Dear Mrs. Naidu

by Mathangi Subramanian

  Madam didn’t say anything, but she put the palms of her hands together and kind of leaned her nose into them and nodded, just like an evil genius would do right before she told you her plot to assassinate the queen.

  (At this point I’m mostly sure that Vimala Madam isn’t evil. But when she does stuff like that, I still have my doubts.)

  “At first I didn’t know what to do, considering that the government is supposed to give us money. But then I thought of someone I could ask for the money,” I said. “Or some place, actually.”

  I stopped for a second, not sure how to tell her my idea.

  “So?” Vimala Madam asked.

  I know that when you read it here, it sounds like a question, Mrs. Naidu. But you know how Vimala Madam is: she can even make a question sound like a command.

  So I told her about my breakthrough.

  I told her about how after I learned about the 25% reservations in Child Rights Club, Amma took me to Greenhill. (I didn’t tell her about how I wanted to get a seat at Greenhill because my best friend one of my two best friends goes there. But that’s not really an important part of the defense, is it?) Then I told her how the secretary at Greenhill had asked Amma for a bribe.

  “That’s when I came to you with the pamphlet about the law and you explained it to me, Madam,” I said. “And then I talked about it with Deepti and we got the idea to fix our school.”

  (I didn’t tell her the part about how I thought my best friend one of my two best friends might come back if the school was fixed. Because that’s not really an important part of the defense either, is it?)

  The whole time I was talking, Madam’s glasses were getting lower and lower and her eyebrows were getting higher and higher. If I hadn’t stopped, I think she may have run out of nose space. She definitely would have run out of forehead.

  “Sarojini, I’m very disappointed,” she said. “I have mentioned to you numerous times that I am a human rights lawyer with extensive experience. Furthermore, I am the founder of one of the foremost child rights NGOs in India. My organization and I would have been more than happy to take your case regarding the corruption you faced when you were only trying to exercise your right to a reservation seat under the 25% quota.”

  When I heard that, my stomach began to twist. “I didn’t want to trouble you, Madam,” I said, looking down at my lap. “I didn’t think I should bother you with something this small.”

  “Small?” Madam asked barked, smacking her desk with her hand. “Small? Children all over Bangalore are facing the same situation that you find yourself in because schools like Greenhill are unwilling to fulfill their responsibility under the law. Each instance like yours sets a dangerous example. Challenging just one case could alter the course of history. Why, with a defendant as likeable and intelligent as you, we would surely win a stunning victory. Your case could change the lives of children all over this city – perhaps all over this great nation! This case is not small. Not at all. In fact, it is enormous!”

  By now she was yelling. It wasn’t like the aunties yell at each other over small things just to be dramatic, or like Amma yells at me when she wants to protect me. It was like yelling at an imaginary judge and an imaginary courtroom that was full of imaginary reporters ready to use the media as a powerful tool for justice.

  (I don’t yell very much, Mrs. Naidu. But if I did, I’d want to yell like that.)

  “I’m sorry, Madam,” I said. “But when we went over the law that first time, I thought you were trying to get me to understand that it was more important to fix the government schools than to get into the private schools. Because I’m not sure how much 25% is, but it seems like a lot less than the number of people who won’t get reservations. That’s all I meant by small.”

  Madam stared at me and my stomach twisted harder. She didn’t move or make a sound for what felt like a long time. Then, all of a sudden, she sniffed and looked off into the distance, absently tapping her fingers on the desk.

  “I suppose that was what I was trying to communicate,” Madam said. Or, actually, she kind of grumbled.

  She kept staring for a while. Then, finally, she cleared her throat and looked at me again.

  “Well, what do you have in mind, Sarojini?”

  So I told her, Mrs. Naidu. And when I did, she actually smiled.

  I’m not lying.

  She smiled.

  And her face didn’t crack and her head didn’t explode and the universe didn’t crumble into pieces.

