The Last 3 Minutes – Episode 2

Hari

Michigan - September 1985 – Nineteen days until

Framed in Hari’s bedroom doorway, his twin sister Casey stood like a small mountain. Her hands were on hips, her powerful mouth a little twisted. “Why is my brother such a major loser?” she cracked. 

“I am not a loser,” Hari said reasonably. He was not particularly powerful. Or a mountain. Maybe a cool, grassy hill. 

She sighed. “Okay, you’re not a loser. Can you help me?”

“I don’t know.” He wanted to, but hesitated. 

“It’s not a big deal.”

“It’ll be quick, and then we can play a game or watch TV together.”

“I don’t want to watch TV.”

“No one in this family ever wants to do anything together!” Casey shouted. 

“We do stuff.”

“Everyone just sits around with their own thing. You’re always just reading in your cave or playing D&D.”

“I’ve only played Dungeons and Dragons once in my life.” That was a mild lie. 

Casey narrowed her eyes and blinked. “You and Sita are so boring.”

He shrugged.

“So?” she asked. 

“What?”

“Even if we’re not going to hang out, can you help me with my English homework?”

“You don’t need my help. You’re really good at English.”

“I’m just stuck because it’s the start of a new class and all,” she said.

“You should talk to your teacher.” Hari sniffed hard, his nose tormented by allergies. 

“You have to help me!” she said, “I’m your older sister!” That was her age-old line. 

“You were born twelve and a half minutes before me,” Hari replied. That was his line.

“So are you going to help me or not?”

“Not.”

“Fine!” She threw up her hands. “I just won’t do my homework then. And don’t tell Mom. It’s not like I’ll get flunked out of seventh grade because I skipped the first assignment. You’re such a fucking awesome brother!” 

She flung herself out of the room and slammed the door. Casey liked to punctuate her statements. Hari heard her stomp down the hall to her room. There was another slam. 

When they were little, Hari and Casey shared a bedroom and adored each other. They played together and made art and did puzzles. Sometimes she sat while he read aloud. For their eighth birthdays, their father got them an aquarium and some guppies. Around the time they turned nine, they moved to their own rooms. Hari kept the fish. Things were very quiet in his own room. Mostly, he enjoyed that. 

He loved and hated the fact that their house was always very full and very loud. Casey was the loudest, Hari the quietest. They often had other people around the house, too: friends of the kids, parents’ friends, Gina, of course, and nowadays, Ram. 

Gina had joined the family – or really, was hired to join – after Hari and Casey were born. Their parents were overwhelmed with twins and a toddler. Hari had no idea why they had so many kids so fast. Casey always said they probably didn’t mean to. 

Back then, Gina lived in the basement bedroom as the resident nanny. Now, she still came to the house early on weekday mornings to help with breakfast, and she typically stayed until the late afternoon, tidying up the house and preparing dinner because Amma had never been much of a cook. Gina, a little older than Amma, was divorced and never had children of her own. She adored Sita, Hari, and Casey as if they were her own family.

Cousin Ram was a graduate student studying electrical engineering. He had arrived in America just a week after Hari and the family had returned from their trip to India. Ram now occupied the basement where Hari used to seek refuge from his sisters and where he had spent hours programming his Commodore 64 computer. Ram was at home in the morning, but spent long afternoons and evenings on campus doing his research. Sometimes he got back after midnight. 

Hari kept a large set of family photos. On top of the dresser, the biggest one was one of him and his father. They were at a Detroit Tigers game when he was seven. Hari did not like baseball, or any kind of sports, but his father was a fanatic. Hari ended up getting sick on a hotdog during that game, and vomited in his father’s lap. 

Right after his father died nine months ago, on New Year’s Day, Hari figured that was it. His death would be the whole family story. Every time someone saw them, they would think, there go the kids who don’t have a dad.

