I almost tripped over my dupatta as I got up to greet the judge. Should I bend down and grab my dupatta, or greet him first? I wondered in a panic.

Mrs. Judge picked up the dupatta and put it over my shoulder and then wrapped her arm around me. My hands trembled so much that I could hardly say, “Namaste.”

Sarina introduced me to everyone and I must’ve mumbled something, but I couldn’t remember anything. It was as if my mind were a big empty bowl that I cupped in my hand and stared at.

“Jeeta,” the judge said as we sat down to eat. “I like the sound of your name. When I was a poor struggling lawyer I always thought about you.”

Confused, I looked at him.

“Your name means ‘victory,’ doesn’t it? Well, I wanted to win the case I was fighting, so all day I would hum jeeta, jeeta, jeeta. I had no idea that a real Jeeta would walk into my house one day.”

My ears turned red. The worst thing was that Neel was sitting right across from me and kept on eating spicy batata vada, potato balls. I wondered if Sarina knew that this was the same Neel, the one I’d told her I liked.

“How is college? Have you learned much in the past two years?” the judge asked Neel.

“Some.”

“What do you mean, some? Don’t tell me you’ve been cutting classes and going to movies like your pappa and I used to?”

“Did you do that, Pappa?” Neel asked.

“Jeeta, do I look like someone who would cut classes?” Neel’s pappa asked me.

It was so unexpected that I couldn’t even say, “no.” My quick brain was not so quick after all.

“She thinks you’re guilty as charged,” Neel said.

I knew they were trying to make me comfortable, but I wished they’d forget I was there.

“Next year Sarina and Jeeta will be in college. Don’t give them ideas,” Mrs. Judge said.

“These kids don’t need ideas from us,” the judge said. Then he asked Neel what he wanted to do after he finished his college.

“I still have a couple of years to decide,” he said. “I can finish my MBA here, or go to America and study there. Right now I’m in favor of staying here, but if I get a scholarship, I’ll hop on a plane.”

I thought, How can anyone so young be so confident in what he wants to do? Isn’t he afraid of going to America by himself?

“Money shouldn’t be the only consideration, Neel,” the judge said. “When we were little your pappa and I strung beads by the thousands to make money to pay our school fees. When we were in college we used the streetlight by our house as our reading lamp. And now look where our struggles have brought us.”