Despite K’s intense irritation, Abhi’s good mood begins to rub off on him as they sit drinking beer at the Leopold Café. It is strange to be here again, the place where they met. It seems like another life, like a thousand years ago. Abhi orders another round and soon they are wandering through the hot night together, drunk and amazed to be alive on earth, right now, in Bombay. The energy of the city surges through them.

The airport, when they arrive the next evening, is small, makeshift, and surrounded by an aura of intense chaos; an almost impenetrable crowd seethes with travellers and taxi-drivers and beggars and police, with rickshaws, cows, dogs, children. A strange procession winds its way along the footpath and disappears around the corner. There is singing. There are people cooking dinner. There are people lying on the ground, seemingly asleep.

Inside the terminal, it’s filthy and unbelievably muggy. The smell of piss and incense is overwhelming. Bent in half, men in white uniforms are carrying huge bags back and forth on their backs. The night outside is like something living, an enormous entity beating at the doors.

‘So,’ K says. ‘This is it. Come visit sometime.’ He steps forward to embrace Abhi.

But Abhi pushes him away. ‘Not so fast,’ he says. ‘I’m coming with you.’

‘What are you talking about?’

That’s what he was doing yesterday, he explains. It wasn’t drugs. He was arranging a plane ticket, a visa. ‘Amazing what money can do,’ he laughs.

Abhi has always wanted to see Australia, he claims. The outback, the dangerous animals.

‘I don’t know what to say,’ K says, genuinely shocked. ‘I don’t know any dangerous animals.’

And yet, it seems that with this gesture, something has been sealed between them.

Their passage through the various levels of bureaucracy is interminable. Their papers are passed from person to person, checked and re-checked by teams of officials. Someone — it is unclear who — takes their passports and disappears. But fifteen minutes later, the passports are returned with a smile, and eventually they are allowed to board the plane.

For K now, there is a sense, almost, of excitement. A new adventure moving beneath the surface of numb grief. They find their seat numbers, settle in, try to get comfortable. Not exactly easy with a wad of hash up your arse. But it turns out that Abhi has one as well. They laugh about this, in convulsive whispers. They are brothers in arms. Finally, the aeroplane begins to move. It taxies aimlessly around the airport and then, with a tremendous rush, surges forward and lifts into the sky.

Beneath them, India tilts and falls away. Acres of slum shacks pour across the landscape. The black bay is scattered with tankers.

K’s hands ache. His arse aches. His head, too. But it will be alright, he thinks. With Abhi, things always turn out alright.

And many hours later, somewhere above Thailand, K reassumes his old name — Vincent. He whispers the word to himself.