“Is it unlocked?”
“No,” he says. “But I can get it open.” He pulls a blanket from his bag and wraps it several times around his fist. Then he punches through the glass diamond in the bottom left corner. The sound of breaking glass shatters the silence. I flinch, but no lights go on and no one comes running. Deven tosses the blanket to me and then reaches his hand through the opening and unlocks the door. We step into the kitchen.
The smell of ginger tea envelops me and I’m suddenly five years old again, curled on Gita’s lap listening to her whisper folktales against my ear. Deven lights a candle, but I already know what I’ll see in the flickering light. A yellow teapot painted with red elephants, a single matching teacup with a chip in the handle and the dregs of the pale tea Gita favors glued to the bottom. Gita has been here. Recently. My throat is thick with the memories I can’t swallow.
“Marinda?”
“She was here,” I say.
“Who?” Deven swings the candle so that the light dances between us.
“Gita,” I say. “She’s…” Suddenly I realize I don’t know what to call her. My fill-in mother? One of my handlers? The woman who dried my tears when Gopal beat me, but never stopped him from hurting me in the first place? “She’s one of them.”
If Gita is here, Mani could be too. I race into the dining room, where Iyla, Mani and I would sometimes be allowed to eat together. But large sheets are draped over the tables and chairs, and the moonlight streaming through the windows makes them look like huge, hulking beasts. I let go of Deven and run my hand along the fabric. My fingers come away coated in dust. No one has used this room in a long time—at least months, maybe years.
I run down the long hallway where my bedroom used to be, flinging doors open as I go. All the rooms are dark, cold and empty. When I get to the room that used to be mine, I pause with my hand on the doorknob. Please let him be here. Please. I open the door and it is cold and dark, just like the others. But not empty. My old bed is still here, draped in a gray sheet that might have been white once. Mani’s bed is here too. And shoved in the corner, bathed in moonlight, is his tiny baby cradle. It’s not covered in anything but dust, as if it wasn’t worth protecting. As if it will never be needed again. I’m overcome with a sudden wave of nostalgia. Mani became my brother in this room. For months I woke several times a night to feed him, change him and sing him back to sleep. It was so much responsibility for a ten-year-old. As I stand here, the full weight of my life with Mani comes rushing in on me. Both the burden and the blessing of it.
Deven finds me standing in the middle of the room with my hands pressed to my cheeks. He squeezes my shoulder.
“Mani’s not here, Marinda. Time to go.”
“Maybe he’s in the other wing?”
Deven lifts an eyebrow. “What other wing?”
“On the other side of the dining room. I’ve never been there, but…” And then the realization washes over me. It’s where Gopal said the other girls lived, through the dining-room door, which was always kept locked. I always pictured a hallway full of rooms, full of friends that I would never meet. I hurry to the forbidden door and turn the knob. It’s not another wing—just a bedroom, the only room in the whole building that looks lived in. Another wing exists no more than the other vish kanya do.
“Forget it,” I say. “Let’s go.” I wipe at my eyes. How will we ever find Mani?
We leave through the front door. There’s no reason to sneak now, no one to hide from. We cross to the other side of the street and start back the way we came. We’ve gone only a few steps before I stop.
“Wait,” I say, “we can’t leave yet.”
“What? But he wasn’t there, Marinda. I checked every room.”
“Gita will be back.” And as I say it out loud, I’m certain it’s true. Since I was little, Gita has had the same routine: a cup of ginger tea in the evening, followed by a long walk. Then she returns to reheat the pot and have a final cup before bedtime. If she had left for good, she would have washed the teapot, dried it, put it away. Gita can’t bear loose ends. She is walking through the neighborhood right now—I know it like I know the feel of my hand in hers, like I know that her skin smells like jasmine.
We wait crouched behind a tree for more than an hour. My eyes stay fixed on the girls’ home, but the darkness deepens and there’s no sign of Gita. With every moment my despair grows. I’m about to suggest giving up, when I see a dark shape emerge from the shadows. I would know that gait anywhere.
Before I can even think about it, I’m racing across the street toward her. She looks up and freezes. “Where is he?” I shout. Her eyes widen and she takes a step back. For a moment I half expect her to turn and run. Instead she fixes me with a steely gaze.