On top of the dresser, Hari also had a black-and-white photo of their grandfather. He was sixty-nine now, but the picture was taken when he was a very young man; Amma was a girl smirking in the background. Their grandfather’s name was Sundar Sundaram, but he went by the nickname Sunny and insisted that they call him Sunny Iya. For Hari, seeing him was by far the best part about visiting India. 

When the family went to India when Hari was five, all Sunny Iya wanted to do was take the children on walks and tell them stories. Hari only remembered faintly, but he used to whistle a funny little song to rouse them early in the morning. The sky was still mostly dark, with just a hint of red and orange. He had them splash their faces with cold water, and he said, “Come, quickly come! It is story time.” He led them up to the flat roof of the house to watch the sunrise. And they followed because our parents said they had to and because he was a riveting storyteller.

Between the trips to India, Sunny Iya sent stories in his letters six times a year. He wrote in crisp, elegant writing on blue aerogram paper. He enclosed a small black-and-white photograph every time so they would know what he looked like. Amma was always thrilled when the letters came, even though they were addressed to the children.

There was always a moral at the end of the stories in the old letters. One of his best stories in the letters was about the violent fight he and his brothers had not long after their oldest sister died. They started punching each other, and Sunny Iya knocked his younger brother out cold. It was unbelievable. In the last paragraph of the letter, Sunny Iya dropped his homily: “So here is the reason for my story: we do not get to choose our brothers and sisters the way we might choose our friends. We are forced to play with them, eat with them, learn from them. When my brothers and sisters were well behaved, their behavior was contagious, and I became better. If I was bad, I was contagious, too. The people you are born with have more influence on you than even your parents.”

Hari, already the family archivist, had kept all of Sunny Iya’s letters, and this one they all reread fairly often. Amma, who would have been a novelist in another life, loved reading the letter aloud in a booming voice like Sunny Iya’s, and she would add a big flourish at the end. 

After finishing the story about the brothers’ fight, Amma would always smile and nod her head, expecting the profundity to blow their minds. Hari loved the story because it was crazy to imagine Sunny Iya fighting with his brothers, but he didn’t want to burst Amma’s bubble. Hari, Sita, and Casey would merely sit, the three of them looking at each other. Hari never had the urge to hit any of his siblings, not even Casey, but he was quite sure they were not going to influence each other one bit.

Now he curled up on a beanbag with an Issac Asimov book. He read, then reread the same few pages, then his mind wandered again. His first day of school had been pretty good. Seventh grade was going to be okay even though he would once again feed at the bottom of the social heap. He liked it down there. It was a quiet, safe place to hide. 

He wondered what Sita was up to. She had not spoken to him all day. She and Amma had almost been in a car accident that afternoon. Sita stayed mum at dinner, just chewing her lip. In fact, she had not talked to him much in a few weeks. 

He ambled downstairs. Halfway there, Casey suddenly bellowed from the living room. “Where is everybody? It’s almost eight o’clock! ‘Who’s The Boss’ is on.” Hari did not move a muscle. After no one answered, she yelled again, “Come on! It’s starting.” 

Still, no one responded. Casey snarled. “Fine! I’ll just watch by myself.” The theme music blared. 

Hari skirted into the kitchen. Ram was peering in the fridge, and Gina scribbled on a piece of paper. She was staying at the house late today because she needed to take tomorrow off. When Hari came in, she looked up and grinned at him. “No TV, huh?”

He shook his head. 

Ram emerged from the fridge and coughed. “Would you like to come with us?”

“Where?” Hari asked. 

“Grocery store,” Gina said. 

“But it’s late,” he said. 

She nodded. “I know, but your mom didn’t make it to the store earlier this evening.” Turning to Ram, she asked, “Anything else?” 

Ram closed the fridge, looked in the pantry, and said with a sheepish smile. “Pop tarts.”

Gina raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. 

“I know,” Ram said, “But they are quite tasty.” Then he added, coughing again. “I also need to get cold medicine. My body doesn’t know how to handle your American viruses.”

