He leaves that house, every inch of which he knows in his sleep, knowing he’ll never see it again. Into the village he walks, through the inside paths, zigzagging on the steep slopes, cutting across the streams, through the orchards, around the backs of other houses, through yards of cats and dogs he knows. He climbs above the village, to the pine ridge, perches himself on a boulder.
What should he do? The world has opened up before him. He could travel to Delhi if he liked, and from Delhi he could fan out into UP. He could search out his mother and sister if he tried; if he really tried, he could still remember that land, how the foothills looked in the distance; given enough time, surely he would stumble upon it. He’s strong now, he’s smart. He can read and write, he can even speak some English. He could do it, it’s not inconceivable. Only . . . every time his mind pursues that thought, it begins to shrink and crawl in fear. His mother’s image withers, his sister’s screams. Can he even remember what they look like now? He can still see them in his dreams, he sees their faces out of the corner of his eye, but when he tries to build their waking images, they crumble under the intensity of his grief. But surely, surely, they are rich now. They are happy because of him. That’s why he worked so hard, that’s why he sacrificed himself, that’s why he was here so many years. Surely now they would be wealthy enough. If the money stopped appearing in her bank account, what would she think? That he was dead? Maybe. They would mourn him maybe. Maybe it was better to think of himself this way. He has paid his debt, now he is free.
He stands up with this sudden liberation and wanders down from the ridge, carrying his bag, into the village. It is possible now to see his freedom as an opportunity. He can live, if he wishes, as the foreigners do. Without ties, he can do anything. He can work in the city awhile, spend time in Delhi making money, discover the world and its wonders, go to far-off Bombay. He pictures it. He could work there awhile, get to know both places, find his mother and sister later on, at his own leisure, when he’s a rich man. But then he wavers. He has no papers, after all. His identity is tied up in the farm, in Daddy, in this village. And what skills does he have for the city, a terrifying place?
He wanders into the village with these thoughts bubbling over one another and sits on the steps outside Purple Haze, one of the backpacker cafés in which he has spent so much time in his youth, tolerated then embraced the way stray dogs are embraced. The owner Surjeet has always been sympathetic to Ajay. He steps outside now to condole with Ajay on Daddy’s death.
“Uh-ho, and what’s this?” he asks, kicking Ajay’s bag with his foot. “Going somewhere, are we? Do you have a holiday coming up or a pilgrimage?”
“No,” Ajay shyly says.
“What then? Have you been thrown out?”
Ajay nods and smiles meekly.
Surjeet shakes his head. “I hear the new man is a thief. Where will you go?”
“Delhi.”
“Hey! Don’t go to Delhi,” Surjeet says. “The city is a devil.”
“I’ll work there,” Ajay says.
“More likely you’ll be killed.”
Ajay waits patiently, expecting more.
“Listen,” Surjeet finally says. “My customers know you already. I know how hard you work. Why don’t you just stay here and work for me? For money, like a real worker.”
It’s frightening how quickly Ajay agrees.
* * *
—
He slips into this life of service. He’s paid two thousand rupees a month plus food and gets to sleep on a mattress on the café floor with the other boys at night, laid out when the tables and chairs have been packed away. Surjeet lives in a house in the village—he leaves around six p.m.; the café boys—all Nepalis who’ve been there years—stay up after the café is closed, cooking their own food, smoking cheap cigarettes, watching movies on laser discs, talking longingly about home, about what they’ll do one day when they have enough money saved, the cafés they’ll open, the farm machinery they’ll buy. But not Ajay. He does his work, sweeps up, makes sure the café is in order, then he’s the first to sleep, at ten on the dot, curled up at one side, oblivious to the noise, the laughter. It never occurs to him to be part of them, to ask to be part of them, and it never occurs to them to ask it of him—they accept him as he is, without malice or curiosity. He’s the first to wake too, before dawn. He doesn’t want to risk disrupting the fortune of finding this place, doesn’t want to put his security at risk with irregular behavior. As soon as he wakes, after folding his bedding away, he climbs fifteen minutes through the forest, brushing his teeth with a twig as he walks, heading to a small waterfall he knows with a bar of soap in his hand. He strips and washes himself there naked in the freezing water, forgetting everything for a moment, then he returns to the café and takes the waste scraps from the previous day to feed to the cows and the chicken bones for the stray dogs in the square. When he returns to the café he quietly sweeps up the debris of the night as the boys still sleep, then as they wake, he begins to set out the tables and chairs. The Nepalis stretch, spit, brush their teeth, wrap themselves in shawls, look dumbly out at the mountains, light cigarettes, watch him pick up their slack, then they turn the burners on and make chai, cook breakfast, look on him in gentle puzzlement. Soon his hard work belongs to them, he is like a mascot. They let him be, indulge him, in a way. He works that first season in this manner, without flagging or wavering. He passes no judgment, makes no enemies, keeps his opinions to himself. Smiles and nods at every request. The boys take care of him. Cook extra food for him, which he eats gratefully. He inspires friendship and loyalty.
When the season comes to an end, he counts his money and collects his share of tips. He’s made fourteen thousand rupees in all—he can’t believe how easy it is. It’s almost as if he’d been given money for doing nothing. It becomes magical, unreal. He likes the security it brings; he could go anywhere now, live for a while, make his own choices. But that has its own peril—and now he has a decision to make. Winter is approaching, the cafés have shut down, the snow will come, the roads will be blocked off, the village will hibernate, as it has done every year, and he has nowhere to go. If he stays, he must find a house in which to work to live. He asks Surjeet if he can stay—Surjeet says he’s going himself, to Chandigarh, his home here will be shut and locked. “I can take care of it,” Ajay says.
“Alone? All winter?”
“Yes.”
“No, why don’t you go and find other work and come back in the spring?”