alive.”

  “My fault?” I snapped. I was so angry and scared, I could barely speak. “Did it occur to you that I could have died in there, too?”

  “Yeah, and I came back to save you when I should have made sure my parents were safe. And now they’re gone. Yes, it’s all your fault. I hate you, Dylan Moore.”

  I knew he was upset and scared. I understood what he was going through, and yet his words were a knife in my gut.

  I’d never felt so betrayed or utterly alone in my life.

  ROHIT AND I CIRCLED THE THEATER THREE MORE times. There was no sign of Mr. and Mrs. Lal. Each time we completed a round, Rohit’s mouth would crumple and I’d suggest we go again.

  “Maybe they’ve been taken to the hospital?” I asked, noticing the flashing lights of a departing ambulance.

  “You think they’re so badly hurt they’re in the hospital?” he asked, his arms twitching at his sides as if he were a malfunctioning robot. And even though I was mad at him, I felt his panic. What if they were my parents? I pushed the thought away. Right now I had to focus on Mrs. Lal, drill sergeant slash caring mom; Mr. Lal, Gandhi incarnate with a dry sense of humor; and my best friend. The Lals were my second family. I couldn’t rest till I knew they were all okay.

  “People are hospitalized even for smoke inhalation,” I said. “I’m sure they’re all right, Ro, and probably worried sick about us right now.”

  “You’re absolutely right,” he said. “Yes, that’s it!” He nodded so vigorously his glasses fell off his nose and bounced on the pavement. He stooped to grab them and only when he put them back on with shaking fingers did he realize the right lens was cracked.

  “Just great,” he said in a tired voice. “Blind in one eye.”

  “Let’s go home,” I said. “It’s no use hanging around here.” The fire had died away but the remains of the theater still belched thick black smoke. The crowds had almost dispersed and the firemen were packing up their gear.

  “Always thinking about yourself, aren’t you?” snapped Rohit. “How can we go home when my parents are missing?”

  “I meant in order to check if they’re already there and then go to a hospital or police station,” I said, my anger starting to simmer again. “I’m sure your mom will expect us to use common sense.”

  Stay cool. I had to repeat it to myself like a mantra. Panic and fear are making him say these cruel things. He can’t mean it. But I couldn’t help wondering if this was what he really thought of me. Had our friendship been so weak that at the first sign of trouble it had fallen apart? Or had this trip shown us that we’d never really been best friends in the first place? I understood, now, what Ron might have felt when he thought Harry had entered the Triwizard Tournament without telling him.

  “They
could be walking around the theater in the same direction and might be ahead, or behind us,” said Rohit, trying to reason it out. “That’s why we haven’t bumped into them. Right? Right?”

  “We’ve gone around a bunch of times, in both directions. They’re definitely not here,” I said. “They could be anywhere. So, we check the flat, then the hospital, and then the police station. And then we do it again.”

  “I say we stay right here,” said Rohit. “Mom wouldn’t leave till she’d found us.”

  Arguing, we moved away from the theater and turned onto a quieter street. A few beggars slept on, oblivious or unconcerned about the chaos just around the corner. The air was hot and stifling. I was so drained I thought I would pass out right there.

  “So what do we do?” I asked.

  Rohit started walking. I hoped it was toward the flat because I had no idea where we were. And I definitely couldn’t remember the flat’s address.

  Suddenly a movement caught my eye. I whipped around. Shadows flickered but no one was there. The power had come back on but the streetlights were so dim, they barely illuminated the road. I fell into step beside Rohit, my heart pounding. The hair on the back of my neck prickled. Someone was following us. I knew it. Felt it.

  “Call them on your cell!” I said in a flash of inspiration. I couldn’t believe neither of us had thought of it earlier. My memory lapse probably had to do with my smoke-addled brain and sheer panic. One call would solve all our problems!

  Rohit gave me a sheepish look. “I already thought of it.”

  “So then what are you waiting for?” I yelled. “The return of the king?”

  “Forgot the cell phone at home when I plugged it in to charge,” mumbled Rohit, not meeting my gaze. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I remembered during dinner but since we were all together, I figured …” His voice trailed away. “If I’d told Ma I’d forgotten it at home she would have ripped me apart and made us go back for it. Now I wish I had. And then we would have missed the movie and we wouldn’t be going through this nightmare.”