Vanished

by Sheela Chari

  Sree shrank back behind his mother again, and Neela caught her parents exchanging looks as if they thought Sudha Auntie was a very strange woman.

  After dinner, everyone returned to the living room.

  “You have to do the honor of playing something for us, Sudha,” Mrs. Krishnan said.

  Sudha waved her hand. “You don’t want to be subjected to my playing on an evening like this.”

  “Are you joking?” Mr. Krishnan asked. “All our friends will say, You had Sudha Rajugopal at your house and you didn’t hear her play? It would be a hard thing to live down.”

  Sudha Auntie grinned. “That is a nice thing to say, even to an old donkey like me.”

  Neela listened as her teacher and parents went back and forth. She knew this pretense of Sudha Auntie not wanting to play, and her parents insisting, was all just an act. It was only a matter of time before Sudha Auntie “gave in” and did what she had been hoping to do all evening long. At last her parents “won,” and Mr. Krishnan got out the student veena.

  “Glad to see it’s still here,” Sudha Auntie quipped.

  Neela bit her lip. Would she ever hear the end of it from her teacher?

  Sudha Auntie gestured to her. “Neela plays first.”

  Neela started. “No, you can go ahead.” She hoped that would be enough to avoid playing.

  Sudha Auntie was adamant. “All musicians play. Besides, we want to hear you.”

  “Go on,” Mrs. Krishnan said gently.

  Mr. Krishnan smiled encouragingly. “How about the recital piece?”

  Neela sighed, seeing she had no choice. She sat down next to the student veena. It seemed she had been practicing the recital piece for so long. But she had been getting better. Even Sudha Auntie, who used every opportunity to harp on all the things Neela was doing wrong at their lessons, had been criticizing her less these days. Still, practicing was not the same thing as performing. When you performed, you didn’t stop in the middle. Unless you messed up.

  Neela began softly, building volume as she continued with her song, entirely conscious of everyone watching her. Why couldn’t she concentrate the way she did when she was alone? Then halfway through the piece, Sree crept next to her to tap the beat on his lap. And usually it was annoying to have him so close to her elbow. Yet that little thing made her feel as if it were just the two of them in the living room, as it had been all these past days. She started to relax, the great eye inside her opened at last, and she was able to focus. When she finished, she had counted three wrong notes, but she was sure she hadn’t left out any lines this time, and she had even improvised the last notes the way she did when she was alone. Everyone clapped.

  “Sree, you counted the beats!” Mrs. Krishnan said. “When did you learn that?”

  “Neela taught me,” he said.

  Her parents looked at her, surprised.

  “He’s been sitting with me when I practice.” Neela shrugged as if it was no big thing, but secretly she was glad he had done a good job.

  “Not bad,” Sudha Auntie said. “Neela, you’re improving.”

  Neela smiled. “Thanks.”

  “Of course, you’ll have to learn to sound more musical,” Sudha Auntie added, “and less like a trained monkey.”

  Her parents and teacher laughed. How typical of Sudha Auntie. Yet wrapped inside that monkey comment was an actual compliment—maybe the first Neela had ever heard from Sudha Auntie directed her way. She felt a glimmer of satisfaction flash through her. When Sree sat on the couch next to her, she didn’t shove him away like she normally did.

  Next came Sudha Auntie’s turn. She started first with a scale known as a ragam, which contained all the notes she would play in the song. Then she continued with the main song, which Neela recognized immediately. It was “Sri Chakra Raja.” Her mother sang it when she was scrubbing the kitchen or folding clothes. Neela always associated the song with housework. It never occurred to her that it could be performed in front of an audience.

  Sudha Auntie took her time with the melody, her fingers gliding up and down the frets effortlessly. Neela remembered Lalitha Patti saying that Sudha Auntie made many appearances in her early days, with thousands of people coming at a time to hear her play.

