Lucky T (23 page)

"Stop! Please!"

She stepped over the knees of the woman sitting next to her, whacking the poor lady in the face with her backpack. The bus stopped the second Carrie got into the aisle, throwing her forward a few feet. Angry passengers all around her grumbled and shot her dirty looks.

Checking out the window to make sure the hal ucination was still there, Carrie reached up and yanked her bags out from the shelf above. Grasping everything in both hands, she tottered down the aisle as quickly as possible, thanked the bus driver, and tripped into the street. As she picked herself up and dusted herself off, she stared at the little woman standing on the corner, holding a red moped by its handlebars.

The woman with the birthmark and the nose ring. The woman who had almost run her down with her lucky T.

She knows where my T-shirt is, Carrie thought wildly. She's the only person who knows!

"Hey! Moped lady!" Carrie shouted, hoofing it over to the woman just as the walk light started flashing and the crowd on the corner moved forward as one. "Hey, you! With the bike!"

The woman didn't seem to hear her. She pushed her moped forward, disappearing into the throng, but Carrie wasn't going to let her go this time. She adjusted the straps on her bags and dove into the melee.

Please just don't let her get on that bike, Carrie thought desperately. If she does, it's all over.

At the far corner the crowd broke up, some heading toward the shops up ahead, others veering off in various directions. Finally Carrie caught sight of the moped woman again. She was preparing to fire up the engine.

"Step away from the moped! Please!" Carrie shouted, near tears.

But the woman just kept going about her business and sped off. Carrie didn't have to think twice. She took a deep breath and started to run.

With her bags slapping against her thighs and back, Carrie ran as she had never run before. As her feet slammed against the pavement, she dodged a vendor selling sweetmeats from his cart, jumped over a pile of cow dung, and skidded past a group of children playing marbles near a stoop. Her breath became labored and her brow and armpits started to sweat, but she refused to slow down or stop. She was not going to lose her T-shirt. Not this time.

Up ahead, the moped turned into an alleyway, Carrie's heart plummeted at the thought of the woman disappearing again, and then it happened. A wheelbarrow full of coconuts appeared out of nowhere and Carrie's momentum was too great. She tried to pul up, but she couldn't. She slammed into the side of the cart and fell to the ground. Her bags went flying. Her shin exploded with pain.

The man with the wheelbarrow yelped something in a foreign language and knelt on the ground next to her.

"I did not see you," he said in clipped English. "I am so sorry. I did not see you until you were on the ground. You are cut very badly."

"No! I'm fine. I'm fine!" Carrie said, tears squeezing their way out even as she protested. There was blood everywhere, but Carrie barely reacted. Al she could think about was that she was going to lose her lucky T. Again.

"We need some help!" the man shouted. He held his hands to the top of his turban and turned around and around. "Anybody? This girl needs help!"

A small crowd quickly formed around Carrie, and she felt someone grab her under the arm to help her up.

"We'll get you to a doctor. Don't worry," a woman's voice said in her ear. "Can you put any weight on it?"

"I don't know." Carrie sniffled. She touched her toe to the ground and winced, but when she tried again, the pain was a little duller.

"Good," the woman said. "We'll just get you inside."

"Thanks," Carrie said, limping along. She looked up at her nursemaid for the first time. Her mouth dropped open and she almost fainted dead away.

"Moped Lady," she said under her breath.

The woman stopped and her whole face creased in confusion. Then she clearly recognized Carrie. "You're that gehra from the other night. The one I almost killed!" she said.

Carrie looked up at the building they were shuffling into. A sign above the door read Calcutta Women's Mission. She was here. The last shelter on her list.

Fifteen minutes later Carrie was clean and bandaged, sitting on the edge of a chair in the Calcutta Women's Mission office, and Moped Lady, whose name turned out to be Payal, was looking at her with an amazed sort of gleam in her dark eyes.

"So you've come all this way, and you were about to give up, when you saw me?" Payal said, lifting her chin from her hand.

"Yup."

"And you jumped off the bus and chased me with all your stuff and ripped up your leg . . . and all this for a T-shirt?"

"Yup."