“You can go to the pharmacy next door to Mercer’s.” She asked Hari, “So are you coming?”

The three of them took Gina’s car, a beat-up stick-shift Chevette. She drove even faster and more carelessly than Amma. Hari clutched the seat in back, trying to focus on a point in the far distance so he wouldn’t throw up. Ram chuckled as they hurtled down Equator Road. The car still smelled of cigarettes because Gina used to smoke. Amma made her quit two years ago. 

“Your driving reminds me of India,” Ram said. 

“I’ll take that as a compliment!” she chirped. 

As they neared Mercer’s, Hari wondered where Amma and Sita had almost gotten hit. He crossed his fingers for good luck. 

They lurched to a stop in the parking lot. While Gina and Hari headed into the store, Ram walked around to the pharmacy. It was always open late, but it smelled funny and was known to harbor strange characters at night. Hari was glad to avoid it. Ram said he would meet them back at the car. 

Inside Mercer’s, Gina grabbed a cart and pointed to the far side of the store. “You go that way to get the pop tarts and some cereal, your choice. I’ll head that way to get the milk and eggs. I’ll meet you in the back where they have the meat. Casey wants hot dogs.”

 Hari took a roundabout way to the pop tarts, wandering past the candy and cake mixes, then the cans of soup and green beans, the frozen waffles, the junk food Amma started buying in recent months. He found the pop tarts, but agonized over the flavor. Things were not easier over at the cereals. He was looking very carefully when someone said behind him, “It is truly amazing isn’t it?”

A lady he did not know spoke to him. “Amazing and paradoxical that when faced with an enormous array of choices, it actually becomes harder to choose. You might even be tempted to give up altogether and walk away.”

“What?” he asked. 

“All of this cereal!” The woman had a sort of airy British accent. Hari could not say for sure. She had black hair tied up in a bun. She was wearing sunglasses. He took a step away from her. 

“Don’t be alarmed,” she said, “I mean no harm, though I imagine your parents have told you not to talk to strangers. I am visiting, and whenever I come to a place, I like to talk to the people who live there.”

He swallowed, thinking he should make a run for it, but he was also reluctant to be rude. She seemed harmless. 

“Where are you visiting from?” he asked finally. 

“That’s actually a rather difficult question to answer.”

He hoped the conversation might be over. But it was not. 

“You see,” the lady began, “I’ve lived in many places over the years. I am a bit of a wanderer, though I do come back to certain towns again and again. Like this one, Hamilton. I have family here, and I enjoy returning often. I have been coming here for a long time for my personal matters and for my work. As I tell everyone, work can either be a tedious thing or a meaningful, life-affirming one. Sometimes it may seem that all we do is push the boulder up a hill, only to allow it to roll back down again. Then we are pushing once more. But there is meaning in that attempt.”

Hari nodded, though he no longer had a clear idea what the lady was talking about. Then he said hastily, “Well, I have to pick out a cereal and go. Someone is waiting for me over by the meat.”

“Yes, I am sure. You must go. I would suggest that cereal.” She pointed to a box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

He hesitated and then took the box, wondering for a second if she had poisoned it. She smiled at him in a grandmotherly kind of way, so he smiled back. 

“It is nice to meet you, young man. I sincerely hope our paths will cross again.”

He took one last quick look at her. She no longer smiled. The sunglasses were so dark he could not see her eyes. He took off for the meat aisle, and found Gina looking around impatiently. 

“What happened?” she asked, throwing up her hands. 

“It took me a while to decide.”

“I should have gone with you.” She laughed. “We’re all done. I’ve got everything.”

Soon they were back outside, Gina pushing the rattling cart through the parking lot. He hoped we would not encounter the old lady, though he also figured she was probably the kind of weirdo that only bothered kids who were alone. 

Back at the car, Ram was looking groggy. 

