Fifteen Lanes - S.J. Laidlaw Page 0,39

Shami regarded the woman hopefully.

“I’ll get you a banana after we see the doctor,” I said hastily.

Shami sighed.

The woman murmured something to her husband and he handed her a large bag. She opened it up and rifled through, pulling out a metal tiffin box. Shami watched in fascination. She opened the top level, revealing a dish of fresh-cut fruit—mangoes, papaya and pineapple. She handed the dish to Shami, who snatched it greedily and began tucking in. Since Ma’s brief affair with the fruit-wallah ended, we rarely got fresh fruit.

“Thank you, Auntie,” I said.

“Your mother should be here,” she said gruffly, watching the fruit rapidly disappearing into Shami as though he was worried she might snatch it back if he weren’t quick.

In my head I made a promise that I would talk to Ma about giving Shami more fruit. In school they taught us about eating a balanced diet. But they never taught us how to do that when you lived in a house with two dozen other families and everyone, all the mothers and children, shared a tiny kitchen with a single element for cooking. Like most residents of Kamathipura, we lived on street food, fried dough, sometimes stuffed with potatoes and onions. The closest we came to fresh fruit was the occasional dollop of tamarind chutney.

I’d have to make up a story about why I thought it likely Shami would even eat fruit. That didn’t worry me. Most of what I said to Ma was lies or half-truths, as was most of what she said to me. Sometimes, if Ma lied hard enough, I could make myself believe her. I don’t think Ma ever believed my lies, though. I think when you get bigger your imagination gets smaller, or maybe Ma just didn’t have the energy for pretending.

Shami finished the dish and began noisily sucking juice off his fingers. I handed the dish back to Fat-auntie. Shami smiled at her. She fought a losing battle to hold back her own smile, which flooded her face like a monsoon rain.

“He’s a beautiful child,” she said.

“Yes,” I agreed without embarrassment, because it was true, yet counted for so little. A boy needed only to be strong, and Shami wasn’t that.

“Shami strong,” said Shami, reading my thoughts as he so often did.

“Of course you are,” said the woman, exchanging a look with me.

“Shami strong,” Shami repeated firmly.

“Do you know what time it is, Auntie?”

She nodded to a clock on the wall.

It was later than I’d hoped. Ma rarely got up before one, but when she did, she’d expect to find Shami at home, either asleep under the bed or playing with Deepa-Auntie. No matter where Shami and I spent the night, I always took him home before leaving for school. I’d told Deepa-Auntie where we were going. I gave her instructions to tell Ma I’d taken Shami for a walk because his cough had made him restless. Ma would see through the deception in an instant. I would never willingly miss school. If we weren’t back by one she’d try her best to beat the truth out of me. She wouldn’t succeed. It had worked when I was a child but I was more stubborn now.

Parvati had agreed to walk Aamaal to school, which was kind of her, considering we’d both had another restless night. She had a new boyfriend who pumped gas at a station not far from our street. He’d told us we could sleep behind the station building, but halfway through the night his supervisor, alerted by Shami’s coughing, had discovered us and chased us off. It was getting harder and harder to find a safe place. If Shami were not so sick I’d have asked Ma for money to rent space in a room. Lots of families did that, several families together in a room not ten feet square. The rooms were cramped and unventilated but it was better than sleeping on the street. Instead I hoarded every rupee I could squeeze out of her for trips to the doctor and herb-filled poultices for his chest. Ma didn’t even seem to care about him anymore. She never suggested he stay with her at night. Aamaal was the only one she noticed.

“Shami pee pee,” said Shami, interrupting my thoughts.

“All right.” I’d seen a washroom near the entrance downstairs. I stood up and took his hand. Just then a nurse poked her head out of the office door and called our number.

“It will have to wait, baby. Can you hold