The Accidental Apprentice

by Vikas Swarup

  ‘Look, he’s not a psycho. He’s an old man desperate for a successor. And he feels I have the qualities to lead his company.’

  ‘He’s mad!’

  ‘But he’s not malicious. He believes in certain values.’

  ‘Then you’re mad.’ He glares balefully at me. ‘I didn’t know you were so desperate for money.’

  ‘I’m not!’ I say forcefully, surprised at my own vehemence. ‘Man does not live by bread alone. Ordinary lives, at times, need the spark of the extraordinary. We need awe, we need wonder, we need hope. Even if Acharya’s offer remains a dream, I’m happy he showed it to me.’

  ‘Perhaps you are right,’ he says slowly. ‘We all need that something extra in our lives. Anyway, it’s your life and you are the best judge of what to do. I just want you to be happy.’

  Our eyes lock and a strange sensation washes over me. I can sense the dawn of a softer understanding between us, a new compact forged in the crucible of heartache and reconciliation.

  Maybe it is the full moon, maybe it is something in the air, the cool breeze that has suddenly sucked out the humidity like a blotter, but I am overcome with a desperate, irresistible urge to kiss him. Even though we are sitting a foot apart on the bench, I can feel the heat of his body on my skin, awakening an answering heat in me, a desire so powerful that it is almost lust. My palms become slick with sweat, my breath becomes ragged.

  I think Karan senses the feverish signals being emitted by my body, for he changes the subject abruptly. ‘Did Neha tell you about my leaving the colony?’

  ‘Yes.’ I nod. ‘Is it true?’

  ‘It’s not the whole truth. I’m not just leaving the colony: I’m leaving the country.’

  ‘Leaving India? But … but why?’

  ‘There’s no dearth of ambition in India, Sapna,’ he says, looking straight ahead. ‘What there is a shortage of is opportunity. So I’ve decided to go to the land of opportunity. America.’

  ‘America? But this is so sudden!’ I respond with the shell-shocked look of someone who has run face first into a wall.

  ‘There’s this friend of mine in California who called me up out of the blue with this fantastic job offer. It’s too good an opportunity to pass up.’

  ‘You are making a mistake. The whole world is coming to India and you want to go in the opposite direction?’

  He gives a bitter laugh. ‘Let me tell you something, Sapna. For people like us there’s no future in this country. Only the very rich and the very poor know how to survive in India. Nobody cares for the rest. We aren’t even needed at voting time.’

  I feel as if an icy claw has gripped my heart. My mind screams, Don’t go, I love you, I’ll die without you. But what actually comes out of my lips is, ‘And when exactly do you leave?’

  ‘Tomorrow. I’ve already got the visa. My flight leaves at eight forty-five a.m.’ He pauses and draws a deep breath. ‘Now that I’m leaving, I want to tell you something.’

  The way he gazes at me with his brown, dreamy eyes, the way his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows, I think he’s going to say something special, sentimental even. My cheeks heat up in a blush with the intuitive perception that our courtship is reaching a climactic moment. Karan is finally getting ready to open that black box, reveal his true feelings about me. A million emotions stir inside me. I wait for him to say those three magical words I’ve been yearning to hear for so long.

  His lips quiver, but the three words that tumble out are very different from what I was hoping for: ‘I am gay.’

  I’m about to poke him in the ribs for trying to be facetious, when the tortured grimace on his face stills me. It’s an instinctive confirmation that he’s telling the truth, and I can see how much anguish it has caused him.

  In a way it explains everything: his strange reluctance to enter into a serious relationship with me, his inexplicable failure to return my kiss, his secretive lifestyle, his decision to escape India. And yet it is so unexpected that it leaves me reeling.

  I have nothing against gays. They are some of the nicest people in the world, wonderfully kind and caring, sensitive, loyal and selfless. But somehow Karan’s turning out to be gay seems like a cruel joke on me. I gnash my teeth at the unfairness of it all. It is not the outrage of a bigot, but the frustration of a jilted lover unable to come to terms with reality.

  ‘I hope we can still be friends,’ Karan mumbles in a tone of meek disgrace, shrinking into himself. He seems so fragile right now, I fear one wrong word might break him completely.