"Wow," Payal said, shaking her head and blowing out a breath. "You Americans are even crazier than I thought."

Carrie would have laughed, but she was too wrought with suspense. "So, do you know where my T-shirt is?"

Payal raised her eyebrows. "Actually, I know exactly where it is."

"You do?" Carrie gasped. "Where?"

"I just gave it to someone this morning," Payal said. "Her name's Deena. She's ten years old and she's living here with her mother."

"She's here?" Carrie said, her throat going dry. "Here in this building? Now?"

"Yes. But I have to tell you, I don't know if I like the idea of you taking that shirt back, however far you've come," Payal said. "Deena and her mother have no place else to go. . . no income to speak of. She needs clothes." Payal cast a glance at Carrie's suitcase and backpack, which now stood along the wall of the office. "And from the look of things, you don't."

Carrie swal owed hard. She knew what she was asking sounded ridiculous, and she didn't expect Payal or anyone else to understand, but she needed that shirt. She needed its luck. If the last twenty-four hours were any indication, there was no way she could survive without it.

"I'll give her everything in my suitcase, Payal," Carrie said, leaning forward and looking the woman in the eye so that she wouldn't mistake how serious she was. "Al of it."

Payal was clearly impressed. She sat back in her chair and looked Carrie over. "Al right," she said. "But you're going to have to ask her yourself."

Carrie followed Payal up a rickety set of metal stairs and over to a door marked #2. She could barely contain her excitement as Payal rapped on the door. Inside that room was Carrie's T-shirt. It was right behind that panel of wood.

The door creaked open and Carrie looked down. There, staring up at her with big brown eyes, was a little girl with two black braids and one seriously nasty bruise on her right cheek. She was wearing the lucky T. Carrie's birthday wish had come true.

"Hi, Payal!" the girl said brightly.

"Hi, Deena. This is my friend Carrie. May we come in?" Payal asked.

"Yes, you may," Deena said politely.

She left the door open and walked back into the room. Carrie stepped inside, the floor creaking beneath her, and looked around. The room was small , about ten feet by ten feet, with one window in the center of the back wall. Two mattresses were laid out on the floor, each with a sheet and a small pillow.

Stacked against the wall were a couple of meager piles of clothes and a hot plate was plugged into the one outlet. A pan on top of it held a few mounds of rice, cooked and now congealing at the surface.

"Where's your mum?" Payal asked.

"She went out," Deena said, sitting down on one of the mattresses and picking up a ratty-looking teddy bear.

"How did she get that bruise?" Carrie whispered.

"Her uncle was beating them both," Payal replied, turning her back to Deena and lowering her voice. "The father's dead and the uncle took them in. It took her mother three years to get up the courage to leave. They ended up here."

Carrie felt as if she was going to be sick. Suddenly she began to contemplate how she must look to Payal and what Dee must have thought of her once he found out she was in India to find a T-shirt. She probably came off as an overprivileged, spoiled, sheltered girl who knew nothing about the world around her. Carrie had taken all the blessings of her life for granted for so long--long enough that she had come to believe her only real blessing was the lucky T. And while there had been lots of moments this summer that had made her second-guess her superstition, she knew now that she was truly leading a charmed life. T-shirt or no, she had a mom who loved and respected her. She had a father, however absent he was, who cared about her wel -being.

She had good friends, a beautiful home, a great school, and as much food as she needed. She had so many clothes that she was able to give some away because she no longer needed them.

Two months ago Carrie had been unable to see any of this. Two weeks ago Dee's assessment of her had been right on. But standing there, in the middle of that tiny room with Deena and Payal, it was all too clear. Carrie Fitzgerald was not that person anymore.

"Deena? Carrie has something she wants to ask you," Payal said.

Deena looked up at Carrie as she shakily walked over and sat down next to her on the cot. She was aware that Deena could use all the clothes in her suitcase--that a lot of people would look at the proposed transaction as more than a fair trade. But Carrie knew better. She knew what Deena really needed--hope.

"What did you want to ask me?" Deena asked, her eyes wide.

Carrie swal owed back a lump in her throat and smiled. "I wanted to ask you ... if you knew . . . that the shirt you're wearing is going to bring you all kinds of luck."

