Garden of Dreams by Melissa Siebert Read Free Book Online Page B

we’re here?’ Eli asked.
    ‘She knows, she knows, don’t you bother. Turn on the boom box!’
    Danita pressed the button on a giant boom box next to the bed and a tape began playing, Hindi disco. There was a strong downbeat and lots of synthesiser in the background. Danita was thrusting her pelvis and shaking her boobs and her earrings and her hair all around. ‘You like?’ she asked Eli.
    He could barely take her picture, she was moving so much. Anand, too, was definitely having a good time, snapping his fingers, shuffling his feet, grinding his hips. When the beat deepened, Danita began stroking her crotch. Behind the lens Eli grimaced, but kept firing away. He squatted to get a better angle, but more to hide his erection.
    ‘Beautiful!’ shouted Anand. ‘That’s the way I like it!’
    Eli had had enough. ‘Are we done?’ he asked.
    ‘Yeah, but that was fuckin’ great, isn’t it! We see you later, Danita, OK?’
    She nodded and Eli raised his hand farewell. Speechless.
    The door to the third room was closed. Anand didn’t knock, just barged in. The room, dark blue, was dim; a striped purple bedspread covered most of the window. Many of the walls’ magazine photos had been ripped off. On the bed, on the grimy sheets, lay a small girl, maybe not even twelve, stark naked, on her back with her arms and legs splayed to the sides. Her eyes were closed, and her skin looked bluish. The insides of her arms looked like they had been stung a hundred times by vicious bees.
    ‘Is she dead?’ Eli asked.
    ‘Ha! What do you know?’ said Anand. ‘This one maybe should be, she is so useless. I don’t know why Auntie-ji keeps her, she is not paying off …’
    ‘Paying off?’
    ‘Pulling her weight. She’s a lazy little
chut
.’
    Eli stared at her and willed her to wake up. Come back to life. But maybe she was better off dead.
    Obviously no photos of this one.
    Anand grinned as he dragged him out of the room. ‘Get used to it.’



Chapter 9
    ‘Auntie-ji wants you!’ Anand yelled. ‘She’s back and she wants you to herself. Clean up. Five minutes.’
    Eli gripped the edges of his bed, the dirty sheets, and raised himself slightly, feeling the room spin around him. He hadn’t spoken to anyone except Anand for a long time, over a week, he guessed – had barely left this room. Filthy now, with a bowl of piss in one corner, a basin of murky water in another. He didn’t have to sniff under his arms to know he stank all over.
    ‘I need a bath!’ Eli shouted back.
    The key turned in the lock and the door swung open. Anand filled the doorway. ‘You’re right, yaar. Better for both of us if Auntie-ji doesn’t see you – or smell you – like this.’
    The goonda yanked him by the ear, dragged him down the hallway, eerily quiet.
    ‘Make yourself pretty.’ Anand shoved him into the cold, dark bathroom with the once-white tiles. ‘Five minutes.’
    Eli switched on the tap in the stained ball-and-claw tub, hoped the stain was just rust. Just a sign of age and not all the revolting things happening in this place. There was only one set of underwear hanging on the rail, matching bra and panties, a solitary presence in pink lace. They were Sanjana’s, he realised. The ones she’d rescued, so many days ago. In the beginning.
    Eli adjusted the water temperature, stripped and lowered himself into the bath, steam rising against the cold porcelain. He could feel his body becoming purified as he sank deeper, peering across the water surface like a crocodile.
    Then the door was flung open and Anand stood there again, a brown pathan suit in his arms. He dropped it on the floor.
    ‘Auntie-ji has made me her fucking laundry-wallah!’ he said, picking up Eli’s dirty clothes. He looked as if he had a foul taste in his mouth.
    Eli surfaced slightly as he left. He still felt woozy, and his head hurt.He found a sliver of green soap and began washing, arms outstretched. They were bruised, he saw, on the inside, Anand’s