by Samit Basu
'Then think about this for a couple of days. Wouldn't you rather be in charge of your own Flow?'
'No need. I'm sure you'd make a decent Flow with me. But what would I get out of it? You'd make me do some kind of intelligent girl in the city show, small and meaningful. Festival type. Something your friends would like, but they'll never really accept me, no? People from my town wouldn't see it. And I need to inspire them, show them how far someone like them can go. They need to see me on boards at traffic signals, on the sides of buses. I'm going with Indi. I'd lost all hope, but just yesterday my life turned around.'
They finish their salads in silence, stabbing errant leaves harder than necessary.
'I'm sure it'll go really well,' Joey says. 'I'm quite envious of you guys, shooting in that Culture Colony mansion while we slum it out here.'
'Yeah. I haven't seen the place yet, but, wait, how do you know where we're shooting?'
'Oh, I didn't know, just heard they've bought a new space. We do still all work for the same company, you know.’
‘Wait, you knew all along? Why didn’t you say so?’
‘I didn’t know anything,’ Joey says. ‘Sorry, am I talking too much? A friend told me I should talk more, because it’s all we can do, and so I thought I should try it out.’
Tara stares at her with infinite suspicion, and Joey doesn't meet her eyes as she calls for the cheque.
As she walks into the Flowstar building a week later, she checks her other inboxes on her phone. In the Good Morning spam folder is one slightly different from the others: the greeting is standard, but the background is a photo of a sunrise over a forest. In the middle distance, a cow stands next to a milestone by a highway. She's never heard the name of the town written on it, but when she checks, she finds it's in Madhya Pradesh. The last week's one had been from a dhaba near Chandigarh, the first one, a week before that, had been from Rajasthan. She's tempted to write Good Morning back, but doesn’t. This must be how people deliberately avoided text replies in the Olden Days, and she wants Rudra to know she’s still really angry with him.
MC Sharmila projects tremendous calm and balance as she enters the penthouse, but cannot help a flicker of surprise when she sees her former bodyguards, the Six-Pack, lounging around the living room. Joey walks towards her with a pitcher of fresh cold brew, and enjoys the second where Sharmila's sure she's about to throw it at her.
'Why didn't you all tell me you would be here?' she asks the Six-Pack.
'I wanted it to be a surprise,' Joey says. 'I also wanted to get to know them — I've known you forever, and seen them for years, but always as a team, you know? I was just telling them this — everyone gets so used to seeing them in those hot costumes, doing all that fancy martial arts stuff. And you packaged the team so carefully, you should have been a K-pop trainer — but at least with boybands you get to know their names because they sing and talk, right? So for years I called the Six-Pack the Kashmiri one, the Malayali one, the Manipuri one, the Marathi one, the Goan and the white one. I didn't even know Aline was from Pondicherry. Sorry about that.'
'I don't know what this is about,' Sharmila says. 'But before you say anything more, I have a few things to say.'
'Go ahead.'
'I wanted to tell you face to face I don't think you're a real gender-traitor, and I should have been more nuanced about my callout. I've asked my girls yesterday to ease off on you on their Flows, and I don't have a problem working with you. We can even do a Flow together where I tell everyone I forgive you, and it's all good.'
'Thanks, that won't be necessary,' Joey says. 'I presume your girls are some of the people who've been trolling me. If you tell me which ones they are, I'll unblock them. But we can figure that out later. Have a seat. Have a drink.'
She paces the room, hoping to the high heavens she's got all the ex-bodyguards' names right.
'In case you were worried, my Flowco's acquisition of yours was not part of some kind of revenge plot,' Joey says. 'You are valuable, we are expanding, that's all. You're all still contracted for two more years, and all your jobs are safe. I'm not saying this just to make you feel better. I know it's true, because you all work for me now.'
'Just stepping in to avoid confusion later,' Sharmila says. 'We work with your company, as stars. Your job is to take care of us. So let's avoid gaslighting.'
