The fissures ease off as the shore turns rocky. Thickets of scrubby trees sprout forth from the cracks. Strands of tattered cloth festoon the branches, like decorations intended to give a ghostly look. We stumble onto a grove of sculptures made from trash. One of them consists of gloves hanging from a scaffold. They wave in the wind, empty fingers blowing and twirling, searching for the digits that once filled them. Beyond lies a fishing village at the mouth of a small cove, still reeking of shrimp left to dry in the sun. Two boys playing around a boat pulled up next to a hut quickly disperse as we approach. “Wait up,” Jaz calls, but this makes them clamber even faster away over the rocks.
We spot the crows soon after, black specks circling over a break along the shore. Hundreds of them rise and fall in the sky—as we near, we hear their excited calls. Then the stench hits us. The gap in the rocks is actually a vast carpet of bodies, in various states of decomposition—the crows hop and pick and peck among them. Mounds of flowers and vermilion lie strewn about, like the remnants of a slapdash funeral rite. “Stay here,” Jaz says, and I am only too glad to turn away.
He returns a moment later. “I know this is creepy, but it has to be done.” Between his fingers is a pinch of the vermilion, gathered from around the corpses. “For the Khakis, as you call them. They might think you’re Muslim if you don’t look more properly Hindu.” To my horror, he smears the vermilion down the parting of my hair. “A bindi, too,” he says, and presses one onto my forehead with the color remaining on his fingertip.
After that, I insist we walk along the roads. Unfortunately, this does not immunize us from the gore—torsos and limbs lurk in almost every alley and corner. “It’s probably the Khakis—their buffer zone, just like the Limbus created,” Jaz says. He’s right—within a block, we begin to see the familiar pattern of charred buildings and burnt-out storefronts.
Just as I wonder where the Khakis might be all hiding, two of them slide out of a doorway. They spot us at once and stop, blocking our path. “Going for a stroll, all dressed up in red, my jaaneman ?” the taller one says, wetting a finger with his tongue and slicking his hair back, Bollywood-villain style. I try to look unfazed as he touches me lightly in the abdomen with the tip of his machine gun.
“Is this the way to the Devi?”
“Come with us, we’ll personally make sure you get to her,” the other one leers.
He’s about to grab my wrist when Jaz intervenes. “Actually, we don’t need to trouble you. You can just tell me.”
“And who do you think you might be?”
“I’m accompanying her—I’m the one responsible for her safety.”
I can tell Jaz is thinking of going for his revolver—a terrible match for a machine gun, especially considering the ineptness he’s displayed. “Bhim’s waiting for us,” I blurt out. “I’m one of the Devi’s maidens. Can’t you see this red sari I’m wearing?” I’m surprised at my own resourcefulness.
Bhim’s name gives them pause. I force myself not to wilt as they assess my bedraggled clothes, my hastily smeared-on bindi. Then the taller one spits on the ground. “Keep going until you come to the main road.” He spits again. I feel their stares on us as we walk past—I resist the temptation to run.
“I almost pulled out the gun,” Jaz says in an awed whisper. “Though I think if I had, we might both be dead.”
After that, we slink along in the shadows of buildings wherever possible. We almost run into Khakis on two more occasions, but I manage to spot them and lead us to cover each time. I still haven’t been able to figure out Jaz’s motives. What is he after? Why does he tag along? Perhaps it’s the fact that our positions have reversed—he’s the vulnerable one now, dependent on me to shepherd him through this inhospitable Hindu terrain. Should I run and let him fend for himself? Would I feel guilty of leaving him to his fate? Perhaps not a wise strategy—with all the Khakis around, a lone woman, Hindu or not, is probably not very safe.
He seems to pick up on my thoughts. “I hope you don’t mind my company. The most direct way north to my mother is through Juhu, and I’d have a hard time crossing alone.”
I nod curtly at this return of the phantom mother. “There’s safety in numbers for both of us.” I try not to think of my own mother, of whether I will ever see my parents or sister again.
Around four-thirty, we duck into an abandoned clothing store for lunch. The show windows have all been smashed, the mannequins stripped of their garments. They lie naked in a tangled orgy on the floor. We sit on stools and divide up a packet of orange biscuits. I’ve always detested the artificial orange filling, but today I’m glad for the tiny bit of moisture it carries. Jaz, on the other hand, licks it off each side with obvious relish before eating the cookie part.
The unreality of the situation overwhelms me—sitting so tranquilly in the shop, amidst the sexlessly contorted mannequins, dining on this preposterous lunch. Next to this person, a constant fixture at my side for almost a day now, about whom I know little more than the alleged existence of a mother in Jogeshwari. “Will you stay with her once you reach?” I ask.
“No. Too dangerous. Even if they don’t wipe out the city this week as promised, Mumbai’s too juicy a target—air attacks, another bomb, anything. The sooner one gets away, the further , the better. Sequeira’s ferry captain friend has the right idea—lay low in a place like Diu, far away from everything. One small enough to be overlooked, one nobody’s interested in targeting.” Jaz parts open his last biscuit and smears off the lurid cream with his tongue. “You should think of it too—what you’re going to do once you find your husband. Come north, and we can be each other’s passport—journey through Muslim and Hindu pockets with equal ease.”
Except there’s no guarantee I’ll find Karun. Or rescue him from the clutches of whoever is holding him. I slowly exhale, then turn to gaze at the mannequins.
Jaz breaks the silence. “Don’t worry. You’ll find him. We’ll find him. I’ll help you get him out, I promise.” Instead of comforting me, his offer sets off warning signals in my brain.
THE HUMAN TIDE breaks upon us as precipitately as before. One instant, we gaze at the ramshackle walls of a shantytown from the deserted street outside, the next, we enter to find ourselves engulfed in teeming activity. Jaz spots a boy selling goat milk from a pot and bargains him down to two glasses for a hundred. The liquid tastes riper than I expect, but quenches my thirst and, as importantly, washes away the orange residue lingering in my throat. Farther down, a woman vends long and pungent white radishes from a basket—for an extra five rupees, she gives us each a pinch of salt and chili powder in our palms to dip them in.
Emerging from the slum, we find ourselves on a main road, so crowded with people that I wonder if this is where all the desolate blocks of the city have emptied. Men holding bouquets of incense, women cradling kohl-eyed infants, wizened slum dwellers, bouncy college students—we join their ranks in a procession that slowly wends towards the sea. Hawkers line the edges, selling roots and herbs and shiny crystalline minerals, with pictures of Kali herself promising miraculous cures. Some stand next to contraptions with flashing red arrows that look like games of strength, others vend flowers and pooja ingredients and Devi talismans.
We arrive at the beach at sunset. The scene reminds me of the Kumbh Mela, except one more densely packed. Stalls offer rude-smelling food, bare-chested men spin dwarf Ferris wheels made of rough-hewn wood. Green and blue flames leap up from ceremonial fires to cast an otherworldly effect. Shrines to Devi are everywhere—from small figurines adorned with simple flower offerings to elaborate garland-decked sand sculptures surrounded by jostling worshippers. A few of the HRM’s Mumbadevi statues have also found their way down—sentries towering over the festive hordes, their impassive amazon features hued by the sunset. Sadhus and other ascetics weave through the crowd, some with red and white symbols extending up their scalps like elaborately painted skullcaps. In the distance, I think I even see elephants.
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