  My heart goes out to him. ‘Of course you will always remain my friend, my best friend,’ I say, squeezing his hand tightly. But, even as I comfort him, I can sense a new distance between us. It’s as if suddenly the earth had parted and put us on different ends. The thought looping like a mantra in my mind is that Karan is no longer mine. Perhaps he never was.

  The silence between us lengthens, becomes awkward.

  ‘Well, good luck with your new life,’ I say with a forced smile. Then I turn around and head straight back to my apartment.

  I enter my bedroom and bury my face in the pillow, muffling the sobs that threaten to engulf me in a tide of sadness. Every dream of mine has had Karan in it, and suddenly all those dreams have been crushed, pulverised to dust. I gained Karan only to lose him for ever.

  * * *

  Karan leaves for the airport promptly at 5.45 a.m. I watch him from the balcony as he lugs a battered suitcase to the gate, dressed in a white T-shirt emblazoned with the Indus logo and scuffed jeans. Dhiman Singh, the colony’s guard, has already hailed an auto-rickshaw for him. Karan gets into the back seat without as much as a backward glance. But, just as the auto is about to drive off, he leans out and looks up, searching the second-floor balcony of B-Block. He sees me, and raises his right hand in a tentative gesture of salutation-cum-apology, before he is jerked back by the auto lurching onto the road.

  I stand watching the departing auto till it vanishes in the dusty distance. Just as I watched Nirmala Ben leave the colony a month ago. One by one, my friends are deserting me, leaving for greener pastures.

  Papa always used to say that life is about letting go and moving on. But I can’t just erase Karan from my life like a mistake on paper. Each time I pass by his apartment, memories crowd my mind. The sturdy brass lock on his door mocks me, feels like a splash of dirty water on my face.

  Even the weather begins to conspire against me, turning from uncomfortably hot to unbearably muggy. Though the monsoon is more than a month away, the air feels sluggish with the promise of rain. Humidity hangs in the atmosphere like a giant, bloated blimp that refuses to leave.

  With no job and no Karan, I am filled with a biting emptiness. The desperate need to fill this sudden void in my life drives me to Neha. Her passionate enthusiasm for modelling is infectious, just the spark I need to prevent myself from spiralling down that dark rabbit hole of memory and regret. I decide to devote myself wholeheartedly to her new career. We spend the entire day poring over fashion magazines and Bollywood journals, planning her outfits and makeup. Neha, however, isn’t just content with makeup. She wants a makeover. And it begins with a new hairstyle. ‘Didi, hair is very important for a model,’ she declares. ‘You need to take me to the best salon in town.’

  ‘There’s one right next to our colony,’ I offer. ‘I can unhesitatingly recommend the Sweety Beauty Parlour.’

  ‘Be serious!’ She makes a face at me. ‘I need a professional hair stylist, not a roadside barber.’

  * * *

  So it is that at 4 p.m. on Saturday, 11 June, we find ourselves in the newly opened City Centre Mall in Sector 10. I am dressed in a white churidar with a matching chikan-embroidered kurta. Neha is sporting her usual jeans and a pink Hello Kitty T-shirt.

  The mall is bustling with weekend shoppers splurging on designer brands. Today is Bargain Day, with a 10 per cent discount in most stores.

  The City Centre Mall is not normally a place where I go for my shopping
. The prices are enough to give anyone a nosebleed. But Neha insisted that she would get her hair done only at the Naved Habib Hair Salon located on the second floor of the mall.

  The salon looks impressive, with its contemporary design and trendy decorations, but one look at the charges and I almost choke. A haircut with a blow-dry and style costs a mind-boggling ₹1,500! My haircut at the Sweety Beauty Parlour costs just ₹175. But I don’t begrudge forking out the cash. Neha has been given a fantastic opportunity, and she must be equipped to make the best of it.

  I browse a high-end boutique while my sister gets the most expensive haircut in town. Looking at the prices of L’Oréal eyeshadow, Revlon lipstick and Max Factor mascara, I begin to dread the prospect of Neha’s cosmetic shopping. My cash reserves are dwindling fast, and before long I’ll need to shore up my finances by getting a new job.

  By 5 p.m. Neha is done. I have to concede the hairdresser has done a good job. Neha looks more glamorous than ever in her new stylish hairdo – short side-swept bangs with a medium layered cut – that flatters her oval face and highlights her beautiful eyes. I can see the men ogling her as we step out of the mall. In their eyes she is already a model.