“Sorry we took so long,” Gina said. She hiked her thumb at Hari as he climbed in the back. “Someone got carried away in the store.”

Hari sighed and curled up on the seat as Gina took off. He was not sleepy, but he thought his stomach might survive the trip better that way. 

---

Hari

India - July 1985

Hari woke up drenched and still sweating. The last wisp of a dream evaporated, and he did not chase it. He struggled to figure out where he was. A sleeping mat. A pillow as hard as a boulder. The terrazzo floor. Stone walls and heavy air. A crazy rooster crowing outside. Voices then, too. Not English.

He sat up. Casey was still snoring next to him. He remembered that Sita had been sleeping near them, too. But she was gone. They had arrived in Sunny Iya’s village of Pachaippatti late last night. They spent sixteen hours in the air, plus a layover, and every hour felt like four. Hari had gotten tired of reading, tired of sitting, tired of the musky, deadened scent of the airplane. The food was bad, but they got a decent cookie. Not irrationally, Hari worried about bombs. There was the Air India plane from Canada blown out of the sky a few weeks earlier. Hari was sure everyone on their flight was thinking about it. They were probably also thinking about that other plane ten days before Air India: the TWA flight from Greece that got hijacked by more terrorists. It was amazing that anyone traveled anywhere nowadays. 

When they landed in Madras, there was a long line for customs inspections. They stood in a big, steamy hall with a single dusty fan whirling aimlessly above. It was nine in the morning, but Hari’s body had lost all track of time. They emerged from the arrivals hall into a scene of chaos outside the terminal. Sunny Iya stood beaming, holding a big sign with all their names. He had flower garlands, heavy and damp, explosive with the scent of rose. 

They did not stay long in the city. A few hours after they got off the plane, Sunny Iya accompanied them on the express train south to Amma’s family’s ancestral village. The express train was anything but. It kept stopping for all kinds of reasons, for snacks and ice water, for cows stuck on the tracks, for families complaining to get on, packing the rear cars so tightly it must have been impossible for them to breathe. 

They got to the village after ten last night. The family estate was a big compound with three different houses, two courtyards, and a small field for animals. The whole place was dark and quiet when they arrived, the enormous family already tucked away. “Get some good rest,” Sunny Iya said as Hari and his sisters tried to get comfortable. “It will be a busy day tomorrow. Many people to see you!”

Sitting on the sleeping mat in the morning daze, Hari shook himself. Even here, his nose was runny, and he had no tissue handy, so he wiped it on his sleeve. He heard a few voices outside in the family compound. He opened the door and poked his head out. The air was even warmer, the sunlight already brilliant. From beyond the big wall came the jingle of bicycles on the village road. He could also hear a radio crackling with a strident news announcer.  Another competing one blared a happy, raucous song. He smelled woodsmoke from stoves, and incense, too. 

 Still standing in the doorway, he realized he was hungry, and decided to go find Amma. Just then, an enormous red-shelled creature scurried inside. The thing might have been half the size of his hand. He slammed the door and screamed, hopping around, trying to save his toes. 

Casey popped open one eye and grumbled loudly, “What are you doing?”

“Bug!” Hari cried. “Big bug!”

Casey did not seem alarmed. She sat up and looked around. The creature had skittered under a bureau. 

“I don’t see anything,” she muttered. 

“It’s gone. It was huge! A roach, or maybe a scorpion.”

She shook her head. “You woke me up for nothing. I was having a good dream.”

She sat in groggy silence for a while, and then asked, “Are you hungry?”

They both changed out of their pajamas in different, semi-screened corners of the room where they had slept. When they walked outside, they were swarmed by people, generations all talking at once. Aunts, uncles, cousins, then second- and third-cousins, too – everyone who could possibly claim relation to them, some much older and some who were toddlers. Their cousin Ram, who had a thick mustache and a striped orange shirt from the 1970s, shook their hands, and said, “Come, come. They have been waiting for you since before sunrise.”