  As Neela watched, she was struck by something strange and lovely in her teacher’s face, a kind of glow, as if she were lit from within. How was it that her teacher, who normally looked like a dried-up fruit, could look suddenly almost…beautiful? Play for yourself and it will come beautifully. Her grandmother’s words returned to Neela. Was that it? Would it ever come beautifully for her? Tonight had been better. Her mind was on her music, with a little help from Sree. If only she could find a way to do that every time.

  Neela continued listening to her teacher, and she imagined herself in the future, as she always did. But instead of seeing just herself, she saw a circle of veena players like Sudha Auntie, Veronica Wyvern, and Parvati, widening that circle to let her in. She pictured their music billowing out like an enormous knitted blanket, stretching and covering the entire world. The thought comforted her.

  She looked through the window, watching as fresh snow fell over dead leaves and bare tree branches, covering the tops of houses and cars, turning the quiet, empty street white and new.

  By morning, Arlington was covered by more than a foot of snow. When Neela got to class, Ms. Reese was talking to Matt, and she didn’t look pleased.

  “Matthew, I’ve been very generous, but no matter how I add them up, they’re much more than thirty.” She looked at Neela sitting down at her desk. “Neela, I’m afraid I have to say the same for you. Please see me after class so we can make up your late minutes.”

  Neela stared down at the floor. No one in class had been punished yet for tardiness. She and Matt were the first ones for the whole year, and possibly for the first time in the history of Bay State Elementary. This was worse than getting punished in Art. Neela could feel the class watching them. Even Amanda, who would normally be snickering, was strangely quiet, as if she couldn’t believe Neela was getting in trouble either.

  Ms. Reese shook her head. “You’re two of my best students. Why can’t you come to school on time?” She gave them each disappointed looks. Neela felt her insides churn.

  “The snow,” she said helplessly. It was unfair to count minutes during bad weather.

  “But what about the other days? It can’t be the weather alone.”

  “Sometimes, Ms. Reese,” Matt said seriously, “I run into Neela on the way to class, and we’ll end up talking about a great book we read, and we just forget about the time because we’re so absorbed by our conversation.”

  “Oh, please.” Ms. Reese’s voice was high and sharp.

  Neela sighed. Matt could be such a twerp.

  Ms. Reese made a note on her desk calendar. “I expect you both after school on Thursday. Who knows, maybe this will cure you of your tardiness.”

  “Yeah, right,” Matt said.

  Her parents weren’t exactly pleased when they found out she had to stay after school for being late. They spent dinner discussing the virtues of punctuality, which, as far as Neela was concerned, no one in her family had mastered, least of all her parents.

  “When I was young in India, the schoolmaster would smack our hands with a ruler if we were late,” Mr. Krishnan said.

  “Did it hurt?” Sree asked.

  “Let’s get a ruler and try it on you,” Neela said.

  Sree started screeching, and her parents frowned at her.

  “I was kidding,” she muttered. “Besides, you’re making that up.”

  “I’m not!” her dad said. “Things were different then.”

  “And that’s why you missed your dental appointment this week,” Neela said. She was the one who had answered the call from the receptionist asking where her dad was. “I guess that ruler really helped.”

  “No one’s perfect,” Mr. Krishnan conceded. “Even a ruler isn’t perfect.”

  “St
art writing.” It was Thursday after school. Ms. Reese had set them up with their “assignments” and was stepping out to the main office. “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” she said before closing the classroom door behind her.

  As soon as she was gone, Matt turned to Neela. “Show me what you have so far.”

  She did.

  “That’s just your name.” He leaned back in his chair. “This bites.”

  Neela had to agree. Lateness, she decided, was relative. You were late because someone else wanted you somewhere before you were ready to be there. But that was probably not what Ms. Reese wanted to read about in the essay that she and Matt were being forced now to write: “What I Missed by Being Late to Class,” which, if she thought about it, was impossible to write. How could you know what you missed if you missed it?

  “So did you find your veena?” Matt asked.

  Neela was surprised he remembered. She put down her pencil. “No.”

  “Do you think a nun took it? She could slip it under her robe and walk out the church, and no one would notice. They’d just say, ‘There’s goes a really fat nun.’”

