She washed her hair twice, the way her mother had taught her—first the scalp, fingers pressing hard against the bone, then the lengths, working the conditioner through until the strands felt like wet silk between her fingers. The water ran hot down her back, steaming the small bathroom mirror she had wiped clear with the flat of her palm. She watched herself in it as she worked: the curve of her shoulders, the heavy weight of her breasts swaying with each movement, the flat plane of her stomach, the smooth hairlessness of her body that she maintained with the same devotion she gave to her hair.

The conditioner sat for three minutes. She counted them in her head, the way she counted everything now—the minutes to a blowout, the hours until dusk, the money folded in her mother's sari in the almirah. When the time was up she rinsed, tilting her head back so the water ran clean, and then she stood in the steam and let herself drip, her skin pink from the heat.

On her bed, laid out in the order she would put them on, were the things she had chosen: a push-up bra in soft rose, the cups lined with lace that would lift and hold her heavy breasts high; a g-string in a deeper shade, the fabric barely more than a triangle and a string; a pair of tight blue jeans that sat low on her hips; a yellow short top, cropped, the kind a college girl might wear on a hot day, the kind that showed the smooth plane of her stomach and the full swell of her chest. Matching bangles in gold and glass rested beside them, and the anklets her mother had left behind, and the high heels with the thin straps that would make her calves look longer.

She dried herself standing in front of the mirror, the towel rough against her skin, and then she sat on the edge of the bed and plugged in the blow dryer. The heat hit her scalp and she leaned her head forward, letting her hair fall in a dark curtain, and worked the brush through it in long, patient strokes. The noise filled the room, drowned out the clock and the fridge and her father's breathing from the front room, and she let her mind go empty the way she had learned to in the blue door house—focus on the task, the brush, the heat, the way the strands went from wet to damp to almost dry.

When it was dry enough, she set down the dryer and picked up the straightener. The plates heated with a small click, and she took a section of hair from the crown of her head, clamped the straightener at the root, and pulled it down the length in one slow, even stroke. The hair fell flat and glossy behind it, and she took another section, and another, working from the front to the back, the room filling with the faint scent of heated keratin. Her arms ached by the time she finished, but when she was done her hair hung to her waist like a sheet of black water, straight and shining, and she shook it once to feel the weight of it swing.

Makeup next, in the order she always used: primer first, then foundation blended down her jaw and neck so there was no line, then concealer under her eyes where the sleepless night had left shadows. She did her eyebrows with a fine brush, shaping them to arch over her eyes, and then the eyeshadow—a soft gold that caught the light, then a darker shade in the crease, then liner drawn out in a careful wing on each side. Mascara, two coats, and she blinked to test them. Kohl on the lower lash line, smudged softly out, so her eyes looked larger, darker, more like her mother's. Blush on the high points of her cheeks. Lipstick last—a deep rose, almost red, pressed onto her lips and then blotted on a tissue the way her mother's tube had taught her.

She looked at herself in the mirror and touched the small gold earring in her left ear, the one her mother had left behind. She had worn it every day for two years. She turned her face from side to side, watching the way the light caught her cheekbones, the way the kohl made her eyes look older, knowing. Then she stood and dressed: the g-string first, pulled up over her hips, the fabric settling into the cleft of her ass; then the push-up bra, and she reached behind herself to fasten the hooks, and when she turned back to the mirror her breasts sat high and full, the lace barely containing them, the cleft between them deep and shadowed.

She pulled the jeans up over her wide hips, buttoned them, and the denim hugged her thighs and her ass, the curve of her hips straining the seams just slightly. The yellow top went over her head and she adjusted it, tugging it down over her breasts until the hem sat just above her navel, the fabric thin and soft, the outline of her nipples faint against it. She added the bangles—gold and glass, seven on her right wrist, five on her left—and they chimed when she moved her arm. She sat on the edge of the bed and fastened the anklets around her bare ankles, the little bells and beads settling against her skin, and then she stepped into the high heels and stood.

In the mirror she saw a college girl, fresh and young, her hair long and straight, her makeup flawless, her body curving out of the tight yellow top and the low jeans. She looked like she might be on her way to a class or a café, not to the house of the neighbor who had blackmailed her into this. She looked like she had never known the blue door house, or the officer who held her throat, or the men who paid for her. She looked like a girl who had her whole life ahead of her.

She held that look for a moment, let herself be it, and then she turned from the mirror and walked out of the room.

Her father was in the front room, asleep in his chair, the lamp still burning even though the morning had fully come. She paused in the doorway and watched him for a moment—his face slack with sleep, his hand loose on the armrest, the empty whiskey glass on the table beside him. He had not asked where she was going. He had not asked for days now, not since the night she had told him she was done being his wife. She did not know if that was relief or defeat or something else, and she did not have time to find out.

She crossed the room on silent feet and slipped out the front door, closing it gently behind her.

