Sleeping On Jupiter by Anuradha Roy

come. See that line of birds there? They are exactly like the real ones. Go on, touch the feathers.”
    He was pointing to a shelf in the room in which there were birds sitting in a row. I did not dare to touch them.
    “They aren’t alive, child, they won’t peck you,” he said. “They’re stuffed. So that they are still enough to paint.”
    At one of the windows was a bird in a cage. This one was definitely alive: it hopped about and screeched. It had glossy green feathers on its back and a red band at its throat. Maybe when I was out on the flowerbed that time, it was the bird making those strange screaming noises.
    “That one’s next. It’s a parakeet. It’ll be a big painting,” he said. “Go on, give it a chilli to eat.”
    When I did not go towards the bird he patted his lap and said, “Come here.”
    I climbed on to his lap as I had before and he settled me there and said, “Tell me why you went to that fence. You know you are not allowed, and there is a reason why. If people from outside see you, they might report you to the police. And then what? Do you want to be taken away and locked up? You must do as I say or God will be angry and you’ll get into trouble.”
    I pulled away from him and said, “I was only looking. I didn’t do anything.”
    He pressed me back against his chest. “Some things are forbidden, you know that, don’t you? We need rules when we live together.”
    His face was very close to mine. I could see where his cheeks had tiny black bristles from shaving and I thought of the way my father used to sit at a mirror tacked on the wall outside our hut in the morning and shave. When I was very small, my father would rub his bristly cheek against mine and I used to squeal when he did that.
    Guruji said, “You don’t always understand the reasons why I tell you to do some things and not do other things, but there is a reason and one day you will understand it was for your own good. You have to hide for a while because there is a war. If you are found wandering outside now, they will lock you up in jail. Just wait a little, then you can do whatever you want to.” He said, “Do you trust me? Don’t you think I will always do everything for your good? Didn’t I save you from the war and from starving on the streets without your parents?”
    He said, “Didn’t I tell you the day you came here that I am your father, mother and God? Can you disobey all of them?”
    He stroked my hair and shoulders while he spoke. It was very cool in the room and the curtains had turned afternoon into evening. I could hardly hear his voice, it was no more than a murmur and the words sounded longer when they came from him because he stretched them out.
    He stroked my arms and said, “You are like an insect. Don’t you eat?” He held my leg and said, “Let me see that knee. Look, there is a scar from the time you fell off the pomegranate tree. That should teach you not to be naughty.” He rubbed the scar and then another scrape with his fingertip and said, “What is this one from?”
    “I was playing yesterday and I fell.”
    “Does it hurt?” he said. “I don’t want any of my children to be in pain.”
    As his hand moved from scar to scar, it went under the skirt of my tunic and began to stroke the part between my legs. His hand went up my thighs and down. He shifted my weight and slipped down my knickers and put his hand right between my legs. He lifted his own robes and he pulled my hand towards himself and said, “Hold this, it is magic.” It stuck out from between his legs like a stump.
    Then he said, “Your hand is much too small, hold it with both.” I had to turn to be able to do that. I did need both my hands because the stump was really big now, but I thought I did not have to hold it because it would keep standing on its own. When I took my hands away to see if I was right, Guruji pushed them back. I grew tired of just sitting there holding a stump. I did not know why he was