The Bandit Queens E-Book

Parini Shroff

• Herausgeber: Allen & Unwin
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Seitenzahl: 515

Beschreibung

Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2023 A BBC Radio 2 Book Club Pick 2023 'Not since Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger has the rotten core of modern India been exposed in quite such blackly antic fashion as Parini Shroff manages here in this intermittently absurd, feminist revenge caper about a group of snarky, much-abused, predominantly Hindu wives...sheer gutsy verve.' The Times 'A darkly funny revenge drama rooted in the reality of rural India . . . [A] vivid, unsentimental story that succeeds in being both satirical and moving.' Guardian 'A radically feel-good story about the murder of no-good husbands by a cast of unsinkable women' - New York Times 'Mordantly humoured, pacey feminist revenge thriller' - The Sunday Times __________________________________ For Geeta, life as a widow is more peaceful than life as a wife... Until the other women in her village decide they want to be widows, too. Geeta is believed to have killed her vanished husband - a rumour she hasn't bothered trying to correct, because a reputation like that can keep a single woman safe in rural India. But when she's approached for help in ridding another wife of her abusive drunk of a husband, her reluctant agreement sets in motion a chain of events that will change the lives of all the women in the village.... A darkly irreverent and fresh take on a feminist revenge thriller, perfect for readers of My Sister the Serial Killer, How To Kidnap The Rich and the Sharon Horgan series Bad Sisters. 'Tender, unpredictable, brimming with laugh-out-loud moments' Téa Obreht, author of THE TIGER'S WIFE 'Original, memorable, and endearing' Charmaine Wilkerson, author of BLACK CAKE 'A rollicking mash-up of adventure story, thriller, dark revenge, and comedy' Cristina García, author of DREAMING IN CUBAN

Leseprobe

First published in 2023 in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

Published in hardback and trade paperback in Great Britain in 2023 by Allen & Unwin, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.

Copyright © Parini Shroff, 2023

The moral right of Parini Shroff to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.

Every effort has been made to trace or contact all copyright holders. The publishers will be pleased to make good any omissions or rectify any mistakes brought to their attention at the earliest opportunity.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Hardback ISBN: 978 1 83895 714 8

Trade paperback ISBN: 978 1 83895 715 5

E-book ISBN: 978 1 83895 716 2

Book design by Susan Turner

Printed in Great Britain

Allen & Unwin, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd

Ormond House, 26–27 Boswell Street

London WC1N 3JZ

www.atlantic-books.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PARINI SHROFF received her MFA from the University of Texas at Austin, where she studied under Elizabeth McCracken, Alexander Chee, and Cristina García. She is a practicing attorney and currently lives in the Bay Area. The Bandit Queens is her debut novel.

To Arthur, my navigator: Nevada-1-2-1-Papa-Papa

ONE

The women were arguing. The loan officer was due to arrive in a few hours, and they were still missing two hundred rupees. Rather, Farah and her two hundred rupees were missing. The other four women of their loan group had convened, as they did every Tuesday, to aggregate their respective funds.

“Where is she?” Geeta asked.

No one answered. Instead, the women pieced their respective Farah sightings into a jigsaw of gossip that, to Geeta’s ears at least, failed to align. Saloni—a woman whose capacity for food was exceeded only by her capacity for venom—goaded most of the conversation.

“This isn’t the first time,” Priya said.

“And you know it won’t be the last,” Saloni finished.

When Preity mentioned she was fairly certain she’d seen Farah buying hashish, Geeta felt it best to nudge them to more prosaic matters. “Varunbhai is not going to like this.”

“Well, now we know where her money’s going,” Priya said.

“Some devout Muslim.” Saloni sniffed, the gesture dainty for a woman of her size. Lately she’d been attempting to rebrand her weight as evidence of her community status. Compounded with her preternatural talent for bullying, this guise worked on the women. But Geeta had known Saloni and her family since childhood—when she ruled the playground rather than their loan group—and could accurately attribute her heft to genetics betraying her in her thirtieth year rather than any posh mark of affluence. Ironic, considering Saloni had spent her first nineteen years perpetually malnourished, thin as paper, and just as prone to cut. She’d married well, curving into a stunning woman who’d reclaimed her slim figure after her firstborn, but hadn’t managed the same after the second.

Geeta listened to their rumors, observed how the women contributed and piled on, with clinical interest. This must’ve been the way they’d whispered about her after Ramesh left—a fallen woman “mixed with dirt”—then shushing each other when she approached, their lips peeling into sympathetic smiles as sincere as political promises. But now, five years after her husband’s disappearance, Geeta found herself within the fold rather than shunned, thanks to Farah’s absence. It was a dubious honor.

Her fingers toyed with her ear. When she used to wear earrings, she would often check to make sure the backs were secure. The sharp but benign prick of the stud against her thumb had been reassuring. The habit lingered even after Ramesh vanished and she’d stopped wearing jewelry altogether—no nose ring, no bangles, no earrings.

Tired of the gossip, she interrupted the women’s musings on Farah’s defection: “If each of us puts in another fifty, we can still give Varunbhai the full amount.”

That got their attention. The room quieted. Geeta heard the feeble hum of her fan stirring the air. The flywheel’s tight circles oscillated like a tiny hula hoop. The blades were ornamental; the heat remained thick and unforgiving. The fan hung from a strong cord Ramesh had tied in their old house. It’d been early in their marriage, so when he’d stumbled on the ladder, it had been okay to laugh—he’d even joined her. Rage hadn’t found Ramesh until their second year together, after her parents passed away. When she’d been forced to move into this smaller home, she’d tied the cord herself.

A lizard darted up the wall in a diagonal before hiding in the lintel’s shadow. Geeta’s mother used to tell her not to be afraid, that they brought good luck. She itched to see it plop from the dark pocket onto one of the women—preferably Saloni who was terrified of all animals except, inexplicably, spiders. The other two—sisters Priya and Preity—were neither kind nor cruel, but they deferred to their leader. Geeta could sympathize, having herself once served under Saloni.

“No way,” Saloni said. “It’s Farah’s problem.”

Geeta stared at the dark wall, willing the lizard to be a good sport.

Nothing. “It’s our problem,” she snapped. “If we default, Varunbhai won’t give us another loan next year.” The women were somber; everyone knew the center extended loans to groups, not individuals.

Then began a communal metamorphosis from fishwives to martyrs: the women spilled their excuses onto each other, all pushy contestants in a competition with no judge to rule as to who was the most aggrieved party.

“I have to buy my kids’ schoolbooks. They keep getting more expensive.” Saloni’s lips compressed. “But it’s such a gift to be a mother.”

