Iman dangled her arm outside the boat. Her fingers caressed the water. Such a busy world down there. She hummed a song for the dolphins, but if they came too close it would alarm Salma, so she sang softly instead.

Salma could row without getting tired. She was stronger today than yesterday. She turned her head and glimpsed the blur of red. There he was, jogging through the trees, alongside the bank, but she could row faster than he could jog.

Iman caught a glimpse of the man in the red T-shirt. Mindful of what she was and wasn’t wearing, she hid herself behind Moni.

‘We will soon lose him,’ Salma said. ‘He won’t catch up with us.’

By the time Moni turned, the jogger was already far behind. She didn’t even see the colour of his clothes.

Are you running after me because I ran after you the other day? You will catch me only when I want to be caught, that is, if I want to be caught. I can run as fast as you can run. I am lighter than you, stronger each day, leaner and quicker.

Later, Salma posted a selfie of them at the boat on the group page, the serene water around them, the purple mountains behind. Not all the comments were the mix of envy and approval she was seeking. The queries, ‘What happened? You couldn’t get to the grave?’ required explanation.

At night when the Hoopoe flew into Iman’s room for the second time, she was not surprised. He told her a story about water. His stories made her not think about Ibrahim, not hurt and rage. Water, the Hoopoe said, is the essence of everything. We would not be here without it. He told her about the water djinn who could swim faster than a sailfish. Because they leapt out of the water, they covered more distance. The world of the oceans, the Hoopoe said, is a secret. People think they know, but what they know is only a little of the whole. It’s incomplete. That’s why the unexpected keeps on happening; that’s why so much is out of control. People believe they have tamed the wilderness, mapped the stars, charted every inch of every continent. But there are still surprises out there. To leap up and slap them on the face. To humble them occasionally. Just because they think they know best.

But Iman didn’t know best. Iman knew that she didn’t know. And that was an endearing quality, she had been told. The Hoopoe was entertaining, but he was also a warning of what could go wrong, a warning of what was coming.

‘Disappointment is around every corner,’ he said. ‘The way forward is a circle. The other side is different only because it faces the opposite direction. If everyone could see the end of Time, their hair would turn white in fright.’

‘Where do you live?’ she asked him.

‘In a garden.’

‘Why can’t Salma and Moni see you?’