Spiral Road (23 page)

I’ve forgotten what it’s like to be in a house that sounds like a bustling thoroughfare. Even before the dhobi arrived with a bundle of washed and crisply ironed clothes, Ma was surly. The sight of Uncle Musa’s man, Nur, in the kitchen has soured her.

The laundryman doesn’t help matters. He tells Ma that the cost of his services has gone up by fifty takas per hundred items of washing. The remainder of her morning composure dissipates and she accuses him of unscrupulous business practice. He remains unperturbed, slobbering his index finger with spit to count the ten taka notes that Ma reluctantly hands him. She has chosen the notes that are limp, dirty and partly torn.

Uncle Rafiq follows soon after, looking cheery and with a basketful of food, supposedly for me. An argument breaks out near the front door. The rickshaw
wallah
doesn’t have any change this early in the day and Uncle Rafiq is carrying large notes. Ma, still recovering from her indignation at the dhobi’s greed, offers no help to her brother. The
darwan
joins in, reminding the rickshaw
wallah
of his station in life and telling him to wait outside the gate.

I pay the man who then demands another ten takas for carrying the basket to the front door.

‘No free service!’ the rickshaw
wallah
insists, vigorously shaking his head.

‘We agreed that it was part of the fare!’ Uncle Rafiq thunders. ‘There’s too much corruption in this country of ours!’

‘Who are you calling dishonest? Huh?’ The rickshaw
wallah
glares and takes a step towards the old man.

‘
Oshoboh loak
!’ Ma gasps from behind the door. ‘The rudeness of these low-class people!’

Uncle Rafiq is intimidated by the man’s aggression and backs away.

I step between the two and meekly hand over another twenty takas.

‘May Allah bless you, my boy!’ Uncle Rafiq beams.

I’m invited to inspect the basket in the dining room. There’s an entire
Hilsa
fish, a leg of mutton, okra, aubergines, spinach, a bottle of Brahmanbaria ghee, a small tin of freshly pressed mustard oil, two large jackfruits, sweetmeats and yoghurt.

‘I went to the market at dawn when everything’s fresh,’ he tells Ma. ‘I was hoping you hadn’t sent Mirza to the bazaar. The walk has given me an appetite.’

Ma eyes the basket without enthusiasm but feels obliged to offer him breakfast of poached eggs and toast. ‘I can’t cook today,’ she says defiantly. ‘I have to take Ibrahim to the podiatrist and then to the doctor.’

I sit and talk to Uncle Rafiq as he devours his eggs. ‘No one eats freshly made parathas for breakfast these days,’ he sighs. ‘I remember a time when we would sit at the table and—’

‘No one has that much time any more, Masud tells me,’ Ma interrupts sharply. ‘And he’s right!’ It’s not like her to be rude to her brother. Her sense of propriety is ingrained with the rules of etiquette towards an older male member of the family.

Abba begins to call Ma from his room.

‘Couldn’t Mirza prepare the meal?’ Uncle Rafiq looks disappointed. ‘I was hoping that we could have lunch together.’

‘It’s not possible today, Bhaiya.’

Ma’s waspish exchange with Nur this morning has made her bold. He had undiplomatically refused to greet Ma, pointedly saying he had a message for me from Uncle Musa. Smugly he’d added that he was under specific instructions not to communicate anything to her. She was further exasperated to discover that Nur had spent the night here. Ma also scolded Mirza for allowing Uncle Musa’s man to stay without asking her permission. But
Nur had arrived after midnight and it seems reasonable for Mirza to have let him share the room behind the garage.

Zia’s grumpiness doesn’t help. He’s curt with Uncle Rafiq and brushes past Nur on his way to work. ‘Can you see what he wants?’ he demands brusquely. ‘I don’t want to deal with any more of Uncle Musa’s problems. I’ll probably be late tonight.’

‘Don’t do anything silly,’ I warn quietly, following him. ‘I’m sure Omar’s fine.’

‘For how long?’ he snaps.

In the hall I try to call Steven Mills again.

Nur appears, wringing his hands apologetically. ‘Choto Babu, the message from your uncle is urgent.’

I agree to see him in a minute on the back veranda.

Uncle Rafiq is, I see, still slumped contentedly on a sofa in the lounge. He opens a silver box, inlaid with mother of pearl, and pops a paan in his mouth.

Steven Mills still doesn’t answer.

