Chapter 14: Veer

# Chapter 14: Veer

## The Notebook

Gauri listens to the radio every day. She listens at three fixed times; 6 AM, 12 PM, 6 PM — the times that she has chosen because the times are equally spaced and the spacing is the method: if the signal has a schedule, the schedule will reveal itself across three daily observations.

She keeps a notebook. The notebook, which was a ruled notebook, the ruled notebook that Indian schoolchildren used, the notebook with the brown cover that said Classmate in blue letters, the Classmate, which was the brand that every Indian child had written in from age six to age eighteen, the brand that was as Indian as dal-chawal and chai and the distinctive anxiety of board exams. Gauri had found the Classmate notebook in a stationery shop on Baner Road — the shop: shuttered, the shuttering: opened with Veer's bolt cutter, key that opened every shutter in the new, the bolt cutterworld.

In the notebook, Gauri records:

Day 1 (Thursday): - 6 AM: Signal present. 7.240 MHz. Pattern: A (dot-dash). Duration: continuous. Strength: weak (2/5). - 12 PM: Signal absent. Static on 7.240 MHz. Scanned all SW bands. Nothing. - 6 PM: Signal present. 7.240 MHz. Pattern: A (dot-dash). Duration: continuous. Strength: moderate (3/5).

Day 2 (Friday): - 6 AM: Signal present. 7.240 MHz. Pattern: A (dot-dash). Duration: continuous. Strength: weak (2/5). - 12 PM: Signal absent. - 6 PM: Signal present. Strength: moderate (3/5). NEW: at 6:17 PM, signal changed. New pattern: dot-dash-dot-dot / dot / dot-dash / dot-dot-dot-dot. Translation: L-E-A-H.

"LEAH?" I said when she showed me. "Yeh kya hai? Naam hai?"

"Shayad. Ya code hai. Ya; ya random hai."

Maybe. Or a code. Or, random.

Day 3 (Saturday): - 6 AM: Signal present. Pattern: A. Continuous. - 12 PM: Signal absent. - 6 PM: Signal present. NEW: at 6:22 PM, signal changed to: dot-dash-dot-dot / dot / dot-dash / dot-dot-dot-dot. L-E-A-H. Then back to A. Then at 6:31 PM: dash-dot / dot-dot / dash-dot-dot / dot-dot-dot-dot / dot-dot / dot-dash-dot-dot / dot-dash-dot-dot / dot-dot-dot. Translation: N-I-D-H-I-L-L-S.

"NIDHILLS?" Gauri frowned. "Nahi; wait. NIDHI. LLS."

She stared at the notebook. Stared at the letters. Rewrote them with spaces: NIDHI. LLS.

"NIDHI," she said. "Nidhi ek naam hai."

Nidhi is a name.

"Aur LLS?"

"Nahi pata. Abbreviation? Location? LLS. Kya ho sakta hai?"

I don't know. Abbreviation? Location? LLS, what could it be?

Pallavi, sitting on the sofa with Kiaan, said: "Lavale."

We both looked at her.

"Lavale," she repeated. "Pune ke paas. Lavale, L-A-V-A-L-E. Nahi, woh LVL hoga. Hmm."

She thought. Then: "Lonavala? L-O-N-A-V-A-L-A. LLS: Lonavala? Nahi..."

Gauri shook her head. "LLS nahi match karta kisi city se."

LLS doesn't match any city.

Day 4 (Sunday): - 6 AM: Signal present. A. - 12 PM: Signal absent. - 6 PM: Signal present. At 6:15 PM: L-E-A-H. At 6:20 PM: NEW pattern. Longer. Much longer. Gauri's hand cramping as she copied the dots and dashes.

Translation: S-A-F-E-Z-O-N-E-L-A-V-A-S-A-A-L-I-V-E-N-I-D-H-I.

Gauri wrote it out with spaces. Her handwriting getting larger as she wrote, the larger, which was excitement that the hand transmitted when the mind was excited:

SAFE ZONE LAVASA ALIVE NIDHI

"Lavasa," I said.

Lavasa. The planned hill city — the planned city that had been built in the hills between Pune and the Western Ghats, the city that was supposed to be India's answer to Portofino, the city that had been built by Hindustan Construction Company and that had been India's most ambitious real estate project and that had failed spectacularly, the failing, which was the Indian development story in miniature: grand vision, inadequate execution, legal battles, half-finished buildings, abandoned construction, the HCC bankruptcy, the Lavasa sign on NH4 that pointed to a dream that had become a monument to ambition's limits.

