the long way, around the massive warehouse that faced Mohan’s car, and emerged on the other side, hiding against one wall. She was now closer to the door but farther from his car. There was one other car, red, parked in front of Mohan’s, and this, she guessed, belonged to either the brother or the father.
She waited, shivering, in the cold rain, but not a single girl came out of the warehouse or went in. At three o’clock, she returned to the bus stop, knowing it was an hour’s ride home. The rain picked up in the evening, after Mohan left, so she waited until the next morning—she bought a flashlight and thicker socks, and when she arrived, she saw that this time neither car was parked in front of the building. She tiptoed to its entrance and squinted to see through the darkened glass door. Nothing. She tried the flashlight and saw a few meters into what she guessed was a vast room, piled with boxes, and with the outlines of maybe a desk at the far end. There were no other rooms that she could see. She walked around the building, looking for an unlocked back way, or a loading dock, like she’d seen in so many of the other warehouses, but this one was only metal siding on all sides; she listened for sounds, voices; she thought she might try to break open the lock on the door, but as she stood examining it, a car passed along the adjoining alley.
If Savitha did live here, it occurred to Poornima, crouched against the side of the building, why would she be here during the day? She would be cleaning houses during the day.
That night, when she returned, the warehouse was even darker and quieter than it had been during the day. She knocked on the door, waiting for a light to go on. She walked around the building, slamming her fists against the sides. She tried to break open the heavy lock, and then the glass of the door, but it was reinforced, and neither the plastic flashlight nor the weight of her body did any good. Where was she? Where was she? Poornima stared at the door, gave it one last kick, said to the dark, unbreakable glass, “Not here,” and left.
* * *
On the bus ride home, after midnight, she looked down at her bruised arms, her gashed elbows and hands, her broken flashlight, and realized the thing she had known all along: Mohan was her only hope.
* * *
She bought a bottle of whiskey—the most expensive she could find at the corner store—and then she spent the afternoon making rice and dal and eggplant curry (the fattest eggplants she had ever seen, and which cooked nothing like the ones in India) and potato cutlets, though the hot oil frightened her so much that she made just enough for Mohan and turned off the stove. But even with the scents of the food and the bottle of whiskey set out on the counter Mohan refused to stay for dinner. He left without a word, before she could think of anything more to convince him.
Poornima grew desperate.
She paced the small room, looking out of the window, up and down the street, every minute or so. She remembered, back on her street in Vijayawada, the man who’d been ironing the child’s frock, and the sleeping rickshaw wallah, and the cows and the dogs poking among the small garbage heaps, and the vendors calling through the streets, and she was struck by a sudden and violent homesickness. She nearly bent over with it, but straightened her back at once. For what, she admonished herself, angry with herself for even this slight moment of weakness. For brothels and charkhas and men and mothers-in-law? Is that what you’re homesick for? She smoothed down her blouse and jeans, unused to wearing them, and which, again, she’d bought in Vijayawada specifically for her trip to America, and took a deep breath: she recalled suddenly the one thing that had made his eyes flicker, the only thing, in the two weeks that she had known him, that had given him pause.
She left the whiskey on the counter, and when he arrived the next night, she said, “I won’t drink it. You might as well take it with you.”
He looked at the bottle and hesitated, and when he did, she said, “Who is Lazarus?”
“What?”
“Lazarus. From that poem. The one you like. Puffrock said something about