One thing we couldn’t do for sure at this point, I knew, was to put a stop to your visits to the Chabad house, or forbid you from consorting with such a bad influence as Malkie. You and Malkie were tighter than ever, inseparable. In the synagogue you circulated holding hands, calling yourselves soul sisters. Only the previous Sabbath as we were walking together toward the Chabad house for lunch, dodging the violent traffic as we sought an opening to cross Mahatma Gandhi Road in the Fort District after morning prayers, Malkie said to me, “I just want you to know that I love Maya with all my heart and soul. She is like a sister to me. I wish she could be my true sister. I wish she could marry Shmuly. Then we’d be real sisters. Too bad she’s only twelve, I just can’t wait that long.” And she held up her hand, the one clasped to yours, the one with the dazzling rock on its fourth finger, she held it up toward the heavens, turning it this way and that in an effort to catch a glint of sunlight as Rabbi Mendy strode briskly past in intense conversation with Shmuly, but the clouds were low and dark, there was not a glimmer of light present to land on the facets of the stone and set them aglow, the toe of your boot as she pulled your arm upward to show off her bling snagged on an irregularity in the pavement and in the slow-motion seconds before I could reach out to save you, your sister wannabe Malkie let go of your hand and down you flew onto the sodden concrete, hitting bottom, crying, Sorry, sorry, sorry.

The all-consuming discussion between Shmuly and his father as they swept past us when you fell in the street raged on in feverish whispers throughout the Sabbath lunch in the pauses between the ritual requirements, so that they scarcely fulfilled their mandate to reach out to their guests, including me in my usual place at the table so near to them, the spectral old woman as always shedding ash from the other world to my left. Following the Grace After the Meal, when everyone had escaped to process the digestive overload, you approached hand in hand with Malkie to ask permission to stay through the afternoon until three stars would be visible in the night sky, not very likely in the monsoon season, and the Sabbath queen would regretfully be ushered out. As I was rising to work out the logistics with Manika in the kitchen where she typically hung out, socializing with her fellow low-caste colleagues, Rabbi Mendy made a downward gesture with his hand indicating that I remain in my seat, Shmuly turned to you and said, “I hope you don’t mind, just a few questions, then we’ll let you go and you can play with the dollies,” and the rebbetzin Mindy slipped into the empty chair to my right—all of them pouncing on us in a single pincer movement in what seemed like a preplanned coordinated three-pronged action.