The lane was quiet in the mid-morning light, the sun already high and warm. She walked in her high heels, her anklets chiming with each step, her hair swinging against her lower back. A few neighbors were out—a woman hanging clothes on a line, an old man sitting on his steps with a cup of tea—and they looked at her, and she let them look, her chin high, her face calm. She was used to the looks by now. She had been getting them since she was sixteen, since the hormones had started to change her body, since she had stopped hiding.

The Sharma house was at the end of the lane, a low white building with a tin roof and a small courtyard. She had not been inside it in years, not since she was a child and her mother had taken her to borrow a cup of sugar. The gate was open, and she walked through it, her heels clicking on the cracked concrete, and she could smell the sandalwood incense even before she reached the door.

The door was ajar. She pushed it open and stepped inside, and the air hit her—thick with incense and the smell of fried spices, yesterday's oil still hanging in the heat. The floor was sun-warmed teak, creaking under her heels, and the room was dim after the bright outside, the curtains drawn against the morning. She stood in the doorway for a moment, letting her eyes adjust, and then she heard a sound from the back of the house—a chair scraping, footsteps.

Sharma aunty came through the doorway at the far end of the room. She was wearing a housecoat, her hair pulled back, and she looked at Maya with a smile that did not reach her eyes.

"You came," she said. "I wasn't sure you would."

Maya stood in the middle of the room, her hands at her sides, her bangles still. "I said I would."

"Yes, you did." Sharma aunty crossed her arms and looked her up and down—the yellow top, the jeans, the heels, the long straight hair. "You look like a college girl. My son brings girls home like you sometimes. He thinks I don't know."

Maya said nothing.

"He's in the back room," Sharma aunty said. "Waiting for you. He's been waiting since last night, actually. He barely slept." She smiled again, and there was something hungry in it. "He's been dreaming about you for weeks, you know. Ever since he saw you walking down the lane in that red dress, the one your mother left behind. He came home and told me about it, and I knew then. I knew what you were."

"Aunty—"

"No, don't Aunty me." Sharma aunty stepped closer, and her voice dropped. "You know what you are. You know what you agreed to. My husband is going to fuck you, and I'm going to watch, and when he's done you're going to go back to your father's house and pretend none of it happened, and I'm going to keep your secret. That's the deal."

Maya held her gaze. "I know the deal."

"Good." Sharma aunty stepped back and gestured toward the doorway she had come through. "He's in there. Go on. He's been waiting long enough."

Maya walked past her, her heels clicking on the teak floor, and she could feel Sharma aunty's eyes on her back, on the sway of her hips in the tight jeans, on the long fall of her hair. She pushed open the door at the end of the room and stepped through it.

The room was smaller than the front one, dimmer, the curtains drawn so tight that only a thin line of light came through. There was a bed against the wall, a low double bed with a worn cotton sheet and a thin pillow, and beside it a small table with a glass of water and a strip of pills. And standing beside the bed, watching her, was Sharma uncle.

He was a big man, broad-shouldered and thick through the chest, with a weathered face and heavy hands. He had the look of a man who worked with his body, who spent his days lifting and carrying at the depot, and he stood there in his undershirt and his loose cotton trousers, his hands at his sides, his eyes fixed on her.

"Maya," he said, and his voice was low, almost gentle. "You came."

She stood in the doorway, the light behind her, and she let him look at her. She had learned, in the blue door house, that a man's hunger could be managed if you met it with stillness, if you gave him time to look and then gave him what he wanted in your own time. She stood there in her yellow top and her tight jeans, her hair falling to her waist, her anklets chiming softly, and she let him see her.

"I came," she said.

He took a step toward her, and then another, and she could see the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands twitched at his sides. She could see the shape of him through his trousers—thick, hard, already straining against the cotton—and she knew that Sharma aunty had been right, that he had been waiting for this, that he had been dreaming about her.

"I've never seen anyone like you," he said, and his voice was rough. "I've seen a lot of women, but I've never seen..." He trailed off, his eyes moving over her face, her chest, the curve of her hips. "You're beautiful."

She held his gaze. "Thank you."

He reached out and touched her hair, the ends of it where it fell over her shoulder, and the gesture was almost reverent—the way a man might touch something fragile, something he was afraid to break. She stood still and let him, and then she reached up and took his hand, and she led him to the bed.

"Sit," she said, and her voice was soft, measured. "Let me take care of you."

He sat down on the edge of it, looking up at her, and she stood between his knees and reached down and undid his trousers. He was hard immediately, thick and heavy, and she wrapped her hand around him and felt the heat of him, the pulse of him against her palm. He let out a breath, a low sound that was almost a groan, and she looked at him and then she lowered herself to her knees on the teak floor.

"You don't have to—" he started.

"I want to." She said it simply, and it was almost true. "Let me."

She took him in her hand and leaned forward, and her mouth closed around him. He was thick, thicker than most, and she had to open her jaw wide to take him, to work her lips down the length of him. She tasted salt and heat, the smell of him filling her nose—sweat and soap and musk—and she moved her head slowly, taking him deeper, her tongue tracing the vein on the underside of his cock. His hand came down and found the back of her head, his fingers threading into her straightened hair, and he held her there, not pushing, just holding, as she worked him with her mouth.