“We just bought another buffalo. My kids guzzle so much milk. I keep telling them ‘if you’re thirsty, drink water!’ ” Preity coughed. “But still, they bring me joy.”

“My boy needs medicine for his ear infection. He cries all the time.” Priya hurried to add, “But there’s no better blessing than a son.”

“Joys of motherhood,” they murmured.

“Such a privilege, na?”

Preity and Priya were twins, formerly identical. The scars across Preity’s face and neck shimmered like heat when she toggled her head in agreement.

“What about you, Geetaben?” Saloni asked. Her upper arms were plump and wide, straining against her sari blouse’s sleeves, but they then abruptly transitioned to the trim elbows and forearms of her youth. The two halves could’ve easily belonged to separate people.

“Well, I don’t have the joys of motherhood,” Geeta said after the women were emptied of excuses. Her voice was patient, but her smile was feral. “But I do have the joys of sleep and money.”

No one laughed. The women looked at the ceiling, the fan, each other, the door, anywhere but at her. Geeta had long ago released the idea that one needed eye contact in order to feel seen. She’d grown accustomed to their discomfort around her; people didn’t like being reminded that what you’d lost, they took for granted—though Geeta no longer felt like Ramesh had robbed her of anything by leaving. There were times she wanted to tell the women that they could keep their blood-sucking husbands, that she harbored no envy, coveted no part of their messy, small lives. It was true she no longer had friends, but she did have freedom.

Another lizard skittered along the wall. While Geeta appreciated luck as much as anyone, she had no use for two lizards. It was said that if you happened across two lizards mating, you’d meet an old friend. If you saw them quarreling, you’d pick a fight with a friend instead.

“I’ll pay,” she told the women, as she reached for the grass broom she kept in the corner. “I don’t have children, I don’t have a husband and I don’t have a buffalo.” She tickled the ceiling corner with the jhadu’s stiff bristles. When that failed to cajole the lizards, she thumped the wall twice.

Someone gasped at the loud sound. Priya scooted behind Saloni’s larger frame as though Geeta were a threat. Which many assumed she was: a churel who, depending on the gossiper, gobbled children, rendered women barren or men impotent. That a woman had to have perished in order to return as a churel did little to staunch the village’s rumors.

Saloni blotted her upper lip with the back of her wrist. Fresh sweat bloomed quickly. She glared and Geeta could easily recall her at fourteen—slender and haughty as she held court, hip jutting against a bicycle while the boys sighed.

The lizard finally dropped from above—alas, missing Saloni’s disdainful face—and scrambled for its bearings. With the broom, Geeta slapped the floor, herding it toward the open entrance.

“Right,” Saloni said. “So we agree: Geetaben will cover it. You’ll settle it with Farahben later, correct.” It was not a question.

Given Saloni’s stamp of oppressive approval, the others did not even pretend to mew or protest. Saloni’s social weight was as robust as her physical. Her father-in-law was the head of the panchayat, the village council. Five years ago, when the government demanded their village observe the reservation system and elect a woman to fill one of the five council seats, Saloni was the obvious choice. In fact, these preloan meetings were usually conducted at Saloni’s house, but this week Geeta’s empty home had been selected for reasons no one had bothered explaining to her.

The twins stared at Geeta, wary, as though she were the death goddess Kali and her broom a sickle. She knew they were thinking of Ramesh, what had allegedly become of him at her hands. And just like that, she was no longer a part of the pack; they avoided her gaze and her touch as they handed her their money on their way out. Saloni alone met her eyes, and though Geeta recognized the scorn as easily as she would her own face, at least it was some manner of acknowledgment. A response, however negative, to the space Geeta occupied in this world, in their village, in their community.

She slammed the door shut after the three of them. “No, no,” she muttered effusively to no one. “Thank you.”

Farah visited that evening, wilted and scared, bearing a gourd as a gift. Her left eye was swollen shut, a tight pistil amidst a purple bloom. Geeta made it a point not to stare as Farah thrust the long green vegetable toward her.

“What’s this?”

Farah waggled the vegetable until Geeta took it. “You can’t show up to someone’s house empty-handed, everyone knows that. Saloniben came by my place. She said you covered for me. Thank you. She said I should work out an interest rate with you for—”

“Saloni’s a bitch.” Farah blinked at the language. “I only have one question,” Geeta said, leaning against her doorframe. She thumped one end of the gourd against her palm like a nightstick. That she should invite her guest inside was not lost on her.

Farah fidgeted. “I’ll pay you as soon—”

“Navratri just ended, so I know you had plenty of new dress orders.” Farah’s bent head nodded. “And I think we both know who did that to your face.”

“I don’t hear a question, Geetaben.” Farah’s hands cupped her opposite elbows, the movement further rounding her already stooped back.

“What’re you going to do when he takes the money again?”

She closed her eyes. “I don’t know.”

“What’s he doing with it?”

“Karembhai.” Farah sighed.

Geeta knew Karem; so had her husband. Karem sold his dead wife’s spectacularly ugly costume jewelry out of a small shop. That business was hardly thriving, but his bootleg liquor sales fed his litter of children. “If some of the other women complained to their husbands, maybe they could confront your husband.”

“No!” Farah’s thick eyebrows rose and her good eye stretched open in fear, making its swollen sister appear smaller. The image was so disturbing, Geeta focused on Farah’s collarbone instead.

“No, please,” Farah repeated. “He’d be so angry. And anyway, I doubt you could convince the other women—I’m not exactly their favorite.”

This bit of news surprised Geeta, who’d assumed she was the only outsider in their loan group. She sighed. “Can you hide some of your money away from home? Or just lie about what you’re making?”

“I thought of that last week, after I missed those other payments.” Farah swallowed and Geeta watched the walnut of her throat retreat and return. She pointed to her split lip. “But he found out.” She shuffled forward. “May I come in?”

Geeta asked, “Why?” even as she stepped aside. Farah removed her sandals, and Geeta noticed her shoulder blades protruding from her thin blouse like nascent wings.

Geeta did not offer her a place to sit, or a glass of water. A guest was to be treated like God, but Farah was not her guest; and while Geeta went to the temple about three times a year, she wasn’t the serial supplicant her mother had been.

The two women stood barefoot in the middle of Geeta’s singleroomed home. Farah moved closer and Geeta, alarmed, took a step back. It upset her, that intimate liberty, as though she were this woman’s confidante. They were not friends—covering the payment had been a necessity, not a kindness. And yet Farah had latched on to the gesture with the desperation of a neglected dog.