There’s another flurry of activity. Nasreen slips past me and out the front door with Zafar and Yasmin.

On my way to the back veranda, I hear Ma:‘Pyareh, sit still!’

Then Abba bursts into uncontrollable laughter.

From the doorway I see that he’s sitting on his chair with a large bib tied around his neck. Most of the porridge has spilt on his clothes and the floor.

‘Hot!’ He grins as he sees me. ‘Huuu…Huuu!’ He shakes his hands as if in pain. ‘Hot!’

Grimly Ma helps Latif to clean up the mess. I go in to change Abba’s clothes.

‘Hot!’ Abba continues to repeat as Mirza brings in a fresh bowl of porridge. It is as though he likes the sound of a new word he’s learned.

When I eventually catch up with Nur on the veranda, he’s noisily sipping tea from an earthenware cup. He’s immune to Ma’s hostility towards him and entirely comfortable in an unfriendly environment. Nur is a rare creator, spontaneously manufacturing his version of events and conversations from the perspective of his own well-being. Anything that even remotely threatens him is rendered harmless by the working of his fecund imagination. Facts are reinvented, messages modified and judgements readily made. Whenever Nur is the harbinger of unwelcome news, he becomes serious and speaks the Manikpuri dialect in a low voice.

This time, amazingly, Uncle Musa has sent Nur to negotiate his return to the city.

In exchange for 500,000 takas, a large house in a respectable suburb and a monthly allowance, Uncle Musa is prepared to consider moving back to Dhaka. There is no mention of not marrying the village girl.

‘That’s absurd!’ I splutter, appalled by these rapacious demands. ‘The best we can do is buy him a house, financed by selling his village property. He has enough money of his own to live wherever he pleases.’ I’m assuming that he hasn’t frittered his considerable stocks and shares. ‘What’s happened to his house in
Wari, the one that was rented out to the Family Planning Clinic?’

The emissary holds the cup in both hands and blows noisily into it.

‘Nur, what about this girl he’s planning to marry?’

‘Very fine lady!’ Nur tells me. ‘Her father visits your uncle regularly. Things are proceeding satisfactorily. It’s Allah’s will.’

‘It is not Allah’s will that we should be shamed in such a manner!’ Ma snaps.

I don’t know how long she’s been standing near the kitchen door, listening to what’s being said.

Nur ignores Ma and tells me about the bumper mango crop that can be expected from Uncle Musa’s orchard. He inquires about sending a few hundred of the ripest fruits to me in Australia. ‘Mashed mangoes, mixed with thickened milk, strands of pure saffron, boiled rice, sugar and ground almonds—very good for virility,’ Nur advises, with the confidence of a trained dietician. ‘It can help to produce many sons.’

‘Nonsense!’ Ma snorts. ‘Only you can make up such rubbish!’ She turns and storms back into the kitchen.

Nur grins. I can’t help admiring him. With the barest effort he has provoked Ma into leaving, a masterly stroke, and with a deadpan expression and serious tone of voice.

A veteran of four marriages, Nur doesn’t even pretend to understand our objections to Uncle Musa’s wedding. He embraces life within the framework of three hearty meals every day, regular prayers, minimal work, flattering
my uncle and stealing as much money as he can from the daily bazaar. His activities are undertaken with the complacent certainty of a final resting place in an opulent Paradise where he’ll be treated as a person of the status denied him during his sojourn in the temporal world.

‘We can’t promise Uncle Musa anything,’ I say bluntly.

Nur’s sly expression tells me that this is what his master wishes to hear. ‘Then it’s best for Boro Sahib to spend the rest of his days in Manikpur,’ he says circumspectly.

‘Nur, make it clear to him that we don’t approve of his marrying again.’

‘He will be pleased to hear that he can continue to lead a pious life in the village.’

‘I didn’t say anything about his living in Manikpur either!’ But whatever I say, Nur’s own warped view of city life will be passed on to his master.

I
N THE LOUNGE
, Ma is unloading her woes on her brother. As soon as she sees me, Ma wants to know my final instructions to Nur.

‘Did you tell him that the marriage cannot take place?’

‘I can’t say that. I’ve expressed our disapproval.’

‘But that’s not enough!’

‘I can’t do any more.’

‘Has Nur already left?’ She calls Mirza who comes running from the kitchen. ‘Where is he?’