  “My veena case has wheels,” Neela said, “so she could just roll down the sidewalk.”

  “Yeah, a nun on wheels.”

  And then they smiled at each other. Neela’s eyes widened. It might be the first time they had actually shared a joke and she didn’t find him completely annoying. She thought for a moment. Maybe with all the mystery and sci-fi books he read, Matt might be able to help.

  Before she knew it, Neela began telling him all that had happened with Hal, Lynne, Mary, the missing teakettle, and the rock. She even told him about the curse but said that it was according to her veena teacher, who was most likely insane.

  Matt listened, and for once he stopped trying to say something goofy. “I’m not sure how Lynne fits in. Maybe it’s just Mary and Hal that are in on it together. I bet you could get some information on Hal at the church.”

  “Julia and I already tried to look up his name on her computer.”

  They both sat, thinking.

  “What if Mary’s married to Hal,” Matt guessed, “and they’re one of those international criminal couples. Maybe there are ancient documents stuffed inside the veena, and they know about it because they make a living stealing valuable papers around the world.”

  “Hmm,” Neela said. Matt was beginning to head in the ridiculous direction.

  “You should break into the office and look up Mary’s file.”

  “I’m not breaking into a church.”

  “I could do it for you,” Matt offered. “I know how to open a lock with a credit card.”

  “That’s just in the movies.”

  “Seriously. I have lots of practice. That’s how I bug my brother in the bathroom.”

  “It doesn’t make sense,” Neela said. “If Mary and Hal were married, Julia would know. And besides, they’re too old to be international criminals.” She didn’t know if age was a factor, but the idea was preposterous anyway.

  She pulled out the photocopy of the embroidery that she had been carrying with her for the past couple of days. “But you’re right, there is some connection between Mary and Hal, and it starts with this.” She gave him the photocopy. “Only, I’ve been looking at it for so long I feel like my brain is about to explode.”

  “That’s pretty serious, because there’s this one case of a Russian chess player who was thinking so hard his brain actually did explode and—”

  “I’m just saying,” Neela said crossly. “Do you want to see the embroidery or not?”

  Matt looked at the sheet for a moment. “It’s a crest,” he said.

  “A what?”

  “A crest. You know, like a family crest or a coat-of-arms. In the middle ages, the knights wore them on their shields and helmets to represent their family.”

  “Like the knights of the Round Table?” Neela asked.

  “Yeah, kind of like that. And now some people are into their family crests, and they have stuff they frame and pass down in the family. This one aunt of mine ordered a coffee mug off the Internet with her family crest on it.”

  “So if this is Mary’s family crest, what does it mean?” Neela mused.

  Matt shrugged. “It explains why she’s into wyverns.”

  “What if wyvern was a family crest and a name,” Neela said. “Like Veronica Wyvern. That’s her name. But it could be her crest, too. Which could mean that Mary and Veronica are…”

  “Related,” Matt finished.

  Just then they heard Ms. Reese opening the classroom door.

  Neela’s thoughts were whirling. Mary and Veronica, related?

  “What, done already?” Ms. Reese said. “I could hear you chatting.”

  “We were brainstorming,” Matt said gravely.

  Ms. Reese laughed. “You have an answer for everything, don’t you, Matt? What about you, Neela? Are you done?”

  With effort, Neela focused on her teacher’s words. “It’s kind of a hard assignment.”

  Ms. Reese smiled. “You’ve got another ten minutes. Keep writing, both of you.”

  Neela sighed. She didn’t want to write. She wanted to talk more with Matt about Mary and Veronica. From his expression, she could tell he felt the same way.

  The last ten minutes seemed to drag on forever as Neela forced herself to write. What had she missed by being late? She was missing a great many things, not to mention a four-foot veena, but she didn’t write that.

  When it was time to go, Matt and Neela handed their assignments to Ms. Reese, but she waved her hand. “They’re for you to keep. But I hope this is the last time we have to stay after. Tomorrow I’ll see you both in class and on time.”