The crowd pushed Hari and Casey into a cavernous hall. Hari looked around, and saw no sign of Amma or Sita. In the middle of the hall, seated in a wooden chair, was Sornam Ayah, their grandmother, looking stiff and regal. An empty seat meant for Sunny Iya was next to her. A little boy without a shirt grabbed Hari’s thumb and pulled him up to the grandmother. Ram whispered to him, “Bow down! Touch her feet.”

As he did so, Casey followed. Sornam Ayah peered down at them with steely eyes and said, “Vanakam.” 

Everyone around them quieted. The grandmother asked nothing else and did not smile. Amma and Sita came into the room with Sunny Iya. As they bowed, Sornam Ayah uttered a sentence to Amma in Tamil, and Amma’s eyes welled up. Sunny Iya sat in his chair. 

Ram told Hari and Casey quietly, “She told your mother that she is sorry for your father’s death.” Ram also explained that this was a welcome ceremony. It was uneasy and mostly quiet, punctuated occasionally by Sornam Ayah who made short pronouncements about ordinary things – an upcoming celebration, the bad monsoon last year, the mediocre food the new cook made. Amma offered short replies in Tamil. Ram whispered in translation. Then silence settled on them once more. 

The legions of cousins sat quietly, too, though the youngest ones bounced around, their parents trying hard to keep them down. Finally, as if on cue, everyone got up. “Time for breakfast,” Ram said to Hari and Casey. 

They sat in long rows on the floor of a narrow dining room, cross-legged with a green banana leaf instead of a plate. A couple of stooped servants doled out dosas, chicken, coconut chutney, fried vadas, sambar, and scooped guavas. Hari was overjoyed. 

After breakfast, Amma told Casey and Sita that they had to get dressed. For a moment, they looked confused. “Indian clothes,” Amma said. Hari was glad he was a boy and somehow exempt. Casey punched him in the shoulder as she swept out of the room. Even when she came back in her pavada, Casey was still cursing under her breath. She walked stiffly, looking miserable and awkward. Sita was entirely at ease. 

Sunny Iya escorted them all back to the big hall. Sornam Ayah was gone, but the room was still full with Amma’s six brothers and sisters and their families. One of the little ones who had a shaved head carried a sloshing cup of milk. He gave Hari’s legs a tight hug, and the milk dribbled onto Hari’s feet. 

“I know English!” the little boy shouted.

Hari grinned at him. “That’s great! How old are you?”

“Five years,” he said, making the number with his fingers. “My name is Aarvind. I had to offer all my hair at the temple. My amma promised God I would do it.”

“I’m Hari.”

“I know! I know! And this is Casey Akka and this Sita Akka. We have known all about you since we were little-little.”

“You weren’t even born yet the last time we visited,” Hari said.

Aarvind nodded. “You’re Americans.”

“Well, we live in America. But we’re kind of half American and half Indian.”

“No one can be half-half!” Aarvind cried. 

All of them laughed. Then Aarvind asked, “Do you eat snow?”

“We come from a place called Michigan that has really cold winters,” Sita explained. “But normally, we don’t eat snow.”

“We don’t have cold here,” he said, “But we have monkeys. You have seen the monkeys?”

Hari shook his head. “We haven’t yet. But I remember them from last time.”

“Many more now! Monkeys jumping everywhere in this village. But do not worry, they will not bite.”

Sunny Iya was standing behind the other children, smiling broadly. “What a sight,” he exclaimed, “All of my grandchildren together at last! Eighteen of you!”

More people paraded through the big hall. Hari lost track of who was who. One ancient man was Sunny Iya’s great uncle. He was more than a hundred years old. He was completely deaf, and he kept smiling at the children, calling them by names he invented. 