‘In the kitchen,’ Mirza replies stiffly. ‘Having breakfast.’

‘Who gave him permission to eat?’ Ma shrieks.

‘Ma, he has a long trip ahead of him,’ I say wearily. ‘He has to take a bus and then walk for a couple of hours.’

‘I’ll speak to him.’ She leaves me with her brother.

Uncle Rafiq wonders if I might be able to spare some time to speak to the congregation in his local mosque.

‘People would wish to hear of the difficulties you face as a Muslim in a Christian country,’ he says.

‘But I don’t!’ I protest.

‘Talk about the other Muslims then,’ he persists. ‘I have read that they are harassed, abused and assaulted in the streets.’

‘That’s not true! There have been a few isolated incidents. Besides, why do you want me to talk about such inflammatory matters to your congregation?’

‘Because people must be made aware of the battle Muslims face everywhere.’

It’s been one of those mornings when nothing much has been achieved. It has merely confirmed how ineffective I am in dealing with people. And now I’m incensed. Uncle Rafiq takes my refusal with surprising calm.

I head up to my room to call the Australian Embassy. After inordinate delays and buffers and questions, I get through to the Second Secretary. Predictably, he knows no one named Steven Mills. I hang up with a sense of hopelessness about Mills’s fate. I cannot think of anything more I can do to warn him. But a gnawing anxiety persists in me.

I ring the Embassy again and, in a fake voice, I tell a receptionist that an Australian by the name of Steven
Mills could be in a life-threatening situation in Sundarbans. Before the perplexed girl can ask my name, I hang up.

Downstairs, Uncle Rafiq strayed into Abba’s room and had a sobering experience. He shakes his head ruefully when he sees me again. ‘It’s become impossible to understand what your father says these days. He lost his temper when he saw me. “Old man! You’re Sumita’s uncle!” he shouted. “Where have you hidden her?”’

‘Was Ma in the room?’

He looks at me curiously. ‘No. But who is Sumita?’

‘He makes up all these people in his mind. It’s part of his confusion,’ I explain hastily.

‘Very sad,’ Uncle Rafiq mutters. ‘I keep thinking of the way he was.’

I lead Uncle Rafiq back to the lounge. He’s still hopeful that I might change my mind about visiting his mosque.

He finally leaves, a disappointed man.

A
LYA AGREED TO
pick me up. Now she is staring out of the car’s window. She’s on her way to the graveyard, and looks wan and frail.

‘He shouldn’t have been so curious,’ she murmurs. ‘He knew too much to be safe.’

‘He was a good journalist,’ I remind her. ‘How much did he tell you?’ I scrutinise every vehicle that overtakes us.

‘Not as much as he could have,’ she replies quickly. ‘But I gathered that he was seeking information about terrorist activities in the country.’

The car pulls up near a group of beggars pestering a mullah for alms.

‘This is not the appropriate moment to ask you—’

‘There will never be an appropriate moment, so ask.’ She opens the car door and then turns to me.

‘Was Shabir involved with the CIA?’

‘I suspect he was,’ she answers perfunctorily, covering her head with a cotton scarf before leaving the vehicle.

Alya invites the mullah to pray at Shabir Jamal’s grave site and assures the beggars that they’ll receive money, provided they don’t bother her. It isn’t her voice but the decisive movements by which she exerts her authority. She hands over a sheaf of twenty-taka notes to the mullah. The beggars move back and fall silent.

Head bowed, she stands at the top of the grave as the mullah recites from the Koran. I stand near the buckled tin gate of the graveyard. I should’ve waited in the car. This is Alya’s private moment of goodbye…adjustment…reconciliation with mortality.

She thanks the mullah and waits until he leaves. The beggars throng around him, clamouring for money. Alya kneels on the dry ground and lights candles and incense sticks. She runs a hand over the soft mound of earth as though stroking a child to sleep.

The caretaker of the graveyard approaches her suspiciously. She issues instructions about weeding the site
regularly and giving alms to beggars and feeding them during Ramadan. He’s all compliance once he receives advance payment for his services.

‘You’re a strong person,’ I say as we walk back to the car.

‘I can’t expect the world to stop while I mourn.’

On the way back, I ask to be dropped off at the airline’s office. I need to reconfirm my bookings.

‘
Khuda Hafiz
,’ she says when we get there. ‘I shall try to see you before you leave.’

