Chained (21 page)

We pass the banyan tree where the trap used to be, and Nandita runs alongside the river, deeper into the forest. When we see the herd in the river, I reach up and pull myself onto a tree branch that Nandita passes under. Only then do I realize I still have Sharad’s key ring. I laugh and toss it into the river. With no way to start the elephant truck and no way to lock the shackles, they will have a hard time catching a new elephant anytime soon.

The elephants trumpet and spin circles and touch Nandita with their trunks, celebrating even more excitedly than they did at the fence.

From a branch that hangs over the riverbank I watch Nandita standing in the river with the other elephants. Water splashes over her body, and she sprays her friend Indurekha with her trunk, just as she did when I first saw them last year.

For the rest of her days, when Nandita is hungry, she will eat. When she is thirsty, she will drink from the river. She will walk without chains wherever she wants to go. When she is tired, she will rest. Someday she will be a mother—a good one, I know, a fierce protector of her children. Maybe one day she will be the leader of this herd.

I climb partway down the tree, then jump onto the riverbank. I’d like to give Nandita a proper goodbye, but I do not want to interrupt her homecoming.

From my bag, I grab Nandita’s Ganesh carving, the one she still holds in her trunk sometimes while she sleeps. She probably doesn’t need it anymore, but I place it on a low branch, just in case. Maybe when she sees it she will think of me.

I turn away to continue my journey to my own village. I don’t know what I will find there. It might not look the same as I remember, but I am going home.

Water splashes and a branch snaps behind me. I do not turn around. For one last time, I will let Nandita sneak up on me.

When I feel her trunk on my shoulder, I turn around and act surprised to see her. She looks like she is laughing as she touches my head and face with her trunk. I step closer to give her a hug, and she places her trunk on my back. The rope that holds the wooden bell around her neck catches my eye. Why hadn’t I heard the bell when she approached?

Both clappers still hang on either side of the bell, so it does not look to be broken. I grab the bell and shake it. The sticks tap against the sides, but the
clip-clop-clip
I usually hear is gone. Mud drips onto my hand, and I turn the bell over to see more mud packed inside it.

Nandita has given me another gift from Ne Min. I laugh as I remember the story he told me while he was carving Nandita’s bell.

“Some elephants, some of the smart ones, are mischievous
.
They clog their bell with mud to block its sound, if they wish to hide from you. Then you will have to search longer, but you will find her, and she will come to you.”

I untie the rope from Nandita’s neck. No one will need to look for her anymore. With the river water I clear the mud out of the bell, then pet Nandita’s trunk once more. I will hang the bell outside my window, and when the wind blows, I’ll think of Nandita and Ne Min.

Sometimes, I’m sure, I will wake up and look around for Nandita, or I’ll smell breakfast and wonder what Ne Min is cooking. Then, as Ne Min said, the remembering will hit me with a pain that drops me to the ground. But I will stand up again. The sadness will be woven with a happiness that makes it worth feeling, and I will not run from it.

*   *   *

The river narrows, and I stop to rest on a moss-covered rock. I don’t know how much farther the river will run, so I remove the empty iodine bottle from my bag. The chill of the riverbank seeps through the legs of my pants as I kneel to place the bottle in the water. I take time to enjoy the feel of the river current running over my hand. Before I return the bottle to my bag, I cap it tightly to hold in the last I will ever see of this river.

I move on toward my desert home, somewhere far ahead of me. Behind me, I hear a distant trumpeting in the forest, a joyful sound I have not heard from Nandita before. Finally, she is home.

*   *   *

It’s been three days since I left the circus grounds. At times I’ve been able to catch a ride on the back of a grain truck to help me get to my village faster, but I’ve had to walk much of the way. One night a nice farmer let me stay at his house overnight so I wouldn’t have to sleep outside. His family didn’t have much to eat but they shared their dinner with me and refilled my bottle with water before I left.

Scatterings of thorny babul and kikar trees stand along the landscape now, instead of the towering forest trees that covered the road with a canopy of branches. I pass fields of chilies, the fruits turning orange and red. The roads I walk are no longer shaded, but that means I’m closer to home.

