Read Online The Hero's Walk by Anita Rau Badami - Free Book Online

had felt safe in the knowledge that Maya was in the same building, just three doors away. During the lunch break, while most of the toddlers were shepherded to the toilets by Mary Ayah and Ruthie Ayah, he had waited for his sister, and when she arrived he had clutched her sticky hand—so certain and comforting—and trotted obediently to the girls’ toilets with her. She had knocked Susheel Prasad’s big head through the bars of the Class Four window forteasing him to tears, and then stood stubborn and unrepentant when the principal punished her for such un-girlish violence.
    â€œBut he was bullying my younger brother,” Maya had argued, when Mother Superior asked how she could have been so wicked.
    And she had dared to sneak up the forbidden stairs to the terrace, where old Mother Claudette stood all afternoon taking potshots with a Daisy gun at stray dogs copulating in the football field behind the school, screaming obscenities in French every time she missed.
    His sister had dared everyone that Arun could remember and had always lived to tell the tale. But she’d been no match for the God of Death. And with the memories came the shame—that he hadn’t cared enough to write back to her, to keep in touch. That he had allowed himself to forget.

    Dr. Sunderraj wasn’t crying, but he kept taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes. For the past few days—since Nandana had tried to walk home, and he had told her that her parents had been in a bad accident—he hadn’t gone to his office. Lots of people had come to the house, one after another. Two women had wanted to talk to her as well. They had said that they were from Social Services. Nandana had answered their questions politely. Yes, she liked staying here. Yes, she liked Anjali a lot, even though she wouldn’t let her play with her new Lego. But she wanted to go home. She liked Aunty Kiran and Uncle Sunny, yes. But she wanted to go home. The women had nodded and had written things in note-books and then talked for a long time with Uncle. There were many phone calls that he answered and many calls that he made.
    Now, in the living room, he was sitting on the ground at her feet, so close that she could see herself in his eyeballs. She and Aunty Kiran were on the fat-tourist sofa. If she concentrated really hard,she thought—if she didn’t speak, if she sat absolutely still—she could see her blue house and her parents and her room with its Minnie Mouse lampshade, all reflected in those eyeballs. She could see her mother moving around in the kitchen, making supper, and her father hunched over his computer, typing away.
    â€œDo you think she understands what has happened?” she heard Aunty Kiran say.
    Of course she did, she thought indignantly, trying to concentrate on those eyeballs that kept moving and destroying the picture of her house. Her parents had gone away for some reason. They wouldn’t be coming back for a while.
    â€œNandana, sweetie, do you understand?” Uncle Sunny asked. She saw her house. Her mother was washing something in the sink. Her father was using swear words, she could hear him. Then Uncle Sunny spoke again and the picture vanished. Why couldn’t he understand that if he kept quiet, if all of them kept quiet, her parents would hear her and come to take her home?
    â€œYour Daddy and Mummy were badly hurt in a car accident. They did not survive,” Uncle Sunny leaned forward and put his arms around her and Aunty Kiran. She could smell his aftershave lotion. Like her father’s. No, just a little bit like his.
    Survive
—that was a word she did not know.
    â€œThey died, honey,” said Aunty Kiran.
    She had seen a dead butterfly on their patio once. It was a beautiful yellow and black one, and it was being dragged away by a troop of ants. She had been so sad that she had not wanted to speak to anyone that day. Her mother had explained that all living