Geeta suddenly wanted to tell her to retain some pride. To withhold parts of herself because there were plenty of people like her husband waiting to pilfer what they could. It was unlike Geeta, not only to intrude in others’ affairs, but also to offer advice. Advice was a cousin of caring; apathy was Geeta’s mantra.

But then Farah said: “Y-you must remember how hard it is. Rameshbhai went to Karem all the time before . . .” and any desire to counsel the woman vanished. Farah trailed off due to some sense of belated tact, but the damage was already done, and stopping short was just lazy. Various endings to her abandoned sentence whipped around the room like detached lizard tails, all echoes of the gossip that had consumed their village on the heels of Ramesh’s disappearance. Before she’d sprinkled crushed glass in his food, before she’d used her fangs to desiccate him into a husk, before she’d chopped up his body and fed it to the dogs.

“Yes,” Geeta finally said. “Before.” It was past time for Farah to leave, and Geeta itched to shut the door on Farah’s swollen, judgmental eye and her presumptuous camaraderie.

But she pressed on. “I need your help—a favor.”

It was a bold move, enough to surprise Geeta, which in turn cadged a bit of begrudging respect from her as well. “Piling on, are we? Well, I don’t have any more money for you.”

“No, I mean, I think I know how to stop him.”

“Good,” Geeta said. “You do that. Then you can pay me back.” She herded her unwanted guest toward the door as she had the lizard earlier, all but thumping a broom at Farah’s chapped heels.

“No, wait.” Farah sidestepped deeper into the room. Geeta sighed. “You stopped Ramesh. He drank and he hit you, I know he did. I saw. We all did.”

“You all did,” Geeta repeated. “But nobody did anything about it.”

Farah’s head lowered, diffident once more. “It was a family matter.”

Geeta nodded her agreement. “Yes, and so is this. Good luck, Farahben.” The respectful suffix of “sister” was not required as Geeta was elder. However, she took comfort in the distance it created. She reached for her door handle.

“Just teach me!” Farah burst out, more hyper than Geeta had ever seen her. Her good eye was manic with possibility. “I can stop Samir, too. I just need to know how you did it, how you got away with it.”

“And by stop him, you mean you want to—”

“Kill him!” Farah said, her voice far too loud. She chopped one hand on the opposite’s palm with a meaty thunk. “Get rid of him. Take him out. Give him a dog’s death.” She clicked her tongue as her thumb sliced across her throat.

Geeta gaped at her. “Have you been buying from Karem?”

“Of course not!” Farah took deep umbrage, as though that prospect was morally repugnant. She was breathing heavily, too fast and nearly hiccuping. She fanned her face.

“Calm down,” Geeta instructed.

Farah nodded while hyperventilating, and began muttering with one long breath. “Kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi . . .”

Geeta stared. “The fuck’re you doing?”

Farah’s breathing steadied. “It helps me breathe deeper. You know? Like the game?” She shrugged. “Whenever I get stressed or scared, it soothes me. It’s, like, my mantra.”

“Your mantra is ‘kabaddi.’ ”

“I know it’s a little odd, but—”

“No, you’re a little odd. That’s super weird.”

Geeta inhaled. This meeting—which should’ve been a brief ThankyouGeetaben–WhateverFarah one-off—had derailed into insanity. That Geeta had even allowed it to get this far spoke of an unusual loss of control—was she really so starved for company that she’d indulged Farah’s madness? She smoothed wayward strands of hair against her crown and spoke calmly, “You have no idea what you’re saying, Farah. You’re not the Bandit Queen that you can run around killing men as you please. Go home and think of something else.”

“I have thought about this!” Farah said, her hands clenched into fists, the thumbs tucked in like little turtles. A child on the verge of a tantrum after being dismissed by the adults as adorable but untethered to reality. “If I don’t get rid of him, I’ll lose the loan and the business. Or, Ya’Allah, I could end up like poor Runiben.” She shuddered. Even Geeta instinctively gulped at the mention of the unfortunate woman who’d once been a part of their loan group.

“He’s the father of your children; think of what this would do to them.”

“I’m doing this for my children, not to them. You don’t know the things he’s capable of. He—” She exhaled. “I think if it were just me, I could handle it. But I can’t be everywhere at once, and there’s three of them, and sometimes I—” She blinked. “Not that I’m complaining.”

“Of course not.”

“No, obviously, obviously I love the—”

And here Geeta chimed in, too: “Joys of motherhood.”

Farah closed her eyes as though receiving a benediction. “So rewarding. But, Geetaben, everyone is better off without him. Me, the kids. Our loan group. Please,” she begged, pressing her palms together. “Remove my nose ring.” Though it was a figure of speech Geeta hadn’t heard for many years, she understood Farah’s plea: Make a widow out of me.

Geeta crossed her arms over her chest. “Two men disappearing in one village won’t go unnoticed. What would you tell the police?”

Farah bobbed up and down, practically airborne with hope. Her enthusiasm was pathetic. “We’ll leave the body for them to find. It’ll look like an accident. Besides, Ramesh was what, five years ago now?”

“An accident? Where are your brains? What, he tripped and fell onto a knife a couple of times? He shot himself with a gun he doesn’t own?”

“Okay fine, I don’t have all the details sorted yet. That’s where you come in! We’ll do what you did, only we’ll make it look like an accident.”

“ ‘We’?” Geeta held her hands up, palms out. She stepped back. “I’m not with you.”

“Yes, yes you are.” An odd calm spread over Farah’s bruised features. Her shoulders relaxed and her voice lowered. Dignity uncurled her spine and seemed to elongate her limbs; the transformation unnerved Geeta. “The others will expect you to keep covering for me if Samir keeps stealing from me. Think about it. You’re the only one without a family to take care of. But if we end up losing the loan, you’re the only one without a family to take care of you.” Farah crept closer. “So it is ‘we.’ ”

Her logic was immaculate; she had only spoken the truth. But Farah’s sudden, clever bravery inspired Geeta’s resentment. “Keep your filmy dialogues to yourself and get the hell out of my house.”

Then Farah slumped, exhausted, and Geeta recognized her once again. “Please, Geetaben.”

“No.”

Farah left as she’d arrived: head lowered, back falcate as though the evening air presented too much of a burden. Watching her leave, Geeta felt an unexpected urge to call her back. Not to capitulate to her batty plan, but to make tea and talk about the terrifying loneliness and loathing that accompanied the black eyes and broken ribs. Then Geeta remembered that Farah was walking home to her family. And the urge cured itself.