‘I'll try, thanks. Regarding Indi, there is an internal investigation under way. It'll be a while before a verdict is reached. I'm not involved, I have bias. None of you will be required to make a statement of any kind, or appear on any show with Indi as part of cross-promotions. Different departments entirely. We already discussed this, Sharmila, I'm just catching you up.'
'Yeah, I’m the one who made these decisions.'
'Now, as you may be aware, two weeks ago, everything changed in the Indian Flow ecosystem. What happened is-'
'We know all this, Joey,' Sharmila says. 'Everyone who knows anything knows about it. The Koreans are coming, and they're doing a diversity push. First time they're doing this anywhere in the world, India is a huge experiment, the world will watch with interest, and so on.’
Joey leans back and tries to look like she’s trying not to look worried. She’s quite sure she ends up looking either confused or blank, both of which are completely viable Intrigue Faces. She brings her fingertips together theatrically, slowly, judging herself very harshly while doing so.
'It's just a rumour,’ she says.
'No, it's not. And I know about it, and I know I'm worth more now. The Chinese are pushing in money to match this, and every Flowco's doing a diversity push. And everyone's forgotten I was the first person to demand diversity in the Indian workspace, which basically means my girls and I are worth even more, and so before we move any further: we want a raise.'
'Why don't you shut up and listen for a second,' Aline says, and Sharmila lapses into stunned silence.
'What happened is that our Flowco needed to think in terms of a new direction as well, and as it turns out, I didn't have active Flowstars to manage. I guess you all know how that happened,' Joey says. 'The thing is, I'd also been sending in pitches about how new demographics could be explored for a long time. Nobody had the time to see them, because there were always fires to fight, but I guess that's why they chose me to head it now. We're not calling it a diversity push, by the way, because Nikhil insists it's just a long-term growth initiative led solely by numbers. I'm fine with that. The numbers are solid, they came from me.’
'I get why you guys needed my Flowco now,' Sharmila says. 'You picked it up cheap.'
'Yes. Aline, Sonia, Farzina-'
‘Farzana.'
'Sorry. Farzana, Mary, Sam, Shruthi — I knew all of you had tried out for Flowstar auditions before you took non-speaking parts as Sharmila's bodyguards and then got famous as a group. When I looked all of you up, I was hoping there would be one of you who had some behind-the-scenes experience as well. And then I found out all of you did.'
'Yeah, I don't think any of us wanted to be hot bodyguards,' Farzana says. 'But... you know how it is.'
'I do. You've all worked as managers, editors, assistants, extras, whatever it takes. You're all experienced professionals, you've worked with each other, you know what this world is. So I want to ask you to be my first set of Reality Controllers. Sharmila, you too.'
'I knew you'd get to it at some point,' Sharmila says. 'I knew you'd find a way to shut down my Flow. This is about revenge.'
'It's really not. I mean of course I was angry with you — you've known me since we were kids, and you didn't even talk to me before you pulled that stunt. I've never been the world's best feminist, but I know enough to know what you did was wrong.'
'No it wasn't.'
'Right. Anyway, you did make me think about a lot of things I'd ignored. So, whether you believe me or not, I'm grateful. So I'll not make it hard for you to work for me — and you do work for me. And I think we can build something really special together.'
Sharmila has more to say, but the Six-Pack aren't looking to her for guidance any more.
'What are we building?' Shruthi asks.
'A beginning,' Joey says. 'I need people who've faced more exclusion than I have to take the lead. Every time I draw up a plan, I come up with a hundred problems. When resources are limited, how do you decide who gets representation? When there are so many languages, and regions, and religions, and castes, and so many other tools to keep people silenced, how do you decide who gets a voice?'
'Everyone,' Aline says.