  (I don’t know, Mrs. Naidu – what happens when an evil genius smiles?)

  And then she walked across the floor and past my chair and opened the door and yelled into the kitchen, “Sujatha! With your permission, I would like to take Sarojini on an educational excursion tomorrow morning. You can let the school know that she will miss her morning class in order to receive some training that will be vital to her future legal career.”

  (Which was just a fancy way of telling Amma that Vimala Madam is taking me to Greenhill tomorrow to execute our plan.)

  (I don’t know why she couldn’t just say that, Mrs. Naidu.)

  Being a lawyer might be more interesting than being a detective, Mrs. Naidu. But that doesn’t mean I don’t like detective stories. Do you remember my favourite part of detective stories?

  The suspense.

  (Don’t worry, Mrs. Naidu – by tomorrow, you’ll know everything.)

  All the best,

  Sarojini

  August 29, 2013

  Dear Mrs. Naidu,

  Are you ready for me to end the suspense, Mrs. Naidu?

  I’ll tell you this: the story I’m about to tell you has a happy ending.

  You know why?

  It leads to a happy beginning.

  Sort of like the beginning of free India.

  Except smaller.

  Except different.

  This morning I got to Vimala Madam’s house early so we could go to Greenhill in a car with a driver and A/C and everything. When I got into the back seat, I wanted to look out the window and wave at everyone so they could see how stylish I’ve become.

  But, as usual, Madam had other ideas.

  “Sarojini, today you will be asking for justice from an institution that is unsympathetic to your cause,” she said. “In order to succeed, you must be adequately prepared.”

  (Translated from fancy lawyer language, this means: the people at Greenhill are mean, so make sure you have the right words.)

  (But since you are a genius, Mrs. Naidu, you probably understood that already.)

  It only takes twenty minutes to walk to the school, but in Bangalore morning traffic, driving took almost an hour. The whole time Vimala Madam asked me questions she thought that the HM of Greenhill would ask me. When I answered, she would nod, and then ask more questions that sometimes got harder, and sometimes just made me think.

  She’d ask things like, “Is there a more precise way to say that?”

  Or, “What evidence do you have to make this claim?”

  Or, “How do you think the HM will respond to what you’ve just said?”

  I have to say, by the time I got to Greenhill, I felt a warm, cottony confidence curl up inside my chest. My stomach stayed perfectly still, even when we walked through the shiny white halls and passed the trophies and photographs, and when I saw my face reflected back at me a thousand times in all the mirrors and glass.

  Until we got to the main office.

  There, at the desk, was the secretary who had asked Amma for a bribe.

  I felt the confidence leap up my throat and try to force its way out of my mouth. It must’ve been stepping on my guts, too, because my stomach started to twist and turn.

  It’s funny, Mrs. Naidu. Even though I remembered her, the secretary didn’t remember me. When we walked up to her, she didn’t say anything at all.

  Then again, maybe she would
’ve remembered me if she had actually looked at my face, instead of leaping out of her chair and falling all over Vimala Madam.

  “Madam Vimala Rao!” she screeched, clapping her hands together. “So lovely to see you. It’s been far too long. How are your darling children?”

  “They’re doing just fine, Nilofer, thank you,” Vimala Madam said. “Sarojini and I have an appointment with the Headmistress. Could you please let her know we have arrived?”

  “Yes, of course, Madam,” the secretary said. And even though Madam had just said my name, the secretary didn’t even glance at me. “Please come, please come.”

  Without any questions or problems or embarrassment, Madam and I walked right into the place that Amma and I had tried so hard to talk our way into, months and months ago: behind the maze of desks and bureaus, through (yet another) polished glass door, and into the headmistress’s office.

  “Mrs. Rao!” the headmistress said. “What a wonderful surprise!”