TWO

While Geeta regarded herself as a self-made woman, she was not, in fact, a self-made widow. Contrary to neighborhood chatter, she did not “remove her own nose ring” by killing Ramesh. She never had any desire to destroy him, just parts of him. The part that drowned himself in drink, the part that was quick to fury but slow to forgive, the part that blamed her for their childlessness, though it could’ve just as easily been him. But little was monochromatic in marriage and even in abuse, because there were other parts, too, parts she’d loved, parts that, when she wasn’t vigilant, still drew drops of unwilling tenderness from her.

But missing Ramesh now was more habit than compulsion; the memories she had felt like someone else’s—all soft focus and cinematic. Like when his parents first came to inspect her suitability, and he’d saved her skin by properly roasting a papadam for her. How, for the first year of their marriage, he’d slept with one hand on her shoulder, her hip, her stomach. The time he’d tried to teach her how to whistle with her fingers. The way he’d laughed, his eyes folding at the corners as she failed, spittle shining on her chin and hands.

But there were other things Ramesh had taught Geeta, too: how not to interrupt him, how not to oversalt his food, how to correctly apologize in the event she failed at the aforementioned (You’re right, I’m wrong, I’m sorry), how to be slapped and not cry out. How to feed them on half a typical budget because he’d siphon their money to Karem and still demand a proper dinner.

She no longer needed such lessons. In the time after Ramesh left, Geeta blamed first herself, then Karem. She associated him with the smell of her husband’s bootleg alcohol: sweet yet repulsive, cloying as it enveloped the bed, the house, her. She wondered whether Farah ever felt suffocated by the stench. Did she, too, learn to breathe through her mouth? There was that pesky urge again, the desire to share and listen, to compare survivor notes with Farah.

If she was this lonely, Geeta berated herself, she should get a damn dog.

Ramesh hadn’t possessed the decency to leave after a huge row; no, he absconded after a cloudless Tuesday evening—she didn’t interrupt him once, the undhiyu was not salty, he peppered her jawline with kisses before bed and she’d fallen asleep smiling. Like a goddamn idiot. His final blow: sneaking away and leaving only his debts and her dusty womb, so that everyone took turns whispering as to which terrible vice of hers had driven him away. That is, until Ramesh didn’t send for the rest of his belongings, or lay claim to their house. Even his elder brother, who lived in a bungalow a few cities away and took care of their parents, was unable to contact him. Then the whispers shifted toward foul play. Ramesh was clearly dead, there was no other explanation.

The police descended with their questions and unsubtle hints that they could be paid to focus on another case. Upon realizing Geeta had little to either her married or maiden name, they scampered away. The village, however, remained unconvinced of her clean chit, and gave her the wide berth bestowed to any social pariah. There were rumors she was a churel of old folklore: a witch roaming on reversed feet, targeting men for revenge, her twisted footprints ensuring they ran toward her rather than away.

To the village, she became a disease, her name a slur. She was, as the idiom went, “mixed with dirt.” To now say, with the acclimation five years afforded, that it had not been humiliating would be a lie. Once, early on, when she was still naïve enough to believe not everything had changed with Ramesh’s defection, she’d paid a visit to her favorite second aunt, a spinster. After Geeta knocked on the green door, its paint flaking to piebald, a shower of rotting potato peels, tomato offal and eggshells, among other wet waste, tumbled over her. Geeta looked up to see her Deepa-aunty, her wrinkles and loathing framed by the second-story window, holding an empty pail and instructing Geeta to leave and take her shame with her.

She complied, while the neighbors tittered, her hair matted with tea dregs. On the walk home, for courage, she thought of the Bandit Queen, and the stories Geeta had compiled of her life from the radio and newspapers, though the accounts often contradicted each other. Born in 1963 as simply Phoolan Mallah, a Dalit girl in a small village, she’d been eleven when she vehemently protested her cousin’s theft of her family’s land. The cousin beat her unconscious with a brick. In order to send her away and out of trouble, her parents married her to a thirty-three-year-old man. He’d beaten and raped her, but when she ran away, the village sent her right back to him and his abusive second wife. When she was sixteen, the same diabolical cousin arranged for her to be thrown in jail for the first (but not last) time. She spent three days being beaten and raped in jail at her cousin’s behest. Soon after, she ran to or was kidnapped by—accounts varied—a gang of armed robbers known as dacoits. If Phoolan could not only survive but escape and exact savage revenge on her tormentors, then surely Geeta could walk home while people stared at the rancid rinds hanging from her neck.

Eventually, she taught herself to enjoy the perks of ostracism, as she imagined Phoolan would’ve done. The upsides of being a childless churel-cum-murderess: raucous kids never played kabaddi near her house (She’ll gobble you like a peeled banana!), vendors rarely haggled with her (She can bankrupt you with one blink!), some of Ramesh’s creditors even left her alone (She’ll curse your wife with nothing but stillborns!). Then the microfinancers came around, offering low-interest loans. City people were hell-bent on helping them—women only, please—acquire independence and income.

Hell yes, Geeta had thought, and signed her name. She’d first eaten her father’s salt, then her husband’s; it was time to eat her own. After Ramesh left, money’s importance had suddenly rivaled oxygen’s. With the first cash installment, she walked three hours to Kohra and bought beads and thread in bulk. She scavenged a wobbly desk and pinned a grainy photograph of the Bandit Queen above her workspace to remind her that if she was indeed “mixed with dirt,” then at least she was in fine company.

At first, sales were nil. Superstitious brides, it turned out, weren’t keen on wearing black magic wedding necklaces cursed by a self-made widow. But after two short-lived weddings where the brides were sent back to their natal homes, the village’s superstitions swung in her favor. If one did not petition a Geeta’s Designs mangalsutra, one’s marriage would last about as long as the bridal henna did.

She wasn’t respected here, but she was feared, and fear had been very kind to Geeta. Things were good, freedom was good, but Geeta had witnessed that survival was contingent upon two hard rules: 1) take on only one loan, and 2) spend it on the work. It was an easy trap to sign for multiple microloans and then buy a house or a television set. Poor, myopic Runi had taken on three loans for her tobacco-leaf-rolling business but had spent it on her son’s education instead. Then the money and her son were gone and, just like that, so was Runi.

Farah’s unwelcome visit had delayed Geeta’s planned errands. The sky darkened under twilight’s thumb as she closed her front door, but Geeta still needed vegetables and some grain to be ground. Her empty jute bag scratched the exposed strip of skin between where her sari blouse ended and her petticoat began. Purple and white onion sheddings lined the bag’s bottom. As she walked, she shook it upside down and the crispy skin trailed behind her, joining festival decorations that were now rubbish—tinsel, broken dandiya sticks in various colors, bright wrappers—on the dirt.