  As they walked to their lockers, Matt asked to see what Neela had written. She shook her head. But before she could say more, he grabbed the sheet from her hand.

  “Hey!” Neela was indignant. She tried to take it back from him, but he was too quick.

  “I learned about the virtues of punctuality…” Matt read aloud. “Oh my God, you’re such a goody-goody.” He handed her paper back. “Anyway, Mary must be the one who took the veena, because she’s Veronica’s grandmother.”

  Neela was still mad he’d snatched her paper. “What did you write?”

  He stopped while she read his sheet. When she finished she looked at him. “You wrote about Star Wars? You wrote about a movie?”

  Matt shrugged. “I knew she wouldn’t read it.”

  Neela shook her head. How could he be so sure of himself all the time?

  “So you think Mary’s the grandmother?” she asked. “But she isn’t old enough.”

  “Then she’s the mom.”

  Neela thought about it. “But she didn’t know what a veena was the day I went to the church. At least, she didn’t know about it the way a mother would know about an instrument her daughter played, especially a famous dead one. Can you imagine having something so awful happen to your kid? You couldn’t pretend you knew nothing about it afterward.”

  By now they were outside and had reached the sidewalk.

  “Well, I’m heading this way,” Matt said. His breath came out as a puff in the cold air.

  Neela nodded in the other direction. “I’m going that way.”

  There was a brief pause before they each mumbled good-bye.

  As she kept walking, Neela thought about the afternoon. Most of the time he acted like a dork, but maybe Matt wasn’t so bad after all. He was certainly the smartest boy in class. And when he wasn’t goofing around, he actually did come up with some pretty good ideas.

  As she neared a corner, she spotted a familiar face on the other side of the street, standing at the city bus stop. Lynne was facing the opposite direction, watching for the bus. Neela hid behind a tree.

  School had gotten out a long time ago. Where was Lynne going when everyone in class either walked home or got a ride on the school bus? No one she knew ever rode the city bus, which went all t
he way downtown.

  “Why are you spying on Lynne?” a voice whispered behind her. “I thought you said it was Mary or Hal.”

  Startled, Neela turned to find Matt standing behind her. “You scared me. And I never said it was just Mary and Hal. I still think Lynne is involved, too.”

  Matt peered around the tree. “What’s she doing?”

  “She’s waiting for the T,” Neela said. The T was the name for the bus and subway that went to Cambridge and Boston. “Why would she be doing that?”

  “Maybe she’s going downtown. It’s not a big deal.” Matt paused. “Unless you want to follow her.”

  “Follow Lynne?” Neela leaned against the tree. Pavi was always telling her to do that. Here was a chance. “I’ve never been downtown by myself. How would I get back? And if I’m home late, my mom will kill me. She’s already upset I got punished in school.”

  He looked at his watch. “Ms. Reese let us out early. You could follow Lynne for a little while and head back, then call your mom and pretend you got delayed at school. She’ll never know the difference. And I’ve been downtown before, so, uh, I could go with you.”

  “Really?” Neela considered his offer.

  He nodded toward the road. “It’s coming. Hurry up and decide.”

  She saw that the bus was only a block away. “All right,” she said. “Let’s do it.”

  She tucked her long hair inside her coat and slipped the hood on. It was the best disguise she could come up with at the last minute. Matt put on a Boston Red Sox cap that he got out of his backpack.

  As soon as Lynne stepped inside the bus, Neela and Matt darted across the street. Neela had just enough time to read 77 HARVARD SQUARE on the front of the bus before they climbed aboard, keeping their faces down in case Lynne looked back. A moment later, the doors closed and the bus pulled out into the street, taking Neela and Matt along with it.

  The bus driver was crazy. At least he acted as if he were, speeding faster and faster down the street, weaving around cars and other buses, so that Neela, who clung to the sides of her seat, was sure they would die in a horrible crash any minute. Matt sat next to her by the window. “We’re on Mass Ave,” he said, which was what everyone called Massachusetts Avenue. He pointed to a street sign when the bus screeched to a halt at a red light.