The chairs are so tightly arranged she can’t tell if she’s feeling Dipika’s sweat or hers through their shalwar sleeves. Like almost everyone else, they’re sitting shoulder to shoulder. Kat’s on the aisle; more room for her long legs. She looks around for familiar faces. Gracie’s attending Mass at another church with one of the housemothers who’s also Catholic. She’ll get dropped off at the Bose flat in time for lunch.
Kavita, Amrita, and a few other girls are here, sitting in the row ahead of Kat and Dipika, with Miss Shireen and two housemothers flanking them. The rest of the Asha House girls worship in mosques or temples, so they don’t attend church. We want our girls to become used to being around good men again, bit by bit, Miss Shireen told her. That’s why we take them to houses of worship.
Kat scowls at the sight of the Hyena in the back holding some kind of basket. Sure hope these men are good, she thinks. Just because they’re religious doesn’t mean they’re safe. PG’s in the back row, a lone white face in a throng of brown. Ravi’s toward the back, too, jammed between the Bose twins. He hasn’t shaved. His eyes look glassy and he has that blank expression Kat remembers from the first time she saw him. It’s like his heart was awake for a while but now he’s slipped back into some kind of emotional coma.
I want you to meet my friend Robin, Grandma Vee told Kat that first night before sending her off to small group. Something’s been troubling that dear child lately. I have a feeling you might be good for each other.
But how can Kat be good for him? Suddenly, an idea of what she can do pops into her head. She has to scrutinize it at first because it’s so out of character for her. But it’s a decent plan, she thinks. She takes the bulletin someone handed her at the door and looks around for a stray pencil. Oh, perfect. Some kid’s dropped a red crayon, and it’s in toe-heel reach. Got it!
As the preacher drones on up front, Kat starts to write. She’s not as good at pithy proverbs or advice-giving as Grandma Vee, but after listening carefully to Professor “Pantera” on the mat for so many years now, she can remember instructions almost word for word.
RAVI
Ravi’s plodding through Sunday like he used to in Boston. He chews and swallows porridge for breakfast, half listens to the Bose family’s easygoing banter, and rides silently in a rickshaw with PG to church. Here, instead of sitting sandwiched between two tall white people, Ravi is sweating between two short Indian twins who are leaning into him from both sides.
At first, he tunes out the sermon. But a Bengali translator stands beside the preacher, and suddenly Ravi realizes he can understand a word or two in his mother tongue, even before the phrases are translated. “Asha,” for example. How does he know what that means? Mrs. Gupta hasn’t taught them the Bangla word for hope. Was it stored somewhere deep in his brain? He buries the word again, putting it out of commission where it belongs.
After the sermon, Miss Shireen and Mira stand to sing with the rest of the choir. Like most of the older women, they don’t wear Western clothes or shalwars to church. Ravi feels a pang at the sight of their flowing, pleated, colorful saris. Somewhere in this sprawling city, his first mother is probably wearing one, too.
Arjun is one of the servers, and the “collection plate” he passes down the rows looks like a handwoven jute basket. The worship band plays instruments Ravi doesn’t recognize—a hand-slapped drum on its side, a long-handled guitar look-alike.
He glances up at the embroidered banner hanging on the wall. Jesus looks Indian, too, like everyone in the room except PG, who’s sitting in the back. A brown Jesus? That’s probably right. He was Middle Eastern, after all.
Where were you the day she left me? Why didn’t you help her?
No answer. He should probably stop believing in a good, loving God. But he can’t. Faith is so deep in his heart he can’t root it out. And he can’t imagine any other version of himself than the Jesus-loving Ravi who grew up learning the Bible. If his first mother had kept him, though, he would probably have worshipped Durga. Or Allah. Was she a Christian? Hindu? Muslim? He’ll never know now.
The ache for her drums inside him like a constant homesickness. It always has, he realizes. He’d feel a strange loneliness at Christmas, once the presents were put away and the gift wrap tossed in the trash. Any guitar solo in a minor key made the back of his throat ache. Even the sight of Mrs. Rivera’s swollen stomach had made him sad. And saris. He’d avert his eyes when desi mothers came to events wearing them. Looking back now, he recognizes these all as echoes of grief.