'Yes. We need Muslim Flowstars, and Dalit Flowstars, and LGBTQIA+ Flowstars. We need differently abled Flowstars, immigrant flowstars, so many other categories it makes my head spin. That's just the beginning. And that's just in India. And that's just for people facing cameras. We need to do all this for people running the Flows as well, for crews, for managers, for everyone in the system. They'll all have to be found, and trained. They'll all have to be heard. Not just by me, but by people with more empathy, more experience and less privilege than I have. The language changes so fast I can't keep up, and I get it wrong — or at least people tell me I get it wrong, and I clam up. On top of all this, there's the whole process of figuring out how to build a system that's bigger than any individual, to find ways to avoid all the infighting, the politics, the cliques, the frauds, the competition for single token spots. The whole point of all this tech, all these connections, was supposed to be that everyone got a voice. And I don't know how we ended up in this situation where it feels like no one does.'
Joey takes a breath, and reads the room. Her head's spinning, her palms are sweating. She doesn't remember when she last spoke this much at length. College? Her short-lived video star career? School debates?
'But we have to start somewhere,' she says. 'We don't wait for the perfect time or team or anyone's permission. We're going to start here, and make mistakes, and learn, and grow. I have money, for now. A year to play with before anyone shuts us down. And I have help — I have people hacking into algorithms that politicians use to control opinions, and advertisers use to control tastes. We have so many new ways to find people who need to be heard, find out who speaks for communities, find out what they need. It's just a question of using these tools to help not just us, but them. I'm sure other people are trying this around the world, but we don't get to hear about it because no one with power wants that. I don't know how long it will take my hackers to arrive at a system that works. I don't know if they're good enough to solve this, they're going to make mistakes too. But they're going to try. There are so many people fighting for inclusion, smarter people than us. We'll find them, talk to them, learn from them, share resources. And all the while generate enough money and attention for our Flowco division to keep the lights on, so they don't just cancel us and focus on the high earners.'
'What do you need from us?' Farzana asks.
'I need a team of people who can work together, teach me things, and believe in this. A core to build around, people who can take the heat, ignore the shitstorm, know what they're looking for. I need a team who will take pay cuts, like I will, to bring in more hands, and pay them fairly. I’ve done box-checking token diversity before — so have you. Now I want more. And I can't think of anyone better than you to do this with.'
'This is such bullshit, Joey,' Sharmila says. 'You want me to take a pay cut, abandon my career, and work with my bodyguards?'
'Yes. You can get back in front of the camera the moment you find your replacement. Also, if Flowstarring is all you want to do, you'll be working for your former bodyguards, not with them.'
'With you as the queen of everything.'
'I don't think you understand, Sharmila. I was wrong before. I'm trying to make things right now. Work with me.'
'That's not good enough.'
'I'm sure you have access to more paint if you need it.'
'Nice try,' Sharmila says. 'I've heard all I need to hear, and we can get a far better deal at other places.'
She springs to her feet.
'Ladies, we're out of here,' she says.
The Six-Pack do not move.
Joey realises everything's different in her family home before Laxmi opens the door: laughter rings through the house. Not AI laughter, but human — her parents on the living-room sofa screaming with what sounds suspiciously like pure joy. She doesn't remember when she last heard anything like this.
There's a puppy. A savage ball of golden fluff trying his best to destroy everything in the house, failing only because he's so very small. He ceases chewing on Avik's toe as Joey appears, and shuffle-bounces towards her. She drops down on her knees to gather him up, and as he wriggles in her hands and bites her chin, tail wagging in a blur, she has no idea why, but she bursts into tears.
'Why didn't you tell me?' she says.
'We'd have missed this,' says her father. He looks a decade younger.
'Something's different about you,' her mother tells her at lunch.
'What do you mean?'
'Must be in love,' Rono says.
'First of all, where are your clothes?'
'What? Oh my laundry. I bought a smart-washer.’
'Good we got the dog,' Avik says. 'Just in time, too. She still has a reason to come here.'
Joey looks around the table, and the house, and listens to her family bicker and a dozen machines fart and hum, and feels something dangerously close to contentment.