The festival of Navratri had ended in late September; for nine dance-filled nights, the village had celebrated various goddesses. Although she never attended any of the garba dance parties, Geeta’s favorite story was of the goddess Durga’s triumph over Mahishasura, a power-drunk demon with the head of a buffalo. He’d been granted a boon that he could not be killed by any man, god or animal. Various gods tried to defeat Mahishasura to no avail. Desperate, they combined their powers to create Durga. She set off on her tiger and confronted Mahishasura, who arrogantly offered to marry her instead. After fifteen days of fighting, Durga beheaded him. It tickled Geeta: never send a god to do a goddess’s job.

She passed the local school. It’d been orange when she’d attended, but the sun had since blanched it into a pale yellow. Tobacco stains the color of rust streaked the walls; kids and men often held spitting contests behind the building. Government slogans, for a clean India or encouraging only two children per family, were stenciled in neat bubble letters on walls. Others were less official: sloppy red warnings against love jihad or Bihari migrant workers stealing jobs. In a village with two Muslim families and zero migrant workers, Geeta found these warnings absurd.

Now a few children played kabaddi in the dirt yard, which made Geeta think of Farah yet again. One team’s raider sucked in a deep breath before invading the other half of the makeshift court as he chanted, “Kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi.” The raider was meant to tag the other team’s defenders and make it back home without being tackled, all in a single breath. Geeta was already late, but still paused as a dispute arose.

“You inhaled!” a girl shouted to the raider. She and the other defenders were in a W formation, holding hands. In a village this cramped, Geeta should’ve known the girl and her mother, but couldn’t place either of their names. If she herself had been a mother, impelled into the bullshit rotation of teacher conferences and game-day events, she’d have memorized which offspring belonged to which woman.

“Did not!”

“Did too!” The girl broke the chain and pushed the raider, who fell back into the dust. She was taller than the other kids and, in her mien, Geeta saw an incipient Saloni. Which was why, when Geeta should have been buying groceries, she yelled through the gate:

“Oi!”

The girl swiveled her head. “What?”

The other players nervously divided their gazes between the churel and the bully.

“Leave him alone.”

“Or what? You’ll boil my bones into soup? I’d love to see you try.”

Geeta’s brow arched. She was accustomed to children’s deferential terror, not their sass. Before leaving, she muttered the names of a few fruits in Sanskrit, which sounded ominous enough to elicit some gasps, though not from the bully.

Away from the school, the evening was unusually quiet. Not one of the four Amin children, who often escaped the hot confines of their shanty to play kabaddi or make deliveries for pocket change, was anywhere to be found. Geeta passed their home, a cube of tin. Three bricks and a large stone weighed the roof down. A rumor she’d heard last week returned to her: the Amins were building a four-bedroom house.

Geeta respected the widowed Mrs. Amin. She, like Geeta, was one of those women who was About the Work. Mrs. Amin’s husband had been a farmer; when the rains failed, he’d succumbed to loan sharks to buy seeds and fertilizer. But the rains failed again that year, and the next. One morning he poured pesticides in the chai his wife prepared, mistakenly believing the government would grant her a compensatory sum. She received only his debts. So Mrs. Amin, after removing her nose ring, used her microloan to start selling homemade sweets, and now she couldn’t cook or fry fast enough. She’d even pulled her eldest daughter out of school to help meet the demand.

Geeta would’ve preferred to be in Mrs. Amin’s microloan group, with other women who moved their hands rather than their mouths. Women unlike Saloni, who’d only joined the microloan because she couldn’t bear not being the nucleus of anything—even a labor circle. It was this same cocktail of anxiety and arrogance that’d prompted Saloni to turn on Geeta when Geeta’s family arranged her engagement with Ramesh’s.

Geeta would’ve bet five months of loan payments that Saloni had never actually wanted Ramesh. Wanting to be wanted was simply her nature. But Ramesh—not even particularly handsome what with his pocked skin and crowded teeth—hadn’t wanted her. He’d married Geeta and after he vanished, Saloni hadn’t offered a single word or food item of support, instead ensuring that the rumors kept churning. It’d’ve been so easy for Geeta to just slip some rat poison in his tea, na? What else could it be, just the two of them in that house. And I know for a fact she’s a perfect liar—she used to cheat from my exams, you know.

All that venom from a girl who’d practically been her sister for the first nineteen years of their lives. Two halves of a gram seed, they’d shared food and clothes and secrets, they’d cheated from each other’s papers and lied beautifully in unison about the same. As Geeta’s father had said dryly, Nakal ko bhi akal ki zarurat hai. Even to copy, you need some brains. Saloni had preferred Geeta’s small home and tired parents to her own small home and tired parents, but this did not parlay Geeta into the alpha. Beautiful Saloni (whose comeliness masked the true viciousness in her humor) was far more suited for the politics of childhood; it was her caprice alone that determined which girl they’d be ostracizing to tears that week, which boys were cute, which film hero was in and which song was out. Geeta was happy to follow, content in her safe, undemanding beta role. Until her wedding to Ramesh was announced. Then, quick as a shot, Saloni changed the rules, pointing the barrel of her weaponized popularity at her oldest friend’s stunned head.

Geeta sidestepped a sitting cow, whose jaw circled in a desultory rhythm. Its tail echoed similar circles, but did little to dissuade the flies communing on her rump. By the time Geeta reached the shops, it was too late. Gates of corrugated metal in various colors covered the entrances, sealed with padlocks near the ground. Fucking Farah, she thought as she turned back.

But voices paused her feet. Geeta closed her eyes to hear better. Two men were talking inside the last store of the strip, Karem’s shop. Geeta inched closer, instinct keeping her tread light. The entrance yawned wide. Despite a twilight breeze, an anxious heat prickled her underarms.

She held her breath as she listened to Karem. It took a moment, but she eventually recognized the second voice, low and burnt: Farah’s husband. Samir had the throat of a smoker.

“No more ’til you pay your tab,” Karem said. Even from outside, his impatience was audible. She pressed her back against the neighboring shop of sundries. “This isn’t your sister’s wedding where everyone can just drink for free. I have kids to feed, too.”

Geeta could not see either of them, but she imagined Karem, his thick hair, narrow forehead, the small hoop in his right ear. And Samir, his scalp fuzzy like a baby bird’s. “I gave you a hundred yesterday!”

“Bey yaar, but you owe five hundred.”