They were about missing her.
In Boston, he managed to keep the sadness to a low beat in the background.
At the orphanage, though, after he’d opened that envelope and read through the contents, it slammed through him like a crescendo.
He can’t completely silence it, no matter where he goes. It’s a never-ending soundtrack to the story of his life.
“I have decided to follow Jesus,” the men around him sing first in Bangla, then in English.
“No turning back,” the women reply. “No turning back.”
No turning back, Ravi repeats numbly. No turning back.
KAT
After the service, Kat finds Ravi, takes him into a corner of the room, and points out where the Asha House girls are clustered toward the front. The two of them stay at a distance, but some of the girls catch sight of them. There’s a lot of giggling and pointing, and Kat can hear the words Amit Biswas, even from where she and Ravi are standing.
“The pregnant one’s Kavita,” she whispers to Ravi. “She’s the girl in the video PG showed us in Boston.”
She can see Ravi’s eyes take in the size of Kavita’s belly. And then register the weariness in her face. He flinches. Good. That’s exactly what she wants him to do.
As they’re boarding bicycle rickshaws to head back to the Bose flat for lunch, Kat cuts in front of PG and climbs up into the two-person seat next to Ravi. He shifts over so that their thighs and arms don’t have to touch. So considerate, even in his sadness. No wonder he’s one of Grandma Vee’s all-time favorites, Kat thinks.
“You coming to lunch?” he asks, lifting his eyebrows.
“Nope. Just keeping you company on the rickshaw ride.” She’s avoiding the Hyena as much as possible. “What did you think of Kavita?”
“She looks … a little sad to me,” he says. “And pregnant. That’s for sure.”
Kat takes a breath. It’s now or never. “Like someone else, maybe? Eighteen or so years ago?”
He’s quiet. The rickshaw splashes through a puddle, drenching the trailing red scarf she always wears as an orna with her shalwar kameez.
Kat tugs it in. “Did Grandma Vee ever tell you about ‘Golden-Ruling’?”
“No, I don’t think so,” says Ravi. “She’s always loving her neighbor, that’s for sure.”
“It’s amazing, but she’s gone through some rough stuff.”
“I know. That’s what makes it even more amazing.”
“Anyway,” Kat says. “She told me that when the people she loves are ‘out of reach,’ she offers some kindness—”
Ravi interrupts. “Kat, I know you mean well, but I already heard one sermon today. Do you really want to preach another one?”
Well, that didn’t go well. Maybe he isn’t ready to hear it yet. His heart is still raw. That’s why you always have a Plan B. She fingers the folded bulletin in her hand. Grandma Vee’s words are there, waiting for when he needs them.
They sit in silence until the rickshaw stops in front of the Boses’ building. Ravi jumps out and lands in the mud. “Here, take this,” Kat says, handing him the bulletin. “I wrote down what Grandma Vee said. And it’s not a sermon, I promise. It’s a survival strategy. I’m trying it, too.”
“Fine,” Ravi says, jamming it into his back pocket. “Thanks, I guess. Sorry I was grumpy.”
She tells the driver the Asha House address. As they start moving, she turns and peeks through the slit in the back of the can
opy. Ravi’s still standing there, getting drenched. Her heart aches for him. Left behind, again.
RAVI
INT. BENGALI EMANCIPATION SOCIETY HEADQUARTERS—DAY
On Monday, Ravi sends his parents a note that sounds more like a telegram than an email: Opened file. No information. Search over.
On Tuesday, his parents answer. Robin, we’re so sorry. We spoke with PG on the phone right after we got your email. Are you okay? If you do want to come back, we’re here for you. Or we can come there. We love you so much. Dad and Mom.
He definitely doesn’t want them here. Especially not Mom, with her worrying and advice. He shouldn’t need her help anymore—he’s eighteen now, a man. And he doesn’t want to go back to his life in Boston, not yet, anyway. I’m staying, he writes. You don’t need to come. PLEASE DON’T WORRY. I’m doing okay.
