What are the odds that I’m picked? Aman thought, feeling cornered. Time was running out. Everyone was probably staring at him.

Aman cleared his throat. ‘Umm—’

‘No, it’s not that he can’t hear you, Ma’am,’ another boy interrupted him. ‘He just can’t spe-spea-speak, but he can . . .’ He looked around for approval. ‘He can surely cry.’

Aman stiffened. Are you kidding me? Cry? That was more than ten years ago!

He had always been a quiet kid, but it wasn’t like Aman wanted to be tongue-tied at such a moment. His reticence had festered over the years as he’d backed himself further and further into a corner. The silence in his world had enveloped him completely after the loss of his father back in 2009, thirteen years ago. His father, the infamous Avi Chandra, had been an army officer. When Aman was five years old, an official letter had arrived at their home in Delhi, informing him and his mother, Upasna, of Avi’s death. But it wasn’t accompanied by any of the outpourings of poignant glory reserved for the deaths of soldiers. No gun salutes. No badge of honour. No eulogies in the press. In fact, there was no state funeral for him—the army had said disobedience and abandonment of duty lay behind Avi’s death.

With little time offered to grieve, Upasna and her son were thrown out of the army staff quarters. She had tried looking for work, but even when the hope of a job glimmered, any inquiry about her family and husband put an end to it. She had no alternative but to take the low-paying job of a dishwasher at a local canteen.

It wasn’t long before the consequences of this unfortunate situation spilled over into Aman’s life. In the second grade, he was called ‘son of a traitor’ by a classmate for the first time, and he ended up sobbing in front of his class. That event bred new bullies who continued to torment him the entire year. The taint of his father’s disrepute seemed to be the only thing people spoke about when it came to him. But changing schools was out of the question—this was the closest public school to where he lived, and they couldn’t afford anything else.

Aman’s survival mechanism had become all about avoiding attention. First, he started watching his actions and weighing his words. He called in sick as often as possible. In the third grade, he completely stopped engaging in any discussions, and from the fourth grade onwards he only spoke when called upon by a teacher.

By the sixth grade, Aman Chandra had sidelined himself to the extent that the older students appeared to have forgotten about him. He was also careful to never engage with the new students, and even went to extraordinary lengths to hide his last name.

By the seventh grade, he had succeeded in his mission to be invisible. His classmates avoided him and the teachers—the regular ones, not the substitutes—clearly knew better than to ask him questions, whether out of pity or sheer weariness. Aman kept a poker face and would admit to no one that he wished he had a friend. Just one person to talk to honestly. But one day rolled into the next, and time went on.