Lunch was another feast: three kinds of rice, including a black one, eight vegetables, roasted chicken, goat curry with hard boiled eggs, lentils, three different fruits, and a fried, sticky dessert. Sita and Hari grinned at each other, savoring all of it. Casey picked at her food, but she avoided saying anything rude. After lunch Sunny Iya ushered them back to the bedroom where they took long naps on the floor mats. Hari woke up groggy again. When he came down, Casey and Sita were already there. Sita handed him a cup of Indian coffee. It was intensely sweet. 

Sunny Iya announced to everyone, “We are going on a walk. All must come. The Americans are going to see the village square and meet our neighbors and friends.”

It was four o’clock, and the heat of the day had not eased much. Hari grabbed the Pentax camera he had inherited from his father, and Sita brought her patchwork purse. Casey took a banana. She said she was starving, and the banana seemed safe. 

Sunny Iya gathered up the rest of his flock, all the cousins and extended relations, and the big noisy group went through the gates of the family compound. The youngest children whistled. 

The road outside was not paved. There were strips of gravel flanked by deep ruts in the red earth. An ox cart up ahead of us rolled along. Two bicyclists behind the family dinged their bells loudly as they careened down the strip in the middle of the road. People jumped aside to let them pass. Cows lazed everywhere, wandering up and down the paths. Goats kicked through the lanes, grazing on a green spot in the middle of an open courtyard. Chickens and roosters darted across the road, pecking at the ground, squawking, flapping, flying a little ways, then plopping back down. There were packs of stray dogs, too, fighting and growling for scraps of food that people had thrown out. 

A few massive houses lined the road. Like Sunny Iya’s, they had tall, sooty outer walls marking their compounds. They had big creaky gates, too. When Hari peered through, he saw the houses with huge wooden doors, elaborately carved with gods, animals, and trees. There were white drawings on the ground in front of each gate, the kolams, now faded because they had been drawn early in the morning by the women who lived there. 

Along the road there were roughly dug sewers full of the stench of dung and human waste, green and yellow water trickling through, steaming in the heat. No one seemed to mind. As Hari walked, he stepped on a squishy turd, and tried desperately to rub it off without getting it on his toes. 

The stucco walls along the road were covered with a dozen grimy layers of movie posters, political slogans, indecipherable graffiti, and ads for soap. The family passed men with dhotis wrapped around their bony knees, walking with a bow-legged gait, their flopping sandals barely held together. They were chewing paan, and expectorating streams of dark red juice. Old women walking near them carried grandchildren or vessels of water, and they wore no blouses, their breasts sagging under their saris. Hari tried not to look. Sunny Iya waved and greeted everyone they passed. He knew all of their names.  People were standing outside their houses because they all knew the Americans had arrived.

The village square was a frenzied place. A throbbing crowd gathered at the bus stop. There were rows of thatched huts for the shops, peeling signs in English and Tamil above each of them. Vegetable and fruit sellers were sweltering with their produce, fanning themselves with old newspapers as they haggled with customers. Their stands were overrun with flies. There was a Shiva temple and a bathing tank with steps leading down to more suspicious looking water. The temple was crammed with devotees who had holy ash and dots of vermillion on their foreheads. On the temple steps, a shirtless priest was chanting in Sanskrit. Smoke and incense wafted all around. 

Sunny Iya said that the members of the family could walk home, but he told Hari, Casey, and Sita to stay. 

“We already had coffee at home,” he explained to a very eager tea seller whose sons were pushing cups at them. “But we’ll give you a few paise because we want to sit here in your shade.”

Sunny Iya handed the boys a few coins, and then gestured for us to sit on the stools arranged around the tea seller’s hut. 

A tall man with thick glasses came over and gently clapped Sunny Iya on the back. “This is my old friend, Srinivas,” Sunny Iya said.

“Old?” Srinivas shouted, sitting down next to Iya, “I’m five years younger than you!”

Another man laughed, “Yes, but Dr. Sunny can still outrun you.”

“Dr. Sunny will never really get old!” someone else exclaimed. 