  If the secretary was all hard and sharp and shiny, the headmistress was all soft and smooth and round. Her short hair curled into ringlets around the dimples in her chubby, milk-tea-colored cheeks. She was wrapped in a cotton-silk sari that was the same purplish-pink as the bottoms of clouds at sunset. Instead of shaking Vimala Madam’s hand, she gave her an enormous hug.

  “How lovely to see you,” she beamed. “Sit, sit.”

  “Always a pleasure to see you as well, Padmini.” Vimala Madam settled into the chair across the desk from the HM like it was a big fluffy sofa instead of a stubborn piece of teak. She motioned for me to sit in the chair next to her. I tried to lean back at first, but ended up perching on the end of it like a mynah bird getting ready to fly.

  “Nilofer, would you fetch us some tea?” the headmistress said to the secretary. “Thank you, darling.”

  “If you don’t mind, I’d like Nilofer to stay,” Madam said.

  “Certainly,” the headmistress said. The secretary smiled her glittery smile, and I shivered. “And who is this?”

  “This is Sarojini,” Vimala Madam said. “A brilliant young woman with a great deal of potential. Top rank, excellent character – someday she’ll make a fine lawyer. Already she has proven to be a leader in her school and community. She and her mother are like family to me.”

  I looked over at the secretary and I thought her face flickered a bit at the edges. Maybe she remembered me after all.

  “I see,” the headmistress said, winking at me. “We at Greenhill try our best to support young leaders like you, Sarojini. Especially girls.”

  I looked over at Vimala Madam, who nodded at me. I took a deep breath and said, “Actually, Madam, I’m here because I tried to get your support a few months ago.”

  “Oh?” the headmistress said.

  “My Amma and I came to see if I could get admissions here,” I said. “We tried to get a place under the 25% reservations.”

  This time the secretary’s face flashed all the way across, not just at the edges. She definitely remembered me now.

  I told the headmistress everything, just like Vimala Madam and I practiced – or, at least, almost everything. I told her about how I didn’t know the rules to RTE when I came here last time, but now I did. I told her how if they hadn’t filled their UKG and LKG classes they should’ve given me a chance, instead of dismissing me. I told her how they had accused us of bringing a false income certificate, which wasn’t fair, and also wasn’t true.

  Then I had to say the hardest thing of all. I gulped and looked sideways at Vimala Madam. And she was doing that thing, Mrs. Naidu – actually all of those things. She was leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms in front of her chest. Her eyebrows were way up her forehead and her glasses were way down her nose and her eyes were focusing all her evil genius power on one person.

  The secretary.

  Who, by now, was an odd shade of white-green, like she couldn’t decide whether to faint or throw up.

  Based on the evidence, I concluded that the best thing to do was to finish the story fast, before Vimala Madam’s eyes melted the secretary into a puddle. “The thing is,” I said, swallowing, “they also asked us to pay a bribe for a seat.”

  “Excuse me?” The headmistress sat up straighter, and pulled her soft features into something hard and stern. “Young lady, that is a very serious accusation.”

  “And one that she can fully substantiate,” Vimala Madam said in her Vimala Madam voice that is impossible to respond to if you are kid.

  But not if you are a headmistress.

  “Mrs. Rao,” the headmistress said, shifting in her seat and adjusting the perfectly creased pallu of her sari. “We are one of Bangalore’s most reputable institutions. We have educated generations of leaders. We stand for –”

  “What exactly has been your progress with filling the seats designated for 25% reservations?” Vimala Madam interrupted.

  “We are finishing the paperwork to allow us to declare ourselves a minority school,” the headmistress said, sticking her nose in the air.

  “A minority school?” Madam asked barked. “On what basis?”

  “We serve a sizeable number of Muslim and Christian students –”

  “Yes, I noticed that your newsletter mentioned that you took in quite a few minority students this year,” Vimala Madam said. “Convenient, isn’t it?”

  “The parents and alumni were fully in favour of this action,” the headmistress said. Then she sighed, and added, “Mrs. Rao, you know that I am the staunchest supporter of this law, and that I do my best to take in scholarship students whenever I can.”