  A gaggle of rickshaw-wallahs surrounds us immediately. ‘Come with me, come with me,’ each of them crows. I zero in on an oldish man in a vest and a lungi, his bronzed muscles glistening from the sweat running down his body. ‘Will you take us to the LIG Colony in Sector 11?’

  ‘It will be thirty rupees, memsahib,’ he says, wiping his brow with a rag.

  ‘Arrey, you think we are outsiders?’ I scold him. ‘We just paid twenty rupees to come here.’

  ‘It’s all right, didi,’ Neha says expansively and clambers into the rickshaw. After a moment’s reflection I get in too, realising the futility of haggling over ten rupees after blowing fifteen hundred on a haircut.

  Today being Saturday, there is not much traffic on the roads, and the rickshaw has no difficulty in navigating its way towards Sector 11. As we swing into Rammurti Passi Marg, I hear the sound of a motorcycle revving down the road behind us. A second later it is beside us, ridden by two youths in tight jeans, both wearing helmets with tinted visors covering their faces. They look like street hooligans indulging in their favourite pastime: checking out girls. In fact the driver draws so near to the rickshaw that he is almost within touching distance of Neha. I am about to shout at him, when he pulls away. The motorcycle zooms past us, making Neha’s hair fly in my face. The pillion rider raises a clenched fist in celebration, mocking us.

  ‘Dogs!’ I mutter under my breath.

  A couple of minutes later, when we are adjacent to the Metro Walk Mall complex, I hear yet another motorcycle sound coming from behind. I turn my head to see the same two riders accelerating towards us, the low growl of the engine growing louder.

  There is something sinister about their intent. I have a gut feel about it. But, before I can take out my pepper spray, the bike is abreast of us.

  Through the corner of my eye, I see the pillion rider unscrew the cap off a bottle in his hand. The warning bell in my head goes off instantly.

  ‘Neha! Watch out!’ I cry as the ruffian hurls the bottle in Neha’s face. A dark oily liquid sprinkles out, and the next instant Neha’s shriek of agony rends the air.

  The motorcycle races off into the distance, leaving a writhing and twisting Neha on the rickshaw. ‘I’m burning, I’m burning, didi,’ she screams. ‘For God’s sake do something! Save me!’ Only then do I realise she has been hit by acid.

  Her body convulses as the acid sears through her skin. It seeps into her hair, and streams down her face and into her mouth. When she tries to wipe it off, streaks of acid run down her fingers and onto her forearms.

  I cradle her in my lap, feeling utterly helpless to prevent the slow disintegration of her face. Her hair is burning away, her skin melting like wax. I shudder to think of the pain she must be in.

  ‘Get an ambulance!’ I yell at the top of my voice at the rickshaw puller who stands like a statue, paralysed by fear. Fortuitously a passing police van comes to our rescue, spiriting Neha and me to the Shastri government hospital in Sector 5.

  * * *

  Three hours later I am still at the hospital, maintaining an anxious vigil in front of the operating theatre where surgeons are battling to save my sister.

  Inside the theatre, Neha is teetering between life and death; outside, Ma and I are teetering between horror and hysteria.

  ‘What have we done to deserve so much misery, Ishwar?’ Ma gazes at the ceiling, interrogating her gods. Then she breaks into racking sobs. ‘Why didn’t God take me and spare my flowerlike daughter?’ she asks, clutching my arm.

  I have no answer to her questions. My mind is clouded with fury and malice. I want to go out, find those savage boys who have done this to Neha and destroy them equally savagely. I imagine gouging out their eyes, cutting off their ears, smashing their noses, chopping off their fingers one by one, and, when they are begging me for mercy, crushing their heads with a heavy stone.

  How I wish I had Karan by my side. He alone can rescue me from the abyss of hatred that threatens to swallow me whole. But he has gone a million miles away and I have no way of contacting him.

  * * *

  The acid attack on Neha has become a police case, and an overbearing officer by the name of Sub-Inspector S. P. Bhatia from Rohini police station has been assigned to investigate it. His incessant interrogation is causing me a splitting headache.

  ‘Did you recognise the two youths on the motorcycle?’

  ‘No. They were wearing helmets so I couldn’t see their faces.’