But Lavasa existed. Lavasa was real, a collection of buildings in the hills, forty kilometres from Pune, built on the shores of Warasgaon Dam, the dam, which was the water supply that made Lavasa viable as a settlement: water, shelter, altitude.

"Safe zone," Pallavi repeated. "Lavasa mein safe zone hai?"

There's a safe zone in Lavasa?

"Yehi toh bola. Signal yehi bol raha hai. SAFE ZONE LAVASA ALIVE NIDHI."

That's what it says. The signal is saying: SAFE ZONE LAVASA ALIVE NIDHI.

"Nidhi kaun hai?"

Who is Nidhi?

"Jo broadcast kar raha hai. Ya kar rahi hai. Signal bhej rahi hai. Shortwave pe. Roz.

Whoever is broadcasting. Sending the signal. On shortwave. Every day. Morning and evening.

"Toh, toh Lavasa mein koi hai. Koi Nidhi hai. Aur safe zone hai."

So. In Lavasa, someone's there. Someone named Nidhi. And there's a safe zone.

"Haan."

The three of us sat in the model flat's living room. Kiaan on Pallavi's lap. Bholu at my feet. The Classmate notebook on the dining table between us, the notebook containing four days of observations, four days of signals, four days of the radio's voice saying: A. LEAH. NIDHI. SAFE ZONE. LAVASA. ALIVE.

The words, the first words from the outside world. The first proof that beyond Pune's dead streets and empty societies and silent roads, there existed: a safe zone. A place where someone named Nidhi was alive and broadcasting and saying to anyone who could hear: come. We are here. We are alive. Come to Lavasa.

"Jaana chahiye," I said. We should go.

Pallavi looked at me.

"Kitna door hai Lavasa?"

How far is Lavasa?

"Chaalis kilometre. Shayad pachaas. Pune se, NH4 pe jaana hoga. Phir Temghar Dam Road. Phir Lavasa Road."

Forty kilometres. Maybe fifty. From Pune: take NH4. Then Temghar Dam Road. Then Lavasa Road.

"Gaadi mein?"

By car?

"Haan. Bicycle se nahi ho payega. Hills hain. Ghaat hai. Gaadi chahiye."

Yes. Can't do it by bicycle. There are hills. Ghats. Need a car.

"Petrol?"

"D-Mart parking lot mein chaar gaadiyaan hain. Unke tanks mein petrol hoga. Agar nahi toh; petrol pump pe manually nikaal sakte hain. Gauri?"

There are four cars in the D-Mart parking lot. Their tanks will have petrol. If not: we can manually extract from the petrol pump. Gauri?

Gauri nodded. "Manually nikaal sakte hain. Pump ka underground tank mein petrol hoga. Ek hose chahiye aur, aur thoda physics."

We can extract manually. The pump's underground tank will have petrol. Need a hose and. Some physics.

"Toh plan kya hai?"

So what's the plan?

I looked at Pallavi. Looked at Gauri. Looked at Kiaan, who was awake now and making the motor-sound. Looked at Bholu, who was looking at me with the look that dogs gave when they sensed that a walk was being discussed.

"Plan yeh hai. Kal: kal hum gaadi dhundhte hain. Petrol check karte hain. Agar gaadi chale: toh Lavasa jaate hain. Dekhte hain ki kya hai.

The plan is: tomorrow — we find a car. Check the petrol. If the car runs, we go to Lavasa. See what's there. If there's a safe zone: if someone's really there, we see.

"Sab jaayenge?"

All of us?

The question. The question that contained the sub-question: do we leave the model flat? Do we leave the home that we have built? Do we leave the safe space and venture into the unknown?

"Haan. Sab."

Yes. All of us.

Pallavi was quiet. The quiet of a woman who was weighing: the model flat versus Lavasa. The known versus the unknown. The safety of isolation versus the risk of connection.

"Theek hai," she said. Okay.

The decision made. Not with enthusiasm. Not with excitement. With a Maharashtrian pragmatism that said: *the situation has changed. The data has changed. The decision must change.

Tomorrow we would find a car.

Tomorrow we would drive to Lavasa.

Tomorrow we would follow the signal.

SAFE ZONE LAVASA ALIVE NIDHI.

The words that would lead us out of the model flat and into the world.

The words that would change everything.