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standing in the world,” Vineetha said.
    “And I will still have to wait in the ration line to buy sugar,” Subhadra said. “Look, what is important to you is not important to us. We live in the real world and in the real world no one cares if India has a big bomb or not.”
    “I’m not helping India make bombs, I’m helping her make energy so that every village in India will have electricity,” Vineetha snapped at Subhadra, and set her half-filled glass of tea on the floor with force. It tipped and the tea spilled onto the floor. Vineetha didn’t bother to pick it up.
    “My life has meaning,” Vineetha said.
    “I am glad that you feel it does,” Subhadra said gently. “We all should feel our life has meaning, otherwise there would be no need to live another day. I didn’t mean to insult you, anyway. I am just upset . . . you know . . .”
    Vineetha all but stomped out of the kitchen, not sure why she was so defensive about her work.
    What did these people know? Vineetha thought angrily. They were so embroiled in their tawdry little lives, what did they care about India and her problems? These were lowly people, interested only in their own lives, not caring about the society, the country, the larger issues. As long as they got three square meals a day they didn’t care who lived or who died.
    The people and the place were suffocating her. Not having felt quite so out of her element ever before, Vineetha decided to leave Tella Meda.
    Ramanandam heard about her decision and came to ask why she was leaving in such a rush.
    “I don’t know why, but I feel unsettled,” Vineetha confided. “I can’t read the newspapers without losing my temper and this house of yours is morose, Raman.”
    That surprised Ramanandam. “Why do you say that?”
    “Everyone is stuck with their small problems,” Vineetha said. “Your lives are . . . your lives are entangled in the ordinary and everyone seems so sad and lost.”
    “Small problems?” Ramanandam asked carefully, his voice quivering a little.
    “Well, yes,” Vineetha said. “I’m not saying your son running away is a small problem, but—”
    “My son, my only son, my child is gone. I can’t find him, I don’t know why he ran away, and you think that is maybe a small problem?” Ramanandam asked, looking even more aged than he had just a few days ago when Vineetha first came to Tella Meda.
    “I just said that it is not a small problem . . . Regardless of the size of your problems, I’m feeling stifled in this house of yours,” Vineetha told him honestly. “Everyone seems so upset about the boy running away and yet no one seems to know how it happened. Don’t you think that’s strange?”
    “Yes, I think it’s very strange that he ran away and none of us can fathom why,” Ramanandam said. He was almost yelling at Vineetha.
    Vineetha closed the suitcase she had been filling up with all her belongings. “Why did he run away, Raman?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “You must know something,” Vineetha said. “Charvi believes that maybe you do.”
    Ramanandam shook his head violently. “If I knew, don’t you think I would’ve done something by now?”
    “Maybe the truth is bitter . . . embarrassing,” Vineetha suggested.
    “What the hell do you mean by that?” Ramanandam demanded. “Bitter? Embarrassing? What did you think happened? He saw me do something terrible and ran away to hide from my sins?”
    “Maybe,” Vineetha said wearily.
    “Maybe? How can you say that?” Ramanandam asked.
    “Look, I don’t know,” Vineetha said. “But when children run away it isn’t from happy homes. They run away because there is trouble at home, with their parents.”
    “Why did you come here? To sling mud at me? To insult me in my own home?” Ramanandam asked, agitated.
    “I thought I came to support you,” she said bitterly. “But I really can’t. Your son is gone and . . . Raman, this ashram of yours is depressing. Everyone here is a failure and