  ‘Is there someone who wanted revenge on your sister?’

  ‘I don’t know. Only a crazed psychopath would do such a thing.’

  ‘Do you know any crazed psychopaths in Delhi?’

  ‘No. Do you?’

  ‘Does your sister have a boyfriend?’

  ‘She might have. I don’t really know.’

  ‘Do you think this could be the work of a former boyfriend?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘It seems you don’t really know your sister.’

  ‘Perhaps I don’t.’

  He strokes his chin thoughtfully. ‘Is it possible that you were the intended victim of the attack?’

  The question startles me. ‘Me? Why would anyone want to harm me?’

  ‘You tell me. Are there any skeletons in your cupboard?’

  ‘No. None.’

  ‘Don’t say none. There are skeletons in everyone’s cupboard. Every person is a potential criminal. And there is a thin line between sanity and insanity.’

  ‘I know.’ I nod. ‘I’m standing on it. If you don’t find the person who did this, I’ll go mad.’

  ‘The whole city has gone mad,’ he sighs. ‘MLA Anwar Noorani’s supporters ran riot through the Sector 7 market this afternoon, protesting against his arrest.’

  ‘My God!’ I exclaim, as the memory of a conversation I had with Shalini Grover comes rushing back to me. Anwar Noorani was a dangerous man, she warned me. And the acid attack fitted perfectly with his vengeful nature and volatile temperament. ‘This is the handiwork of Noorani, I’m sure.’ I grip the sub-inspector’s arm with the instinctive certainty of feminine conviction.

  ‘But he is cooling his heels in Tihar Jail.’

  ‘Tihar Jail did not stop Babloo Tiwari from running his kidnapping and extortion business. You go right now and interrogate Noorani. I’m convinced he organised the attack on Neha, because I helped expose his kidney racket.’

  SI Bhatia hears me out patiently, but the look in his eyes suggests a man who believes he is wasting his time. Eventually, he snaps shut his notebook and turns to Ma. ‘I’ll need to interrogate your daughter if she regains consciousness.’

  Ma gapes at him in shock and bursts into tears once again.

  The sub-inspector hastily amends his statement. ‘I meant when she regains consciousness.’

/>   * * *

  The burns specialist at Shastri Hospital is Dr Atul Bansal, a mild-mannered, bespectacled man in his forties with the weary, stoic look of a death-row convict. I don’t blame him. Of all the wings in the hospital, the burns ward is the most melancholy, drenched perpetually in tragedy. Serious-burn victims come in at all hours. The causes differ – some have suffered from gas explosions, some from acid dousing or electrical burns – but the end result is the same: horribly disfigured faces, exposed and hanging flesh, skin covered in blisters and boils. Listening to their screams of agony resonating through the corridors is enough to make anyone wish for temporary deafness.

  ‘Neha is very lucky,’ Dr Bansal says as he accompanies Ma and me to the ICU, where Neha has been transferred after her operation. ‘She received only forty per cent burns, largely on the right side of her face, neck and chest. She could easily have lost her eyes and ears.’

  From the opposite end of the corridor a gurney is being wheeled in. I glance at the patient’s face and immediately flinch in shock and horror. It is a middle-aged man, around fifty years old. The entire skin of his face has been stripped out, making it not so much a deformed as an unformed face. It is as though muscle, bone and tissue were still evolving, still working out the interplay of blood and fibre and nerves and veins that gives the structure strength and vitality. But the process appears to have been stopped midstream, before the final outer layer, the epidermis, could be stretched over the structure. The result is a mass of flesh coated with a peculiar crimson hue. Where a little bit of skin remains, it has formed into transparent little globules, as if the head had been put in boiling water and the face had bubbled over.

  ‘Not a pretty sight, eh?’ observes Dr Bansal with the matter-of-factness that comes from being exposed to such gruesomeness on a daily basis.

  ‘Who did this to him?’

  ‘His wife of thirty years.’

  My eyebrows arch in astonishment.

  ‘I know you must be surprised. Eighty per cent of burn victims who come here are women. The usual cases of dowry harassment. This one is an exception. The husband was a wife beater who assaulted his wife on a daily basis. Yesterday the wife got her revenge. She doused his face with sulphuric acid as he slept, blinding and disfiguring him for life.’