“I’ll get it to you soon. Just help me out tonight, na?”

“No.”

Samir cursed and a cracking sound made Geeta jump, her sandal tripping over the store’s padlock. A hand—Geeta guessed Samir’s—had slammed atop a table. Everything from her jaw to her anus clenched as she waited to see if she’d been heard.

“I’ll get you the money soon,” Samir said, calmer now.

“Yeah, right.”

“I mean it, I will. My wife has a friend who’s been helping her, she’ll help me, too.”

A thread of sweat wove a thin course down Geeta’s spine.

“Why would she do that?”

“Because if she doesn’t, I’ll make her regret it.”

“Whatever,” Karem said. “Just pay your tab and you can have the daru.”

“Make sure you have something decent ready for me. Your tharra could turn a horse cross-eyed.”

Geeta left then, her heart flapping as she tugged her earlobe. She walked in the littered alley behind the shops. It was not the most direct way home, but it provided cover. If Samir left Karem’s, he’d spot her immediately. That thought made her run, her empty bag bouncing against her like a numb limb. Geeta was not accustomed to running; with each step Samir’s threats slalomed in her head. Would he just beat and rob her, or kill her? Would he rape her? When shock gave way to anger somewhere around the Amin shanty, she changed her physical and mental path.

That drunk chutiya thought her hard work, her life of carefully preserved solitude, was an open treasure chest for his convenience. The Bandit Queen wouldn’t stand for it; she’d killed the various men who’d brutalized her, starting with her first husband. After she joined the gang, she returned to his village and beat him and his second wife, who’d harassed and humiliated Phoolan. Then she dragged him outside and either stabbed him or broke his hands and legs, Geeta had heard differing stories. Phoolan left his body with a note warning older men not to wed young girls. (That last bit might’ve been untrue, as Phoolan Mallah was illiterate and knew only how to sign her name, but it made for excellent lore, so no matter.) The point was: if the Bandit Queen caught wind of burgeoning betrayal, she wouldn’t wait to be wronged. A gram of prevention was worth a kilogram of revenge.

By the time Geeta reached Farah’s house, her throat was dry and she needed a cool bath. Still, she was certain she’d beaten Samir there and pounded on the door. While waiting, she cupped her knees with her hands and panted. Crickets chirred. Her pulse thrummed to the beat of, irritatingly enough: kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi.

“Geetaben?”

She had to suck in two gulps of air before she could manage to say: “I’m in.”

THREE

It was after ten when Geeta heard someone approach. Solar lantern in hand, she opened the door before Farah could knock. Without the lantern, it was as dark inside as it was outside. The scheduled power cuts (“power holidays” they called them, as if it were a rollicking party to grope in the dark and knock your knees on furniture) were increasingly longer and less scheduled. They’d all grown up with kerosene lamps and candles, but after many fires, NGOs came into their town with a rush of concern and gifts, like lanterns and the larger solar lights installed in the more trafficked portions of the village.

Farah stood in the dark, her thin elbow at a right angle, hand still lifted. “Oh, hi!” she chirped, as though they’d bumped into each other at the market. She had, Geeta noticed, a rather uncharming habit of finding amusement in everything, even premeditated murder.

Farah rubbed her hands together and a clean rasping sound filled Geeta’s home. “So what’s the plan?”

Which was exactly the question that had been squatting on Geeta’s head for the past few hours. Farah was counting on Geeta’s one-for-one score in the murder department, and Geeta had long ago stopped protesting her innocence. Telling someone the truth was asking them to believe her, and she was done asking for anything from this village. Because Geeta saw no reason to reveal the truth now—how hard could it actually be?—her voice was fairly confident when she said: “It should be done at night. It should look like he expired in his sleep. No blood—too messy.”

Farah moved to sit on the floor in front of Geeta, who sat on her cot. “Well, how did you do it before? To Ramesh?”

“None of your damn business.”

“Fine.” Farah sighed. “So are you gonna come over to my place now or . . . ?”

Geeta narrowed her eyes. “I said I’d help you, I didn’t say I’d do it for you.”

“But you’re smarter than me. You’ll do it right, I know you will. I’d just mess it up.”

Geeta scoffed. “If you used this much butter on your food, you wouldn’t be so scrawny.”

“Arre, yaar, it’s not like that. I’m just saying you’ve already killed one, another won’t make a difference.”

“Your chut husband, your murder.”

Farah again winced at Geeta’s language but followed her and her lantern out into the night. They avoided the open water channels, walking along the sides of their village’s common pathways, where garbage aggregated. Farah covered her nose and mouth with the free end of her sari. Her voice muffled and miserable, she asked, “What are we doing here?”

Geeta doubled over, her head closer to the ground as she squinted. “Looking for a plastic bag.”

“Why?”

Geeta modulated her voice as though it should’ve been obvious: “Tie his hands and feet while he’s sleeping and then put the bag on his head. Smother him. He dies. You remove your nose ring; I keep my money. Everyone is happy.”

“Smart.”

It was almost sweet, the way Farah looked at her. Like Geeta’s ideas were gold, like she could do no wrong. Despite herself, such adoration filled her with the desire to prove Farah’s faith was well placed and to perform as best she could. Geeta imagined this was what having a child would’ve been like.

“I know.”

“So, ah, is that how you did it?”

Geeta stiffened. She rolled her shoulders back to make her height more imposing. “If you want my help, you’ll stop chewing on my brains with your questions. What I did is none of your damn business.”

Farah looked chastised. She sucked her teeth, complaining, “Bey yaar, fine. What do I tell people? After, I mean?”

“Heart attack, he drank himself to death, anything you like. Just don’t let them do an autopsy.”

“Okay.” Farah drew out the word slowly. “But if you smothered Ramesh, why didn’t you just use a pillow? A plastic bag seems like a lot more work, you know?”

Geeta blinked. Dammit. That thought had not occurred to her. She covered her ignorance with ire. “I didn’t say I smothered Ramesh.”

Farah threw her hands up. “What? Then why are we here? Why not just do what we know works?”

“Oi! ‘Even to copy, you need some brains.’ Do you want my help or not?”

“What I want,” Farah sulked, “is your experience, not your experiment.”

“Forget it. Why should I break my head over your drama?”

“No! Sorry, okay?” She tugged on her earlobes in an earnest apology. “Let’s keep looking, na?”

They walked along the more trafficked areas, where the lines of compost and trash thickened. Geeta toed aside torn packets of mukhwas and wafers. A few meters away were the public toilets the government had recently installed. There were two, designated by helpful yellow and blue cartoons of a card deck’s king and queen. Though she used the squat toilets daily, it’d never occurred to Geeta before now just how silly the drawings were.