'Seriously, what happened?' Romola asks again that afternoon. 'You're awake, sitting up, you're smiling, talking to yourself. What is going on?'
'I think it's the dog,' Joey says. 'Everything feels different.'
'Your father needed him. Someone to take him seriously, make him feel important, listen to his advice. He was driving all of us mad.'
'I'd asked you for a dog only a million times.'
'You should have asked harder. I gave in when one night I found I was thinking of getting him a sex doll to distract him. And thinking I couldn't not because it was illegal, but because it was too expensive.'
'Are you doing okay for money?'
'If I need help I'll ask again,' Romola says. 'Things are a bit tight, but I'm holding it together. I don't think we can send Rono to the kind of college we need to, but he doesn't want to go to college anyway. I don't know what he does all day in his room. He doesn't want to go anywhere, all his friends are on his phone, I don't know what people he's watching all day, and what ideas they're filling his head with.'
'He's fine. I'm sure your parents felt this way about you too.'
'They did, but not when I was in the house. He's just uninterested in anything outside his room.'
'He's a teenager and a boy, ma. You don't want to see what he does.'
'I guess so. I was just hoping the dog would save him, just like he saved Avik. Your father's got a new project, translating Bengali books into Japanese. Yes, I know, he learned. It's not a real solution, but it adds to my income, and we're okay for now.'
'You should take some money from me before I lose my job.'
'No. It's very strange having this money conversation with you, you know? It's hard for me to remember you're not three years old.'
'I can see why you'd still think that, sometimes.'
'I don't know, Joey. It's just... hard to deal with change. I'm tired all the time. And things are changing so fast. If the air was better, you'd have gone to the balcony and seen that the tree is gone.'
'What? My bel tree?'
'Yeah. They cut it one day, out of nowhere, they're widening the street. People know how little parking there is but they all have to get new SUVs, what will their neighbours think otherwise. They keep trying to change more things. Prestige.'
'I'm going to pretend the tree's still there. I don't want to go and look.'
'The whole street's going to be unrecognisable in a few months. But the old things will keep coming back as well. The Welfare Association brought cleaning robots, we all paid for t
hem, but they didn't work, so now they're all lying under plastic in someone's basement, and the same old man who sweeps the street every morning is back.'
'As long as the fascist uncles are still shouting in the park, you'll know where you live.'
'They've started sending long sponsored messages to everyone in the morning with good news stories: how the next wave facial recognition will keep us all safe even if we have masks on, or how a drone found a missing kitten. So more drones, more cameras, more guards, all coming soon. Speaking of guards, how is the Gupta boy? Rudra?'
'Rudra's gone. Didn't even say goodbye.'
'It's a mean thing to say, but that's a good thing for you. The whole family's trouble, always has been. We took them in once, when they were in deep trouble, and they almost ruined our marriage, stayed forever, spent all our money and left without even thanking us. I'm ashamed of how polite we were, back then.'
'I know what that feels like,' Joey says. 'It happens to me at work too. People come in, I start caring about them, and then they leave. And I feel like it's my fault. I don't see things, or I don't do things, and they vanish. Then I bring in new people, and wait for them to leave as well.'
'That's just Delhi,' her mother says. 'People treat it as a stop on their journeys to somewhere better. Or they get stuck, and don't know how to leave.'
'I don't think Rudra had any idea what he was doing at any point. But he's not like his family, he's better. I don't know what he's gone to do, but I think it's something big. Answering some call, some purpose. Something I wouldn't have the courage to do. I've never felt that way about anything.'
'There's no point making these comparisons, Joey. You weren't raised to think you were the Chosen One. He was. He'll go through his whole life with people making excuses for him and taking care of him. I'm glad it's not you.’
‘So am I, I think.’
‘You, on the other hand, might actually survive, and be happy, and sane. All things you deserve. You stay where you belong, make sure no one pushes you around, and do the best you can, and that's all anyone can ask for.'