Last night I walked until I couldn’t move anymore, then found a place to sleep under a roheda tree. My muscles groaned when I stood up this morning to continue my journey.

I’ve been walking all day long, but somehow the sun isn’t going away. The bottle has been empty for a long time now, but I keep checking for one last drop. My exhausted body aches for rest after walking so far. How can I come this far just to fail, so close to home? But I see no water anywhere around me. I must try to keep walking and hope to find a drink somewhere. When I shove the bottle back into my bag, my hand brushes the wood of my Ganesh figure. I take it from the bag and hold it in my hand while I think about all I have been through since the day I carved it.

I’ve been separated from my family, never knowing if my sister survived or if her illness took her. I have seen a loved one hurt and another die. I have lived as a prisoner. And I broke free.

The journey ahead of me is still long, but whatever obstacles it holds, I know I’ve made it through far worse. I have to keep going.

I look to my right and notice something approaching in the distance. Too wide to be a person walking, but too slow to be a truck. As it gets closer I make out the curved horns and nodding heads of two bulls pulling a bullock cart.

The driver stops the cart next to me when I wave. In a scratchy voice I ask how far he’s traveling. He will be passing by my village. The ride will be slow, but I will have a chance to rest. I climb onto the cart and sit atop the rice bags piled in the back. The driver hands me a jar of water, then snaps the reins of the bullocks to drive us forward.

In two gulps I drain the water jar. Even on the rough burlap of the rice bags, I fall asleep.

I wake when the driver calls to me. The cart has stopped. It doesn’t seem like we could have ridden long enough to be near my home yet, but when I sit up the driver points toward my village. I thank the man as I hand him the empty water jar, then jump down from the cart to follow the sunset to my home.

I’d forgotten what it felt like to have sand in my shoes. Sand blows in my eyes, and I laugh. I cry when I see a camel.

When I reach the spot in the road where I last saw my mother, I stop. I look down the road that took me away, just as Amma did the day I left.

Baba said that a story is no good if you hear only the ending. You have to know how you got there. I still cannot say I will ever be thankful for much of what has happened to me, but everything I’ve ever done has brought me here.

A wagging tail catches my eye. I can’t believe it.

“Raj?” I say. He trots over to me. I crouch down to pet him and laugh as he licks my face. He is fatter than I remember. So someone has been feeding him all this time.

The evening is cold, and the village stove pours smoke into the desert sky. I start to run to the courtyard, then stop when I see her carrying a basket of laundry to our house. Chanda pauses at our front door and drops the basket when she notices me.

Her smile is the same as our mother’s. She looks tall. And healthy. I am so relieved to see her, I need all the strength I have left to keep from crumbling to the ground.

I wondered what I would say when I saw her again—if I saw her again—and if she would even recognize me, but we run to each other and crash into a hug as if no time or distance ever separated us. The pain of our separation fades as the scents of spices and bread dough in her clothes welcome me home.

We laugh when my stomach growls. I take my sister’s hand and run toward the smell of baking rotis. Dinner is best when I pour the buttermilk while the roti is still hot.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

India has laws to protect elephants like Nandita and children like Hastin, but as everywhere in the world, there are people who ignore the law.

Since 1973, elephant capture in India has been illegal, except to relocate an elephant that has encroached upon land inhabited by people. For many years, circuses and zoos could legally obtain elephants that had been bred in captivity, but in 2009, a new law banned the use of elephants in Indian zoos and circuses. Many elephants already in zoos or circuses were transferred to national parks and animal sanctuaries. Concerns about the elephant population suffering because of poaching, habitat loss, and human-elephant conflicts led to later amendments to the Wildlife Protection Act, providing greater safeguards for elephants. Despite stricter regulations, forest departments in India continue to receive reports about illegal poaching and elephant trapping. Conservationists and animal welfare groups like the SPCA work to improve the lives of captive elephants in India and protect those in the wild.

Although child labor laws forbid the hiring of children, families who live in poverty often send their children to work in homes as servants or in factories. The children work long hours for very little pay and are sometimes abused by their employers. Laws banning child labor have been around since 1986, and in recent years new laws have been enacted to expand restrictions on hiring children. But millions of children still work under appalling conditions, and people who violate the law are seldom prosecuted.