But he’s not sure he’s telling the truth. It’s only his second week in Kolkata. How is he going to make it through the rest of the summer?
Duty, loyalty, obedience.
Bengali values, according to Shen.
But they’re already familiar to Ravi. They’ve been moving his feet and hands in Boston for years.
Duty was a decent motivator.
It turned down the volume of grief some.
So he tries it now.
He’s supposed to be learning Bangla. Every day that week, Ravi concentrates hard in class. Amazingly, thanks to his three-year-old self who might have been fluent once, he’s good at this. After only a few lessons, he’s absorbing phrases, words, and grammar like a human Rosetta stone. He starts reviewing and practicing his lessons in the evenings with the twins, who are eager to help. In contrast, Kat and Gracie doze off in class after their nights of baby care. Mrs. Gupta keeps shaking her head at their mistakes and smiling at Ravi. For the first time in his life, Ravi Thornton is a teacher’s pet.
Loyalty used to move him, too.
He puts it to work.
Slow steps, but still.
He sends daily emails to his parents. Brief notes and no phone calls, but he keeps writing them. He writes to Grandma Vee, too, and Martin and Ash. He keeps it light and brief, but they’re on his loyalty list. Along with Gracie.
And Kat, even though he was short with her on Sunday. He’s not sure why. Maybe it’s because she dragged him over to see Kavita. It didn’t seem right to focus on a vulnerable girl like that. A pregnant girl, like—he stops there.
It bugged him, too, when Kat sounded so excited about the Golden Rule. Had she never heard it before? He can recite the verse in his sleep: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” But now, like a lot of stuff he’s memorized from the Bible, it doesn’t seem to make sense. The folded bulletin Kat gave him is on his nightstand, unopened. How can you love yourself when the person who’s supposed to love you most dumps you?
He pushes that thought away, too.
Obedience keeps him trudging along.
Arjun asked him to do data entry. Okay. Training sessions with Shen? Fine.
So, after lunch, once the girls leave for Asha House, Ravi works for an hour or so in a small room at the back of the office. Weirdly, it’s not boring work. As he inputs data from court reports about perpetrators who were caught and jailed, he realizes that most were caught thanks to Shen’s heroes. And because a few brave trafficked girls gave their testimonies in court, like Arjun wants Kavita to do. In some of the reports, the girls are named, so he’s required to shred those after entering them into the secure system. He’s beginning to understand why everyone doing data entry needs to sign a confidentiality statement.
He inputs data from older internal office memos detailing rescues that took place in Sonagachi, one of the biggest red-light districts in Asia. A more recent document describes how the “enterprise of selling underage children for sex has been forced to spread out through the city.” Apparently, “traffickers are now using a number of hotels throughout Kolkata.”
Hotels.
Places where people come and go anonymously.
Where bad things can happen without anyone noticing.
The name of the one in the file from the orphanage is etched so deeply in his mind he knows he’ll never forget it: Royal Diadem Hotel.
After enough data has been entered for the day, he takes an auto-rickshaw to the police training center. The silver lining to this act of obedience is that Arjun was right, and so was Kat: Exercise does relieve stress. You forget everything when you’re gasping for breath, running sprints across a gym floor, or straining to push up a barbell.
Ravi forces himself through a sweaty, tough couple of hours. With each training session, and Bontu cheering him on, Ravi grits his teeth and runs a bit more distance, does two more push-ups, and a few more crunches than he did the day before. The two-hour sessions fly by, with Shen blowing his whistle constantly.
Ravi still hasn’t earned a smile or a word of praise. But that’s not why he keeps showing up. Now that hope has failed him, he’s doing his duty, just as he has his whole life.
Loyally.
Obediently.
Meekly.
KAT
INT. BENGALI EMANCIPATION SOCIETY HEADQUARTERS—DAY
On Monday, when Kat and Gracie get buzzed into the office, only Gopal is standing there.
“Where is everybody, Mr. Gopal?” Gracie asks.
“In daily prayer meeting. It is finishing at eight thirty. You may join for last five minutes. But no noise, please.”