Sunny Iya shook his head. “No, no, I am slowing down, slowing very much.”

Then men roared, launching into stories about Sunny Iya’s feats, and they reminisced about the village in the days when India was still a British colony. They spoke in English for the children’s sake. They took the hot cups offered by the tea seller and his sons, and they poured tea down their throats. 

“Of course,” Srinivas explained to the children, “Dr. Sunny only spends half his time here in our great village of Pachaippatti. He is always going to Madurai or Madras or even Bombay for his work. Years ago, he even sailed to Ceylon and Singapore.”

“Very important work,” the other men echoed one after the other. 

“Did you know your grandfather has helped many people?” Srinivas asked.

 “Why did you have to go to Hong Kong?” Casey asked, “Why didn’t you just help sick people here?”

Sunny Iya’s eyes brightened. “Souls all over the world need help, especially people who have unique problems.” 

“Like what?”

Srinivas jumped back in. “Your Iya one time helped a little girl who was hit by a town bus. He saved her life!”

“He’s exaggerating,” Sunny Iya said. He had a small white scar on his chin, and he touched it. 

“No, no, it is completely and one-hundred percent true!” Srinivas maintained, his face now altogether serious.

Casey was intrigued. “You mean there was, like, a girl running in the road or something, and BAM, she got hit by a bus? Was she all mangled and stuff?”

Srinivas was about to speak, but Sunny Iya held up a hand. “ My friend, we can tell the stories of my heroics later, no?”

Srinivas nodded his head and smiled, “Of course, perhaps later.”

The friends finished their tea, and the boys who served them quickly cleared the cups. Everyone got up from the stools and left the shade of the tea stall. It was after five. 

The crowd in the square had swelled further. There was a small, squat, stucco building across the street from the tea stall. It had big glass windows displaying saris. Shoppers spilled out from the door and out into the street. 

Srinivas saw Hari looking at it, and said, “That is a very new place! That sari shop is also having AC.” 

“Can we check it out?” Sita asked.

Casey shook her head. “You’re the only person I know who would want to look at Indian clothes.”

“Yes, let’s go to the shop,” Sunny Iya said. 

“I’ll just wait outside,” Casey said. “I don’t care about AC. It’s not that bad out here anymore.”

Sunny Iya said a long goodbye to his friends, and Srinivas said he would see them again tomorrow. Sunny Iya and the children crossed the road. Casey waited outside the sari shop, while Hari, Sita, and their grandfather pushed their way in. The dimly lit place was packed with people, and it was hotter than outside. The air conditioning barely functioned. Hari followed Sita around, but then she gave up because she could not get close enough to see the saris. 

“I will take you to a much better shop next week,” Sunny Iya said to her. 

They went back outside again and stopped short. Casey was facing down a troop of monkeys. 

Sita covered her mouth, laughing. “It’s like little Aarvind said!”

Five monkeys, an adult and four small ones, watched Casey curiously, their heads all tilted in the same direction. Their fur was a dirty white, and they had long black tails and black hair on their heads. They had perceptive, almost mesmerizing eyes. 

“Chi!” Sunny Iya spat. “Shoo!” He grimaced and said, “These terrible macaques!”

“I wish I had a snack for them,” Casey said.

“No!” Sunny Iya exclaimed, “If you feed these vermin, you will encourage them to bother people. They have even started coming through the windows into people’s kitchens.”

“They’re kind of cute,” Hari said. 

“Come! Come away!” Sunny Iya said to them sternly. 

Casey bent her knees and walked forward a little, her cupped hand outstretched like she was going to pet one of the monkeys. 

Sunny Iya shouted loudly, “Poyvitu! Po!” He waved his arms wildly to scare away the macaques. 

And then everything happened at once. 

Sita let out a rending shriek. Someone grabbed the purse from her shoulder. Sunny Iya ran towards the thief, his eyes strangely closed, and then he suddenly dropped down, like someone had cut his legs out from under him. He landed with a thud. 