Once again, there are things I should tell her, not because they would ease her mind but for reasons of the honesty which she deserves. Yet still I lack the courage to reveal what I know.

I simply nod and get out of the car.

‘A man phoned and left a message,’ Ma greets me the next morning as I return from my first jog since I’ve been here. ‘He didn’t want to speak to you.’

I’m panting heavily and I must look exhausted.

‘Didn’t you sleep well?’

As a matter of fact I didn’t. I couldn’t shake off the shadows of Amin Haider’s faceless men following me. Whether the sounds were imagined or had associations with activities on the street below, I leaped out of bed several times, parted the curtains and peeked to see if anyone lurked near the house. All I managed to see was a stray dog peeing under the streetlight and a beggar crying for food.

Ma reads her scribble on the notepad. ‘He said your friend, Steven Mills, was going home soon. The man didn’t give his name. He spoke English with a heavy Bangla accent.’

‘Anything else?’ I ask guardedly, suppressing my elation.

Ma frowns and consults her notepad. ‘Yes, he said your friend would be covered with an Australian flag. And then he hung up. What did he mean?’

My optimism collapses. I race up the stairs and call Mills. I have to steady myself before I can press the right digits on the mobile. There’s no signal.

My helplessness is enervating.

W
HEN
I
COME
downstairs again, Ma is in Abba’s bedroom, coaxing him to take his medicine.

I notice Mirza, with a shopping bag, loitering near the door that leads to the veranda. I follow him.

‘Nur forgot to give you this.’ He hands me something swathed in a dirty cloth.

Paranoid, I take the brown envelope and examine it by holding it against the window pane in the lounge. The handwriting on the front in black ink—
Janab Masud Alam—
is shaky. I press around the edges of the envelope. I’m fearful of opening it.

I creep up the stairs, back to my bedroom. With a pair of scissors I make a tiny slit in a bottom corner. I cover my nose with a handkerchief and gently shake the
envelope over a towel. Nothing comes out. Slowly I continue to slit open the envelope. I slide my little finger inside and feel the coarse surface around the edges.

Inside is a piece of folded white paper.

There’s something forlorn and stark about the invitation. This plain sheet is in glaring contrast to the fuss and ostentation of Uncle Musa’s third marriage. ‘This probably is the last time he’ll marry,’ Abba had argued. ‘Let’s make it a memorable occasion!’

The wedding took place in Dhaka. Much to our disapproval, Abba had pitched in with a considerable sum of money, for extravagances. There were ten trunks of specially selected clothes for the bride, and made-to-order jewellery crafted by the best goldsmiths in Kolkata’s Bowbazar. Specially made
ladoos
were coated in edible silver foil and crusted with pistachio nuts. Baskets of flowers. Whole carp with gold coins in their mouths. The most renowned cooks in Dhaka were employed and entire houses rented for guests to stay in for as long as a month, during the wedding formalities. I remember the argument over the wording of the invitation. Heated discussions about whether the calligrapher should gild the words and decorate the margins of each parchment.

This invitation is handwritten in Bangla and reads:

Musa Alam requests the pleasure of your company

At the reception lunch to celebrate his wedding

to

Mehrun-Nessa

daughter of Mr and Mrs Kabir Murtaza
At Alamvilla in Manikpur
on
Saturday, 28 June 2003
at
1:00 pm sharp.

There’s no provision for an RSVP. Even if there were telephone and fax facilities available in the village, I doubt if Uncle Musa would bother with responses. He will simply expect the invitees to turn up with presents, which will be carefully catalogued and later assessed for their value.

I scrounge around in my suitcase for the box of blank cards I bought at the Art Gallery shop in Melbourne. I must send a note of congratulations to Uncle Musa, but when I’ve written it I see that it’s syrupy and deferential. Still, were I to be here on the day of the wedding, I would have attended the ceremony simply out of curiosity to see my seventeen-year-old aunt.

Ma will have to be told that the wedding is going ahead. I foresee the dogged attempts she’ll make to explain the catastrophe to Abba.

I don’t need any further incentives to board that flight for Dubai the day after tomorrow. A few hours won’t make much difference, I thought at the time I was at the airline’s office. I allowed myself to be seduced by the prospect of a far more comfortable journey with better food and more comfortable seats. After all, it was to be the
first leg of my real holiday. The mild-mannered young man seemed nervous and apologised profusely for the overbooking on the earlier flight. He was embarrassed by the mix-up and avoided looking at me. Of course, he would try to do something if I insisted on leaving in the morning. I was ushered to a side office by an attendant and offered tea and biscuits while the necessary changes were made and new tickets issued.

