LITMIR.BIZ

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all the apartment buildings. This was where all the big water tanks were – three large, concrete cylinders that were fifteen feet high and supplied water to the homes of Shanthi Colony. There was a small open area between the tanks and the back compound wall. As there wasn’t much else there, the area was often unoccupied.

      But it wasn’t today. As she got closer, she could hear voices. While she could not hear what was being said, she knew now that she was on the right track.

      ‘Hey, do it properly, okay?’ a familiar voice said.

      ‘Excuse me, I am!’

      ‘Come on, guys, don’t fight,’ a third voice said.

      ‘I’m not fighting! She’s fighting,’ the second person replied.

      ‘Okay, okay, sorry, di.’

      ‘Yeah it’s okay. Shall I go bo–’

      As Kummi Paati walked into their line of sight, the girl trailed off and all three of them looked incredibly sheepish.

      ‘I thought I’d find you here,’ Kummi Paati said. ‘So you know quite a bit about how to play cricket, then.’

      Priya spoke first, as Kummi Paati had known she would. Every teenage group of this kind had a ringleader, and Priya was obviously it.

      ‘There’s nothing wrong with that. Girls can do anything these days! Why shouldn’t we know how to play cricket? We play better than most of those boys, in fact.’

      Kummi Paati sat down on an overturned bucket and looked at the flushed face of the indignant thirteen-year-old.

      ‘You are right. Girls can do anything these days,’ she said. ‘Very different from my time. It is a good thing, I think, although I don’t know how many men like this. Still, it is worth it if girls aren’t pushed into the kitchen, or forced to marry when they want to do other things. After all, the men usually find something to be unhappy about, don’t they?’

      The three girls looked at her, possibly unsure about where to go with this.

      ‘Sorry, I wandered from the point. At my age, people often do.’

      She smiled and then continued.

      ‘Yes, there is nothing wrong with girls playing cricket. As I said, it is a good thing.’

      She cleared her throat.

      ‘There is something wrong with stealing, though.’

      Priya looked away.

      ‘Kummi Paati, we – we weren’t exactly stealing. More like borrowing.’

      ‘Do you call that borrowing? Going to someone’s garage when they are not at home and taking something of theirs without their knowledge does not sound like borrowing to me.’

      ‘We meant to give it back! We noticed that Ravi’s father never locked the door until after he drove his scooter home at night and we thought we could practise a bit one day and then put the ball back before the next evening.’

      ‘But you didn’t. And this didn’t happen just once. It happened a few times.’

      ‘It was an accident! I – we felt really bad about losing them.’

      ‘Why didn’t you ask your father for a ball?’

      ‘I did. We all did,’ Priya said. ‘They – he just laughed and said no. He said girls don’t need to play cricket.’

      Kummi Paati looked at the downcast face of the girl. A child, really, who was trying to find her place in a man’s world and was already being shut out. She stood up.

      ‘Well, kanna, we have our work cut out for us. First there is something important you should understand. Things are not different today for girls because people hid behind water tanks and learned things that boys didn’t want them to learn. It happened because many women – women who were braver than me, I must say – challenged men openly. And proved them wrong.’

      ‘I’m not scared, Kummi Paati.’

      ‘I didn’t think you were. Come, let us go to the playground.’

      Back at the playground, Somu Thatha was just putting the hose back on its hook. The boys were still practising.

      ‘Dai, that’s the fifth ball you’ve missed, da!’ Babu shouted. ‘Pay attention!’

      The target of his wrath, a slightly older boy named Madhu, glared at Babu.

      ‘If you stop chucking, I can maybe hit something.’

      ‘Who is chucking, da? Don’t just say whatever comes into your mouth without thinking, okay?’

      ‘You also don’t–’

      He stopped short as he noticed Kummi Paati walking over.

      ‘Babu, I thought you said that you were going to allow the girls to join your practice today.’

      Babu looked utterly exasperated but respect for his elders forced him to hold back what he really wanted to say. Instead he muttered, ‘But Kummi Paati ... our practice ... New Look ...’

      ‘All that is fine. Ten minutes of letting someone else bat is not going to be what causes you to lose. Priya,’ she said, not waiting for Babu to respond, ‘you come here and bat.’

      She held her hand out to Madhu for the bat.

      ‘Hmph,’ he said, as he passed the bat to Kummi Paati. ‘Good luck, Priya.’

      He stifled a snort as he walked away from the pitch.

      The Priya who stepped up to the crease was a markedly less confident person than the one who had spoken to Kummi Paati ten minutes earlier. She cleared her throat but said nothing. Babu walked to the other end of the crease and bowled. The ball hurtled through the air. Priya swung the willow ... and the bat whooshed through the air as the ball landed neatly into the wicketkeeper’s waiting hands.

      A few scattered giggles broke out. Priya clenched her teeth, but still said nothing. Babu looked at Kummi Paati, a pleading expression on his face, but Kummi Paati did not change her countenance at all and he slowly walked back to the end of the crease.

      The second ball sped through the air, faster than the first, as though buoyed by the thrower’s annoyance. Priya swung again and this time, made contact. Thwack! The ball flew through the air, past one surprised fielder, and made it to the boundary line.

      The two other girls whooped and cheered. Babu stared at Priya, his jaw slack.

      ‘That ... that shouldn’t have gotten through ... I mean, we weren’t expecting ... our fielders never thought ...’

      Priya raised her chin as he stammered out excuses. The glint in her eye was back.

      ‘Well now they know what to expect. Shall we continue?’

      Silently, he walked back to the end of the pitch. He rubbed the ball on his shorts, ran a short distance and bowled the ball towards Priya.

      As soon as Priya raised her bat, Kummi Paati knew she had been right about where all the balls had gone. The bat connected with the ball with a solid, reassuring thud. The ball soared overhead, well out of the reach of the now alert boys and over the playground fence. It landed on the concrete forecourt of one of the apartment buildings.

      ‘Does that count as a six?’ Priya asked politely, breaking the ensuing silence.

      ‘I – we never – I mean, yes. Yes, that’s a six.’

      One of the boys ran out to retrieve the ball. Priya finished the over with a respectable fourteen runs in total and handed the bat to Geetha, her friend.

      ‘Who wants to bowl?’ Babu asked, looking at his team. No one responded. Finally, Sulochana, the third girl, stepped forward.

      ‘I will,’ she said.

      Babu

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