Inside the large room where they have Bangla class, about fifty people are sitting cross-legged on the foam mats. Kat had wondered what those were for; they seemed too perfect when she thought about using them for jiu-jitsu lessons. But she’d been hoping to find the room empty. Instead, men are on one side, and women, some with their ornas covering their heads, are on the other.
Every head is bowed.
There’s not a sound in the room.
Quietly, Gracie and Kat slip off their sandals and join the last row of women. Gracie bows her head, too. Kat takes one more look around and closes her eyes. She has no idea how to pray. Hello, she says in her head, picturing the brown, embroidered Sparrow on the banner at the Bengali church. Help, I guess? To train Gracie. Thanks, too. For helping me touch Ravi when he needed it. Help him, too, maybe?
“Lord, hear our prayers.” It’s the Hyena’s voice. Kat’s eyes fly open. There he is, standing at the lectern like he owns the place. “May God bless your hands, minds, and bodies as you serve and protect his beloved children. Go in peace.”
She and Gracie stay seated as people exit in silence. Some see them and smile, others don’t. Kat doesn’t look up as the Hyena walks past.
Last to leave is Miss Shireen, who stops to greet them. “We don’t require foreigners to join our ‘family’ prayer time, but I’m glad you found your way here. Come anytime. See you this afternoon back at home.”
After she leaves, and the room is empty, Kat turns to Gracie. “She might not mean that if she knew we came early to fight, not pray.”
“It’s kind of the same thing, isn’t it?” Gracie says. “Let’s get started.”
* * *
Kat’s decided to keep it simple. She’s going to teach Gracie three moves: Kimura, triangle choke, and mount escape. All three look impressive to a viewing audience.
“We bow before we step on the mat, like this. And then we high-five, fist-bump, and kneel, facing each other.”
Gracie imitates her.
“You’ll need a Portuguese nickname,” Kat says.
“What? Why?”
“It’s Brazilian jiu-jitsu; roll with it. Mine is ‘Filhote,’ which means ‘cub.’ ‘Pantera’—Saundra, my BJJ professor—gave it to me when I was eleven.” Kat narrows her eyes and studies Gracie’s face. “How about ‘Fogo’? There was a little guy at our academy named ‘Fogo’ who made boys twice his size surrender.”
“Wait—that sounds like ‘fuego.’ Does it mean ‘fire’?” Gracie thinks for a second. “I like it.”<
br />
“Great. Too bad we don’t have gis; these shalwars will have to do.”
“What’s a gi?”
“Belted kimono outfits we wear on the mat. But since we’re trying to demo a realistic attack, it’s probably good to be in street clothes. We start warming up with somersaults. Like this.” Kat demonstrates.
Gracie follows her down the mat; she’s not bad. She can do backward somersaults, too. Even in a shalwar kameez.
“You’re really good at that,” Kat tells her.
“Four years of gymnastics.”
“Good. That’s going to pay off. Next, we shrimp.”
“No, I’m shrimp. You’re not shrimp.” Gracie laughs at her own dumb joke.
“Hilarious. I mean we warm up like this.” Kat flops on her back, lifts her hips, turns her body to the side, bends at the waist, pushes off with one foot, and does it again. She repeats this on the other side, scooching all the way along the length of the mat.
Again, Gracie imitates her. By the end of this exercise, she’s out of breath. And starting to sweat. “Tomorrow I’m wearing a T-shirt under this shalwar and taking the top layer off before we start.”
Kat decides they need a physical break. She doesn’t want her student to burn out.
“Let’s kneel again and go over some terms,” she says. “The first thing to learn is ‘position before submission.’ You rely on trained instincts and your head to get your body in the right position, and hold your opponent there until he submits, or surrenders. You move slowly, position by position.”
“Oh, I get it,” Gracie says. “Like Lucha Libre, right?”
“Not like wrestling. You’ll get exhausted if you keep constantly moving and fighting. You have to think more in BJJ, conserve your energy, wait for the right opportunity. In wrestling, you stay off your back. In BJJ, you can fight and win while you’re on your back.”
Forward Me Back to You Page 19