P
ERHAPS
I
SHOULD
have waited until Zia came home this evening. He’s not a morning person and thrusting the invitation into his hands was a thoughtless act.

He gawks at the sheet of paper.

‘So, I’m not invited!’ he observes between gritted teeth. ‘I suppose even his children haven’t been asked. What did you say to him to be the recipient of this honour?’

‘I just didn’t get stroppy and force decisions on him.’

‘I thought that was the idea behind your visit.’

‘He’s a lonely, insecure old man! That cynicism and bravado is a shield. The only decent thing is to let him enjoy the years left to him.’

‘And what about us?’ Zia demands. ‘We’ll be a laughing stock! But I don’t suppose you give a damn. Why should you? Another forty-eight hours and you’ll be on a plane.’

‘That’s unfair!’

‘Well,
you
can tell Ma!’ Zia huffs and walks out.

Did Zia simply lash out in a moment of frustration, or was it his intention to make me feel mean and miserable? It’s impossible to judge. But I refuse to condemn the old man. He’s an outcast in so many ways. Only sometimes foolishly, he’s allowed his instincts to guide him through the long years.

Ma joins me in the veranda. We speak about Nasreen’s children. Ma tells me how well they’re doing at school. It seems that the superiority of the Alams is still divinely inspired. I recognise here a homespun mixture of ideas on natural selection and Allah’s will in blessing our family.

‘We’ve had our share of problems,’ Ma admits, ‘but wouldn’t you say that we’re a chosen family?’

Chosen for what and by whom?

Ma beams contentedly.

This is the opportune moment.

‘Ma, I’ve been invited to Uncle Musa’s wedding.’ I hold out the sheet of paper.

‘I don’t want to read his letter!’ Her voice is defiant. ‘I didn’t even know that a date had been set. Where’s the invitation?’

‘There’s no letter. This is the invitation.’

‘This?’ she says incredulously, grabbing it from me. ‘But it’s on an ordinary piece of paper! Handwritten! Has Musa Bhai lost all his senses?’

‘It’s a waste of money to have expensively printed invitations.’

She scrutinises the writing. ‘This cheapness is shameful! If he was that hard up, why couldn’t he take a
loan? He could have asked Zia. Or you. What has happened to us? Why have we become so mean-spirited?’

‘I’ve written to him offering congratulations. I know Uncle Musa would be happy to receive something similar from you,’ I suggest.

‘So I’m expected to give way to a seventeen-year-old village girl?’

I remain quiet. I hadn’t thought through the implications of the ranking system, the hierarchical positions in the family. After the death of each of Uncle Musa’s wives, Ma commanded obeisant treatment for a short period of time as the female head of the family. But the patriarch is to wed again. Ma’s pride must suffer a serious blow.

‘Will you write to him?’ I persist.

‘No!’ She remains adamant. ‘There was a time when marriage was a serious matter of family pedigree, honour, careful selection and months of planning. But now? Anyone can be a member of this family! Had he been well, your father would never have approved!’

‘He wouldn’t have had a choice!’

Taking the invitation, she heads off purposefully to Abba’s room.

A few minutes later I follow her.

‘Your father doesn’t remember his own brother!’ she tells me despairingly.

‘Ma, you know what his condition is.’

My mind drifts to the sound of a modulated voice over the public announcement system at the International
Airport, inviting us to board the flight to Dubai. I’m the first passenger on the aircraft.

Abba cranes his neck forward and peers at me suspiciously. ‘I know!’ He points an index finger at me. ‘You’re…you are…Su…Su…Uncle!’

Ma’s shocked. ‘What? That’s Masud.’

‘Masud?’ He looks confused. ‘Is he getting married?’

‘No, Musa Bhai is.’

‘Abba, don’t you remember Pochah?’ Perhaps Uncle Musa’s rarely used nickname, Rotten, might spark some recognition.

Abba frowns and then begins to giggle. ‘He went with the maidservant. I was guard!’

With an air of resignation, Ma hands the invitation back to me. ‘How did you get this?’ she asks.

‘It came by post.’