"It's Carrie! Carrie's back!"

Asha's voice sounded out the alarm as Carrie walked up the steps at CCS, her chin held high. Thanks to another quick but effective dousing from the rain gods, she was soaked to the bone. Dash opened the door for her and she swept through, feeling very Katharine Hepburn. Then all the kids rushed in from the lounge area and crowded around her.

"Hey, everyone," Carrie said while dropping her bags. Her shoulders let out a long overdue sigh of relief.

"What are you doing here?" Akhtar asked.

"Are you back to stay?" Manisha demanded.

Dash simply picked up her bags and started upstairs with them, clearly not wanting to risk it.

Just then Dee walked in to see what all the commotion was about. Seeing him brought up a zil ion emotions for Carrie--many of them stemmed from the fact that he always looked smoking hot and none of which she felt capable of dealing with at the moment. She was here for a reason and one reason only.

"Hey," Dee said gruffly. Yep, he was still pretty angry.

"Hel o," Carrie replied coolly. "Excuse me."

She passed right by him, noticed how he smelled like he'd come right out of a shower, thought about Dee all wet and soapy, and walked right to the back of the house. The door to Mr. Banarjee's office was closed. Carrie took in a deep breath and knocked on the door.

"Come," Mr. Banarjee said.

Here goes nothing, Carrie thought. She opened the door and stepped inside.

"Miss Fitzgerald," the director said, looking up from some papers on his desk. "I'm surprised to see you."

"Not as surprised as I am to be here," Carrie said.

She wiped her hands on her wet jean skirt as she walked farther into the room. It was her first time in Mr. Banarjee's office. A few shelves of books lined the wall s, where the only decorations were framed paintings of Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa--two of Calcutta's biggest heroes. His desk was neat as a pin and the shade was drawn over the single window.

"I know Dee told you what happened," Carrie said. "And I know ... I was wrong. But I'm here to tell you that I think I have a way to make it up to you and the kids, if you'll let me."

Mr. Banarjee sat in silence for a moment and Carrie was really hoping he wouldn't toss her out on her butt. What was Celia going to say when she called and told her she was not, in fact, on a plane and that she needed another extraction from CCS?

Finally Mr. Banarjee removed his small reading glasses and folded them in both hands. He blew out a breath and looked at her.

"What did you have in mind?"

The next day was warm and sunny with white clouds zipping high across the sky. A perfect day for a little gardening.

Carrie sat between Akhtar and Trina, digging little troughs in the lush dirt for the marigold seeds Carrie had bought with the last of her spending money on her way back from her visit with Deena. On the other side of the entrance to the driveway Dash, Manisha, and Asha were patting seeds into the ground. Carrie smiled as she watched them work. It felt good to be teaching them a lesson, especially since she had learned so much from being in their country.

"I still do not understand," Dash said as he moved some dirt around with his spade. "One day we take the flowers, the next day we plant the flowers?"

"I already explained this to you," Carrie said, smirking.

"We made a mistake and this is how we're making up for it. We never should have taken the flowers in the first place."

"But you helped us do it," Trina pointed out.

"Yes, and it was wrong," Carrie replied, amused at how long it was taking for all of this to sink in. "The flowers were never ours to take. They belonged to someone else and you should always respect the property of others."

"Listen to her, kids, she speaks the truth," a new voice proclaimed.

Carrie and the others looked up to find Vijay Shah, the kind older man who had answered the door to them that morning, hovering above them. Mr.

Shah was short and stout with graying hair just above his ears and an otherwise bald head. Dressed in khaki pants and a polo shirt, he looked as if he'd just stepped off a golf course. He held out a tray with a pitcher full of whitish juice and a bunch of plastic cups.

Carrie smiled up at him. Mr. Shah had been extremely understanding and kind when she had explained the situation to him that morning.

"I brought you some sugarcane juice," he said.

The kids all jumped up as if he had just offered them chocolate. Carrie slapped her hands against her jeans and got up to help.

"Thank you," she said, lifting the pitcher as all the kids grabbed cups. "You didn't have to do this."