  (Partial scholarship, I thought to myself, remembering Amir.)

  “The fact is that RTE itself is flawed,” she continued. “We cannot maintain our record of excellence if we enroll students with no guarantee that the government will reimburse us for precious time and resources. And, if – and here I stress if – they reimburse us, the amount they’re quoting won’t even begin to cover our costs.”

  “That’s a poor excuse,” Vimala Madam snorted.

  (Which made me feel bad for the HM, Mrs. Naidu, because it sounded like the she didn’t really like what she was doing, but couldn’t come up with another solution. But then I remembered how the secretary had looked at me and Amma like we were diseased, and how Deepti was treated at St. Augustina, and how Deepti and I had found our own solution, even though we’re just kids. When I thought about all of that, I didn’t feel bad for her at all.)

  Then the headmistress turned to me. “Sarojini, is it?”

  “Yes, Madam,” I said.

  “Sarojini, darling, I know you must be upset, but you can’t go around accusing people of bribery just because you didn’t get a seat.”

  “Pardon me, Mrs. Headmistress, Ma’am,” I said. “But I’m not accusing anyone of anything. It really happened. Amma and I were both witnesses. I also have this.” I reached into my bag and pulled out the piece of paper where the secretary had written down the bribe. I held it up so she could see it.

  (I didn’t hand it to her, Mrs. Naidu, because I knew from detective novels that criminals always try to steal evidence, so you have to keep it close.)

  “Why Nilofer,” the headmistress said after a moment, “I do believe this is your handwriting.”

  I looked over at the secretary and she had gone from white-green to green-green. But she was also slumped against the wall and her legs were shaking, so the fainting/vomiting chances were still fifty-fifty, as far as I could tell.

  “I’ve recently been working with some reporters to help draw attention to the problems with RTE,” I said, going back to the script Vimala Madam and I had rehearsed.

  The headmistress was silent, which took me a minute to realize, because she was staring at the secretary, and the anger in her eyes crackled like the air before a thunderstorm.

  “At first, I thought I would tell them abo
ut this bribe,” I said a bit louder, trying to drown out all the static. “I think it could draw attention to all the problems kids like me are having getting seats. But then I realized that I don’t want a seat at Greenhill any more. What I really want is for my school – my government school – to be better.”

  The headmistress’s eyes cleared a little bit, and she said, “Go on.”

  “So then I was thinking: What if Greenhill generously donated a playground for Ambedkar School?” I reached into my bag one more time and pulled out the budget the SDMC had written. “The cost is almost the same as the bribe.”

  “It’s quite a bit more than that,” the headmistress said, looking at the budget. She took out a pen and scribbled the numbers on a sheet of paper, like she was double-checking the total. (Which, by the way, is something that Amma could do in her head.)

  “It might be,” I admitted. “But it’s definitely not more than the cost of fighting a lawsuit from a famous human rights lawyer who almost never loses.”

  Vimala Madam raised one eyebrow and sort of nodded.

  Mrs. Naidu, there are many things I cannot do.

  I can’t raise one eyebrow.

  I can’t shove specs down my nose. (Mostly because I don’t own specs.)

  I can’t make the air crackle.

  But you know what I can do?

  I can find the right words.

  Because after the headmistress finished her calculations, she looked up at me and said, “A donation of this size certainly could be arranged. In fact,” she continued, leaning back and chewing on the end of the pencil absently, “this could be an excellent lesson to our students, not to mention a demonstration of Greenhill’s commitment to our community.”

  “Brilliant!” Vimala Madam said, slapping the desk again. “I do believe we should arrange for a press conference.”

  “Yes, indeed,” the headmistress said. “What school did you say you went to, Sarojini?”

  “Ambedkar Government School, Ma’am.”

  “Ah yes,” she said. “We have a student who came from there this year.”