Geeta’s home didn’t have a pit latrine like many others did, but she still saw men take to the fields. Despite all the recent clamoring about open defecation and sanitation issues, it didn’t bother her; she’d grown up doing the same, they all had. Even those who had pit latrines declined to use them—after all, someone would eventually have to empty them and caste Hindus were quite touchy about polluting themselves by handling their own waste. Some tried to force such work onto local Dalits, an oppression that was technically illegal, though authorities rarely came around these parts to enforce the law.

But for women, the new installations, public and private alike, were wholly welcome. While men could take to the fields at their whim (Geeta had heard that in the West where there were clean facilities galore, men still su-su’d anywhere for the hell of it—nature of the beast and all), the women and girls could only make their deposits either at sunrise or sunset—otherwise they were inviting harassment. So they held it. Better to brave the scorpion than the horny farmer.

Around Geeta and Farah, the crickets’ song swelled. It was difficult to hear Farah as she ambled along another line of rubbish, her attempts half-hearted. After picking up and immediately dropping a bag of chips with carpenter ants inside, she asked, her voice carefully casual, “How come Ramesh’s body was never found?”

Acrid smoke filled the night air; the heat amplified the odor. Throughout the village, trash was being burned. “You’re beginning to sound like one of those gossipy bitches from the loan group.”

Farah cringed, but no longer from the stench. “Why do you curse so much?”

“Because you talk so much.”

“It’s not right for a woman to swear. And it doesn’t suit you.” After a few moments, she asked, “You and Ramesh—were you a love match or arranged?”

“Why are you asking?”

“No need to be so suspicious. We’re on the same side.” Farah sighed. “You won’t talk about the end, so I thought maybe the beginning is less painful for you. Samir and I were a love match. My parents didn’t approve, but we eloped and I moved here.” Her smile was dreamy.

“Maybe you should’ve listened to your parents.”

Farah’s smile sank.

Unwelcome memories of Ramesh crashed into Geeta: the heat of his arm against her side as she’d burned the papadam. The gentle way he’d nudged her aside to fix her error. “Mine was arranged.”

“Oh.” Farah sniffed. She wiped her nose on the back of her hand. The movement pulled up her nostrils, and Geeta saw the underwire of her nose ring. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. At least I can blame my parents. Your situation is your fault.”

“I guess.” Farah held up a pink bag. Red letters covered one side. “What about this one?” She put it over her head. A rip at the seam allowed her nose to poke straight through.

Geeta growled her disgust, smacking her forehead. “I swear, you can’t even count on the trash in India.”

Someone else spoke: “What’s going on?”

Geeta immediately recognized Saloni’s voice. Of course she’d turn up here, her radar for rumors—and therefore power—had always been finely tuned. Geeta turned with a deep breath, giving her back to Farah, who worked to yank the bag from her head. “Oh, hi there,” Geeta greeted with faux charm. “Ram Ram.”

Farah’s breathing fluttered. Geeta nearly groaned as she heard a whimpering, “Kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi.”

“Ram Ram.” Saloni stood a few meters away, her own solar lantern in hand. “Well?”

“Kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi . . .”

“Not now, Farah!” Geeta seethed.

Saloni squinted in the night. “What—is she saying kabaddi? Are you playing?”

“Uh . . .” Geeta started, but every conceivable excuse fell from her like clipped hair.

Farah, mantra apparently having worked, was calm when she said, “We were just looking for Geeta’s bag. She thought she dropped it here.”

Saloni nodded toward the torn, pink bag still in Farah’s hand. “That thing?”

Geeta cleared her throat. She grabbed the bag from Farah and pressed it to her chest. “Yes. It has, er, sentimental value.”

Saloni rolled her eyes. “As weird as ever, I see. You know, just because your name’s mixed with dirt, doesn’t mean you have to, like, literally mix with dirt.”

Geeta’s heart thumped in anger; being dubbed weird at thirty-five years of age should hardly sting, but it figured that Saloni wouldn’t let an opportunity slide, not when she could twist the blade instead. She thrived on spite, always had. Geeta’s voice was accusatory when she demanded, “What are you doing out this late?”

Saloni shifted her weight onto her other foot. “Not that it’s any of your business, but my son left his workbook at the school, so naturally I’m the one walking in the dark to get it.” She blinked. “But I’m happy to do it. It’s a small price to pay.”

“Because it’s so rewarding,” Farah said, nodding.

“Joys of motherhood,” Saloni added on automation, her eyes dragging heavenward. “I’m blessed. It’s exhausting, though. I sometimes think, ‘Saloni, how do you manage to raise those kids and run a business?’ ”

Farah gushed eagerly, “Yes, you’re practically a divinity.”

“Good god,” Geeta muttered.

“Stop.” Saloni flicked away the praise but then agreed solemnly. “Yes, I suppose I am. But it’s worth it. I always say, ‘Until you’ve brought forth the gift of life, you’re not complete.’ ”

Geeta guffawed.

When Saloni opened her viper mouth, Geeta braced for a bite, but instead Saloni narrowed her eyes at Farah. “I didn’t know you two were friends.”

“Like sisters,” Geeta said. “That’s why I call her ben.”

Saloni’s brow folded like an accordion. “You call every woman ben.”

“Not every woman, Saloni.”

Saloni glowered at the pointed lack of suffix. The wind carried a small biscuit wrapper across her toes and she kicked it off. “If I were you, Farah, I’d spend less time pawing through trash and more time figuring out how you’re going to pay back this week’s loan. And Geetaben of course.”

Farah hung her head and Saloni, clearly feeling her work was done, left. Until now, Geeta had been too occupied with her own pariah status to notice Farah’s. She crushed the plastic bag, imagining it was Saloni’s fat head.

Farah turned, hand over heart, eyes and voice hopeful. “You think of me as a sister?”

Geeta groaned. “We should just kill her instead,” she muttered. “Nosy bitch. ‘Saloni, how do you manage to raise those kids and run a business?’ I dunno, could it be your rich husband?”

“What’s the scene there anyway?”

“What do you mean?”

“You two hate each other.”

“So? No one actually likes Saloni, they just pretend to because they’re scared of her.”

“I’m not scared of her.”

“Well, you’ve got a bigger bully to deal with.”

“Oh, you’re not so bad once you—”

“Not me,” Geeta snapped. “Your husband.”

“Oh. Right, right.” Farah cleared her throat. “But what I meant was, like, there’s regular hate, right? Which is really just dislike. Kinda like how you don’t like . . . well, anyone. But that dislike disappears when you’re not looking at them, ’cause you got other things going on. But you and Saloni hate-hate each other.”