Circuses were exempt from child labor laws until a 2010 amendment to the Child Labor Act banned circus owners from hiring children under the age of fourteen. Many owners ignored the ban, but in 2011 the Supreme Court in India ordered the government to enforce the ban by raiding circuses and rescuing child employees.

Advocacy groups in India are fighting vigilantly to end corruption so existing laws that protect the country’s animals and children can be enforced.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I feel like thanking everyone I’ve ever met or spoken to, but since acknowledgment pages tend to be more specific than that, special elephant-sized thanks go out to these people:

My agent, Joanna Stampfel-Volpe, equal parts cheerleader and ninja. Gina Loverde, who while interning at the agency was the first reader for
Chained
and the one to tell Joanna, “You have to read this.” And the whole team at Nancy Coffey Literary and Media Representation: Nancy Coffey, Sara Kendall, Kathleen Ortiz, and Pouya Shahbazian.

Editor Margaret Ferguson, for believing in the story and working countless hours to make it better. Assistant editor Susan Dobinick, copy editor Alicia Hudnett, and the marketing, publicity, sales, and design departments at Macmillan. Most people have no idea how much time and how many people it takes to bring a book to life. Thank you all for your dedication.

The Highlights Foundation for awarding the scholarship that allowed me to attend the Chautauqua Institute in 2008, where I learned how to be a better writer and met people I still call friends.

The community of writers I’ve met in person and online, for celebrating the good times, offering support through the not-so-good times, and keeping me entertained through it all.

Online critique group members who helped make the early chapters presentable: Gail Greenberg, Donna Grahmann, Kathy Hammer, Alicia Richardson, Charles Trevino, and Lisa Willis.

Those who critiqued the whole manuscript and celebrated with lunch and/or cake: Meet, Eat, & Critique members Mary David, Stephanie Green, Charles Trevino (who told me at the beginning, “This isn’t a picture book, it’s a novel”), and Brian C. Williams; Will Write For Cake members Laura Edge, Doris Fisher, Miriam King, Christina Mandelski, Monica Vavra, and Tammy Waldrop. I swear I’m not hanging out with you people just for the food.

The debut authors in the Apocalypsies and the Class of 2k12 have made this journey a fun one to travel. Thank you for all the support and camaraderie as we flail along the road to publication together.

Stephanie Sheffield, who gave birth to Hastin by suggesting “How about adding a boy to take care of the elephant?” back when I thought I was only writing a little elephant book.

My family—those who were the first readers of Hastin’s story, showed patience and understanding when I spent days in front of the computer in a Snuggie, and/or gave support and encouragement along the way.

Dr. Lynette Hart of the University of California at Davis for reviewing the manuscript and providing feedback about elephant behavior. Thank you for making sure those elephants were behaving themselves.

From the Houston Zoo: Daryl Hoffman, Curator of Large Mammals, Elephant Manager Martina Stevens, and all the elephant keepers, for information about elephant care and behavior during and after the zoo’s Elephant Open House events.

Yale University’s 2007 Burmese language study group led by Dr. U Khin Maung Gyi for coming up with name suggestions for Ne Min and his elephant. Viola L. Wu continued to answer my later questions about Burma and Burmese culture.

Journalist/researcher Surekha Sule for the information about rural housing in India, so I’d know what Hastin’s house would look like.

Varsha Bajaj, Nandini Bajpai, Anjali Banerjee, and Mitali Perkins answered questions about India and Indian culture. Rani Iyer gave invaluable feedback after reading the full manuscript.

This book wouldn’t be what it is without Uma Krishnaswami, who was as interested as I was in telling Hastin’s story authentically. Thank you for all the hours spent reading the manuscript, the insightful comments about cultural accuracy and my writing, and answers to endless follow-up questions. I wish I could bottle your patience and wisdom and keep it at my desk. The story of Ganesh on page 147 is based on Uma Krishnaswami’s retelling in
The Broken Tusk
.