Three months.
That's how long it took me to learn every face in our building, every dog that barked at the wrong hour, every aunty who watched from her balcony like a retired intelligence officer. They say new cities bring new risks. Nobody tells you the risk might be living one floor below you, in a faded cotton kurta, holding a bag of vegetables.
I'd been so sure it was a coincidence. A man who looked like the actor from that famous show, the family man with the tired eyes and the secret life. I even laughed when I first saw him. Obviously not, I thought. What are the odds?
The odds, it turned out, were not great, and also irrelevant. Because the man was real, the job was real, and the job was worse than the TV version.
Srikant Tiwari worked in the NIA. Special Cell. His whole day was spent reading strangers' online lives and stamping a number on them. How suspicious? How dangerous? How soon?
I stood on the staircase that night, listening to his television murmur through the floor, and made a decision the way some people decide to quit sugar. Quietly, and with complete seriousness.
This city will not protect my family. The government can barely protect its own paperwork.
So I would do it myself.
I made a list on the back of an electricity bill, because dramatic notebooks are for people with fewer problems.
One. Get into the NIA Special Squad quota, and strike a deal with the head. A reasonable deal. Reasonable for me.
Two. Solve the highway robbery case, the one that had been screaming from the front page every morning, with its trail of looted trucks and two dead men.
Three. Hunt the internet for anything unusual. Anything that might hand me an edge, directly or sideways. A power-up, if the universe had a sense of humor.
The first two would take six months, minimum. The third would take patience, bad Wi-Fi, and a very high tolerance for strange corners of the internet.
I folded the bill and put it in my pocket.
Six months, I told myself. Plenty of time.
RINGGGGG. RINGGGGGG. RINGGGGGGG.
The alarm screamed into the dark like a rooster with a grudge.
Vijay's eyes opened. The electric clock glowed red: 4:30 AM. It looked smug about it.
Beside him, Shilpa and Neelam slept in the warm tangle of blankets, one breathing softly, the other with a small snore she would deny under oath. The bed was a fortress. Leaving it felt like a crime.
Five more minutes, said the weak part of him.
No, said the part that had written the list.
He bent down and pressed a light kiss to each of their foreheads. Shilpa stirred and murmured something that sounded like "mmph." Neelam didn't move at all, which was typical. That girl could sleep through an earthquake and then complain about the noise.
Ten minutes later, face washed and shoes laced, he stepped out into the cold, blue-black morning.
Inhale. Exhale.
Inhale. Exhale.
Inhale. Exhale.
The park was empty except for a stray dog who watched him with deep suspicion, as if Vijay had come to steal something. His feet pounded the track. His lungs burned. The sweat started early and kept going, soaking through his tracksuit until the fabric clung to his back like a second, more annoying skin. His hair plastered itself to his forehead.
Pain is just information, he thought, panting. Very rude information.
Two hours later, shaking and satisfied, he turned for home.
That was when he nearly collided with Srikant Tiwari, who was returning from his own jog at a pace so calm it felt like an insult.
"Hello, Uncle Tiwari," Vijay said, with a respectful nod.
Srikant's face broke into a warm, practiced smile. "Ahh, ahh, hello, beta!" He tilted his head, squinting like a man reading fine print. "But tell me, who are you? I don't know your name. I've seen you going up and down this building, new boy. So what is your auspicious name?"
Three months, Vijay thought. Three months of nodding at you on the stairs.
And the man who reads strangers' secrets for a living can't remember my name.
It was almost impressive. Vijay swallowed the groan, arranged his face into the picture of an honest, obedient child, and smiled.
"Vijay, Uncle. Vijay is my name. And good morning."
Srikant's eyes drifted down, taking in the soaked tracksuit, the heaving chest, the hair stuck to the forehead. It was a quick look. Too quick to be casual.
He's rating me, Vijay realized. Right here, on the pavement. Suspicious or not suspicious.
"Good morning," Srikant said at last, and smiled again.
And just like that, the day began.
By nine o'clock, Vijay had showered, eaten, and been dragged into the world of school visits, with Shilpa walking beside him, clutching a folder of documents like a shield.
"Tu serious hai ya drama kar raha hai?" she asked, after the third principal's office.
(Are you serious, or are you just being dramatic?)
"Dono," Vijay said. (Both.)
The problem was simple to say and impossible to solve. He needed a school that would let him enroll without ever really attending. Home study. A scholarship, because extra money never hurt anybody. Full support from the institution, and a few reasonable demands.
The prestigious schools took one look at the list and smiled the way people smile at a man selling umbrellas in a drought.
"We have never had such a request," said one principal, adjusting his glasses.
"Then I'll be your first," said Vijay. "Think of the brochure."
He didn't get the admission.
But as they walked out into the afternoon glare, past a noticeboard crowded with flyers and a street vendor selling roasted corn, Vijay's eyes caught on something small. A headline on a discarded newspaper, flapping against a lamppost.
HIGHWAY ROBBERY: THIRTEEN TRUCK LOOTED.
He stopped walking.
"Vijay?" Shilpa said. "What now?"
He kept staring at the paper, the wheels in his head already turning.
"Nothing," he said slowly. "Just thinking that the school can wait."
"And the robbery?"
He smiled. It was a small smile, and a dangerous one.
"The robbery," said Vijay, "can't."