“What’s your point?”

“Well, in my experience, that kind of hate comes with a good story.”

“And?”

“And . . . I like good stories?”

“I’m not here to entertain you, Farah. We’re here for one reason only.”

Farah sighed. “I’m not your enemy, Geetaben, you don’t have to treat me like one. You’re doing me a huge favor—the biggest—and I’m just trying to make it easier. Friendship can make things easier, you know.”

“Saloni and I were friends,” Geeta admitted. “A long time back.”

Farah’s face turned supportive, encouraging Geeta to delve. “What happened? Was it a boy? It’s usually a boy.”

“I didn’t tell you so we could gossip, Farah. I told you to correct you: friendship doesn’t necessarily make anything easier.”

“I said it can. It didn’t work out with Saloni, I get it. But what—you’re just never going to have another friend again? That’s bogus.”

“Oh, fuck off, yeah? When were you ever interested in friendship before you needed me?”

“I—”

“After Ramesh, you lot couldn’t be bothered to look at me, much less talk to me. And that’s fine. But don’t stand there banging a bhajan about the importance of sisterhood.” Geeta let the bag fall to the dirt. “Forget it. Let’s go.”

Farah did not move. “But what about the plan?”

“Saloni saw us. It’ll be too suspicious if he dies tonight. She’s a nosy bitch, but not a stupid bitch.”

Farah released a one-note noise of admonishment. “The cursing!”

“Tell me she’s not a nosy bitch.” When Farah opened her mouth, Geeta added, “And remember lying is a worse sin than cursing.”

Farah’s jaw clicked shut.

FOUR

Was it a boy? It’s usually a boy.

Farah’s perspicacity and Geeta’s ordinariness were not welcome realizations.

Yes, it was a boy. If you could call Ramesh—mustache at fifteen, when his family moved from a neighboring village, full beard in by twenty-two—a boy. Ramesh, like Geeta, was neither particularly good-looking nor gregarious. Had he been, his attention would’ve raised her suspicions. Had he been, he’d likely have been smitten with Saloni instead. But while all the boys were wild about what filled Saloni’s undergarments, their parents only cared about what filled her dowry, which was zero rupees and zero paise. (In an early school lesson, their economics teacher explained the custom of dowry. Saloni tried to correct him: the groom’s family pays to take the bride, after all, they’re gaining a whole entire person to help the household. The teacher laughed: no, the groom is paid to take the bride because she’s a liability, another mouth to feed. And, naturally, you can’t buy a person, that’s slavery. But, Saloni snapped back, if you sell one, that’s tradition? She was made to sit in rooster position for the remainder of the econ class.)

Saloni had grown up a severe brand of poor. Geeta’s family was ordinary poor: vegetables with rice or chapatis. In Saloni’s family, they rotated the days half of them wouldn’t eat, always favoring the boys. She was only sent to school due to the state’s Midday Meal Scheme, which offered a free lunch. Most afternoons, they went to Geeta’s home. Once, Geeta’s father brought from work rejected apples that would soon rot; they already suffered from dark spots that Geeta’s mother intended to carve. When she returned from the kitchen with a knife, however, Saloni had already eaten her apple, core and seeds and stem and all.

Geeta’s parents said nothing, but as they finished their apples, and Saloni saw the discarded, evidently inedible bits, her fair skin flushed. That night, Geeta’s parents insisted Saloni stay for dinner before walking home. In their nearly two decades of friendship, Saloni never invited Geeta to her home, and Geeta never asked.

In other parts of the world, Saloni’s nadir of poverty would have subjected her to bullying. But nearly everyone in their village practiced mild asceticism—most possessed simple clothes and two pairs of shoes. Chocolate and cake were rare; on Diwali, they passed around homemade sweets. Besides, while Saloni’s feet may have been bare, her other coffers were full: she was sharp and funny and high caste and, above all, beautiful. So, so beautiful with green-gold eyes that had bewildered her parents, high cheekbones and heart-shaped lips atop a delicately pointed chin. A beautiful child who spawned into a beautiful adolescent, Saloni wasted no time with acne or awkwardness. Like waves under the moon, their classmates bent to her will. Such was her social currency; everyone wanted to be near her, felt promoted by her presence.

But being both penniless and impudent naturally led to very few offers of marriage. Saloni’s older sisters were wed to men in far villages, older men who’d lost their first wives and didn’t demand dowries—much like the premenarchal Phoolan had been given to that thirty-three-year-old pervert.

It was neither a secret nor a surprise that Saloni’s dominant aspiration in life was money. Not bungalow-car-big-city money—Saloni was ambitious but not greedy; she steeped her dreams in practicality. She wanted the normal-not-abject poverty the rest of the village didn’t think to appreciate. They sighed about the rising cost of rice, but could still buy and eat the damn rice. The kind of money that allowed for declining a food based on taste or mood; the kind of comfort where it didn’t occur to her to ask the price of a staple.

Every morning her father walked to the lorries, where he and seven other men spent the day filling a truck with rocks in exchange for twenty rupees. Her eventual husband—she said during hot nights when they’d sleep on Geeta’s terrace with the stars sprinkled above them—needn’t have Ambani-level wealth with crores of rupees, but he needed to have (or have ready access to) a leg up. Saloni realized back while Geeta was still struggling with basic sums from the third row of their shared school bench, that a head start made all the difference. You could be smart—like her father, like her—and still have no means to get even half a step further in life. You could be smart and still break your back for coins that disappeared directly into your children’s bellies as they scratched their plates.

And so, Saloni committed her early teens to scheming. The gifts the boys gave—the cheap knickknacks that crumbled in her rucksack or the erasers shaped like fruit that erased nothing, including her hunger—were useless. No, what she required was a bit of money to secure a dowry and therefore a boy. You’ve got to spend money to make money, she told Geeta, whose opinion differed.

“All the boys love you, but you’ll know ‘the one’ when he’s willing to tell his parents not to take a dowry. At least one will stand up for you. I’m certain. You just have to ask.”

Saloni laughed and bumped Geeta’s shoulder with her own. “Don’t be naïve, Geeta.”

“You don’t think any of them want you more than they want a bit of money?”

“Maybe,” she said. “But not enough to stand up to their mummy-daddy.”

Geeta twirled her earring stud within its piercing. “I just don’t believe that’s true.”

“Because you love me,” Saloni said. “You see me in a way no one else does.” She poked out her tongue. “And because you’re a duffer.”