He took a deep breath. ‘Maa! Open up!’ he said, knocking for the third time.

Eighteen-year-old Aman Chandra didn’t really stand out in a crowd. He was just another gangly teenager, nothing but sticks and hinges: tall and extremely thin. Dark, with dishevelled, dusty hair, and a slouch to his walk, almost as if he wanted to be closer to the ground, away from anyone’s line of sight.

At that moment, what Aman did not know was that he and Prakash would never meet again. But if you had happened to tell him so, he would have been too angry to care. C’mon, open up! He clenched his jaw and kicked a pebble down the dimly lit hallway.

Aman heard footsteps getting louder, and then the door opened, revealing the yellow paint of the small apartment.

‘You’re back early,’ Upasna Chandra said. She was wearing a faded sari, which had once been bright red. She held out her thin arms, offering to take his schoolbag. ‘It’s only four.’

Aman charged in. He had so much to say but didn’t know where to start. He stormed across the room towards the steel almirah and slammed its doors open. He fished out his phone—an eight-year-old refurbished Samsung Galaxy S5 that lasted fifty minutes per charge—and started to scroll through it.

‘What’s wrong?’ she asked.

He refused to look up. All he could think about were the innumerable times he had been shunned, by others, by his classmates, by everyone who sooner or later learnt of his last name.

‘What happened at school, Aman?’ she asked.

His mind raced until he snapped. ‘Why us? Why me?!’

‘Sit down, beta.’

‘No, today I need answers,’ he said. ‘You say that they lied about Papa. That in reality he did not betray this country . . . that he didn’t betray us . . . Then why am I called a “traitor’s son”?’

Upasna looked at her feet.

‘What exactly was Papa accused of?’ he asked, his voice getting louder.

She shook her head and took a step towards him. ‘All in good time, beta.’

‘None of this makes sen- . . . I don’t understand . . .’ Aman said, waving his arms about, walking in circles. ‘Don’t want to live like this . . .’

‘But you have to believe,’ she said. ‘That thread around your wrist is a blessing from the gods. Your life will turn around.’

‘Mother, stop! Not again,’ Aman said. Frustrated, he yanked the thread off his wrist. ‘This thing didn’t work in the fifth or sixth grade. And it definitely didn’t work today. These useless superstitions have only ever given me false hope,’ he said. ‘Hope that maybe I will be able to speak normally to a friend one day . . .’

She met his eyes as if about to say something but then looked towards the floor. ‘Can’t . . . I can’t,’ she said with a catch in her throat. ‘I wish I—was that the door?!’