Casey gave chase, too. A short young man wearing a dhoti and a plaid shirt was sprinting away with Sita’s bag. He jumped onto a moving blue scooter driven by a tall bald man. Casey continued to sprint towards them. The driver of the blue scooter did a three-sixty, and then came towards Casey as if he intended to run her down. She jumped away and rolled on the ground as the scooter accelerated, squealed around the corner of the square, and disappeared. 

The macaques had scattered. 

Sita was crying and shouting, “Oh my God!” again and again. Sunny Iya picked himself up, walked to Sita unsteadily, and then knelt again, putting his arm around her shoulder. “Are you okay, chelam?” he asked. He had tears in his eyes. “They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

Casey walked back toward them, dusting off her pavada. The scarf had fallen off her neck and gotten stained in a puddle on the ground. She picked it up, and tied it in a knot around her waist. 

“Shit!” she exclaimed. “Those assholes!”

“It was merely a bag,” Sunny Iya said. “We will get a new one.” He brushed the hair from Sita’s face. 

“No,” Sita said, her voice a sad whisper, “That bag was a gift.”

“From Dad,” Hari explained. “He got it for her the last time we came to India.”

“Did you see me almost get hit by that motorbike?” Casey asked, laughing. She stared back over the square, admiring the thief’s escape. “Wonder if they planned it, with those monkeys to distract us.”

“Anything is possible,” Sunny Iya said sadly. 

Casey continued, “I want to learn how to ride a motorcycle like that!”

“It was a scooter not a motorcycle,” Hari said. 

“Same thing.”

Sunny Iya gazed at Sita, biting his lip. He was lost in thought, and finally said, “Let’s go home. I think we’ve all had enough of the square.”

In the dusk, they made their way back to the family compound. At the house, Amma burst into tears when Sita and Iya told her about the purse snatcher. Casey mentioned the part about the scooter, and Amma glared at her. The aunts, uncles, and cousins were in an uproar about it. “This is a good, quiet village,” they said again and again. 

Casey got sick of the fuss. She had brought a soccer ball from home. It was dark out in the courtyard, but she blew it up, then kicked and dribbled for half an hour. 

They had chapatis, spinach, and dal for dinner, and then the children had a long time to read before bed. The power flickered out around ten. Ram had warned them that the nightly brownout would last for ten minutes. Hari was prepared and had brought an oil lamp up to the room. It was very dim, but he and Sita read by that light until the power returned. Casey snored. 

By seven thirty the next morning, the house again buzzed joyfully. Hari stumbled out into the courtyard, and one of the servants offered him a cup of milky coffee. Hee found it strange, having people serving him. He did not like it. 

Casey came out, had a little sugary milk, and then said she was going out to kick the ball around again. 

“Already?” Hari asked. 

“Yeah. I’m just trying to survive here.”

Hari went out to the front porch where he found Sita. She sat on one of the long teak recliners. The heat was already starting to creep up. A bus rushed down the bumpy little road, and honked. Families passed along the road, too, starting their morning errands. Sunny Iya came bounding up the front steps, his hands behind his back. “Sita! Hari! Good morning,” he cried. “I have something.”

From behind his back, he revealed Sita’s bag. 

She stared, her mouth open. “How?”

“It’s just as it was yesterday! Not dirty or spoiled. Everything is still inside for you.” Sunny Iya handed it to her.

“You – you just found it this morning?”

Casey had appeared at the porch, too. She cocked her head and asked with excitement, “Did you catch the thief?”

“Ah!” Sunny Iya began, “It wasn’t too hard to make things right.” “Do the police have him?” Casey pursued.

“The police don’t get involved in little things like this,” Sunny Iya said. “It’s all taken care of now.”

“Thank you,” Sita cried. She gave Sunny Iya a hug. 

“Come!” he boomed, gathering all three of us in his big arms, “It is time for breakfast!”