As I leave the room I can feel the start of a smile on my face. Uncle Musa was always a troubled, rebellious being, and he still refuses to submit to conventions, to what the Alams have designated as acceptable behaviour.

I find Mirza and ask him when Nur left.

‘He doesn’t want to be seen by Ma Begum,’ Mirza says cautiously.

‘You mean he’s still here?’ I ask incredulously.

‘He had to do some work for your uncle.’

‘At the internet shop?’

N
UR IS SMOKING
a bidi when I find him behind the garage.

‘Ah, Choto Babu!’ He drops the bidi behind his feet. ‘You received the invitation.’

‘Nur, can you tell me why Uncle is doing this, at his age?’

‘Choto Babu, nothing is as it seems. Your uncle is a kind man.’ He looks as though daring me to contradict him. ‘Yes, the girl he is marrying is very young. But did you know that no other man will have her?’

‘Why?’

‘There are reasons. I’m not allowed to tell.’

My look doesn’t intimidate Nur. ‘Will there be many people at the wedding?’

He shakes his head sadly. ‘Other than her close family members, no one else will come. They’re too embarrassed.’

I give Nur the bus fare for his trip home.

‘It’s best for you to leave before Ma sees you,’ I advise.

Nur nods grudgingly, but doesn’t budge.

‘What?’

‘My stay here has not been easy.’ Nur wipes his face with a
ghamcha.
‘Your mother’s anger…’

I hand Nur additional money.

‘Don’t think badly of him, Choto Babu. Your uncle’s a generous man. He could have employed a younger servant, but he didn’t get rid of me. He built me a small house on the edge of the village and gave me land and money.’

I’
M NERVOUS ABOUT
leaving the house, but the bright day, the crowds and the armed soldiers everywhere all lift my fears.

It takes me much longer than I had anticipated to choose the saris for Mehrun-Nessa.
Chachi
Mehrun-Nessa. It’s difficult to choose from the shimmering array of colours laid out in layers of soft, flowing material. Finally I settle for a rich aquamarine
Banarsi
threaded with gold, and a maroon
Mysori
silk sari with a broad olive-green border. The shopkeeper is delighted and giftwraps the saris.

Then, in one of the sweetmeat shops, I arrange to pick up sweet yoghurt,
ladoos
,
shondesh
and
chomchoms
the next morning.

Back at the house, an hour later, I call Zia at work.

‘The tiles look brilliant in the bathroom!’ he gushes with enthusiasm. ‘The builders are making a big push to finish. They were at work at dawn!’

Silently I bless them for their diligence, for making my brother happy.

Zia’s nonplussed by my request. ‘Of course, I can arrange for you to borrow a car. But why do you need a four-wheel-drive?’

I make no attempt to hide my intention of returning to the village. There must be a firm stubbornness in my voice that chokes questions and prevents comments which Zia might have otherwise made.

When Nasreen comes home from work, she and Ma huddle together in the dining room and whisper.

I get the silent treatment.

I’m disappointed with Nasreen. Perhaps she has sided

with Ma to placate her, but I hadn’t expected my sister to be so disapproving of Uncle Musa.

I stay in the lounge and play ludo with Nasreen’s children. When the phone rings, Yasmin runs to get it. She listens and then giggles. ‘Yes,’ she repeats several times, and then points the receiver towards me. ‘It’s for you,’ she says shyly. ‘It’s Omar Bhai.’

Omar sounds remote and formal. He brushes aside my concerns for his safety. He doesn’t say where he is. I listen carefully. There’s no factory noise in the background. ‘Are you still leaving the day after tomorrow? In the morning?’

‘Yes, but I’m now taking an evening flight.’

‘Why?’ he asks suspiciously.

‘They’d overbooked the earlier flight.’

‘Who made the change?’ He demands aggressively.

‘I didn’t get his name.’

‘Wasn’t he wearing a name tag?’

‘Not that I can recall. But, anyway, it was a young man. He was very obliging. Why can’t you tell me where you are?’

There’s a click and the phone goes dead.

The rest of the day passes slowly. I write a note for

Zia and stay in my room, reading and thinking of the future, without any great conviction that I can change things, or the way I am. I even consider coming back
here permanently. Anything is possible in the safety of my imaginings. Then I think of Steven Mills and his family. Unwillingly, I drift to Flinders Street station. Tullamarine airport. The Bourke Street mall. Crowded streets in the suburbs of Melbourne…