At this point Disco Daniel walks in. Daniel is from the gaavthan, the local Christian slum. Alok isn’t sure what he does to earn a living. ‘Alok men, buy me a drink. Today, you staying the night in Parla, no?’ says Dan. He and Alok used to gamble like crazy in their college days. Alok was young, bewildered, just about learning how to hang his own little ten-watt bulb under the neon sign of the human race. He’d survived an almost fatal knifing on a local train—the outcome of a gambling debt—and spent a night in the lock-up; had a reasonably successful stint as a mosquito coil salesman; done dumbbells at four in the morning. Dan used to have a Mithun haircut, his favourite movies being Disco Dancer and Dance, Dance. The echoing refrain of ‘Jimmy, Jimmy, aaja, aaja, aaja’ still escapes from his lips before vanishing into a passer-by’s ear.

‘The slums are gone,’ explains Dan, and not for the first time, ‘but we hung on. When the developers came with their first offer we refused. Then they offered us a one-room apartment. We refused again. Now, Alokbhai, we are on the fifth floor: two-room flat and a big kitchen. We can look into your kitchen now, Alokbhai.’ This is one lesson life has taught Dan: hold your ground and the rest will follow. This is what he tells his school-going son when he complains of pushing in the playground.

In the kitchen there is grumbling. Smooth brown arms that have knuckled dough for years hang still like indolent pendulums, then swing lazily through the air giving emphasis to muttered, almost inaudible, complaints. The sisters are worried and opinionated. ‘He seems drunk . . . I want an early night . . . imagine bringing that sidey home . . . that’s what happens to men when their wives are bitches.’ The whistle of the pressure cooker wobbles like a dying top, then blows admonishing shushes in the direction of the kitchen ceiling.

Since the door is slightly ajar, Alok and Atmaram walk into the house and take their sandals off. Alok stuffs both pairs under the bookshelf to the left of the door, then rings the bell to announce their arrival.

The front room is empty but for his nephew, Umang, who is down from Delhi for his vacations. He is sitting on a makeshift bench made of two chairs facing each other, forcibly locked in a wooden kiss. He is in the middle of a phone conversation about a Jim Morrison song. To his right is a huge double bed. The semi-circular, orange-coloured headrest on the far side resembles the Bombay sun diving into the cool evening sea in rapidly failing light.