"Your test starts now", hollered the class teacher. "I will speak out the word, you have to write it down on your paper. And remember, leave one finger-space distance between each word. I will say the word only two times", the teacher screamed while looking at Amit who was seated in the first bench. "The first word is Physics (pause) Physics". Rajani scribbled down "Fysics" on her paper. "Next word is Biology. Biology". Rajani wrote down "Biology" on her paper. After Chemistry Chemistry, History History, Social Social, Independence Independence, the teacher reached the end of the list of words. "The last word is Pneumonia. Pneumonia." Rajani's pencil lead was almost about to break as she managed to write down "Neumonia". She had remembered the spelling vaguely and knew that her answer was correct. The bell rang five minutes later and she placed her pencil and the broken lead in her pencil box. The box, originally a bright red one, was shaded gray at many places due to pencil shavings and broken leads. She put her bag on her shoulder, carried the lunch basket in one hand and started walking down to the school gate. The auto-man at the entrance was piling everyone's lunch basket onto the handle of his rear-view mirror. Rajani used the railing of the auto-man's seat from behind and hauled herself into the auto. Her friends were exchanging their ribbons and she didn't have one today. She was wearing a hair-band, a colourful plastic hair-band. She had cried the other day for that hair-band but now she no longer liked it. She wanted ribbons. The ones that her friends were exchanging. Not bothering to speak to her friends, Rajani sat quietly in the auto until her home arrived. She jumped off the auto, picked up her heavy lunch basket and climbed up to the first floor of her apartments. Sunrise Apartments was a new building in this part of the town and was built exactly opposite a slum. Rajani's maid, who lived in the slum, opened the door and received Rajani by removing her shoes and socks and getting her evening glass of milk with Bournvita ready. Rajani's mother was in the balcony cleaning the rice. Rajani dropped her school bag on her bed and changed into her favourite black frock. She wanted to buy ribbons from the store located at the entrance to the slum. The maid's daughter, Shruti, was Rajani's best friend. Shruti worked with her father at the dhobi-ghat located at the farther end of the slum. Rajani skipped her glass of bournvita milk and rushed down hurriedly towards the dhobi-ghat. She had one rupee in her pocket from last week and knew that Shruti would be able to help her use that money to buy a ribbon. At the dhobi-ghat, she saw Shruti watching a huge tanker unload water into a big shallow tank. The water was gushing out of the tanker and creating a mist-effect around the tank. Rajani, with a smile on her face owing to this wonderful sight, walked up and stood beside Shruti. "I need to buy ribbons", she said, turning towards Shruti. "What? Can't hear in this noise", Shruti screamed back as the sound of the water filling the tank submerged the noise of the street. After about 10 minutes, the tank was full and the water tanker had begun to leave. Rajani showed the money to Shruti and told her about the ribbons. Shruti, who spent most of her time washing others' clothes, was not too excited about colourful garments or ribbons. Instead, she wanted to swim in the recently filled tank. The tank was only 2 feet deep and was more than 20 feet wide. Shruti jumped into the water and asked Rajani to join in. Rajani smiled and wanted to but there was a problem. She was wearing her favourite black frock. She couldn't let it get wet. So she sat down at the edge of the tank, dangling her legs against the water surface while Shruti swam from one end of the tank to the other. After about half an hour, Shruti got out of the tank, shivering in the cold and laughing uncontrollably. It was 7 in the evening and time to go home. However, Rajani wanted to buy the ribbons. The scene in the auto was fresh in her mind. Tomorrow she wanted to exchange ribbons with her friends. She persisted Shruti to buy them for her. Shruti, fervently shivering by now, contemplated going home and changing into dry clothes. But then, her home was on the other end of the slum and the ribbon shop was on the other. She decided to skip going home for now and instead went along with Rajani to buy the ribbon. At the store, there were 3-4 customers buying cigarettes, paan and other assorted items of daily consumption. The shop keeper had blue and red coloured ribbons. Rajani, after a few minutes of conflicting views inside her mind, decided to buy the blue ones. Shruti paid the shopkeeper, sneezed once and ran home. She was already feeling the cold gripping her. Rajani held the blue ribbon carefully in her palms and headed home. A warm soup and bread was waiting for her. It was cooked by Shruti's mother, who worked as a maid and as a cook at Rajani's home. Shruti, in the meanwhile, reached home and changed into drier clothes. She also reached out for her old blanket and decided to lie down for a while. The sneezing had become more frequent. The next day morning, Rajani and her mother were sitting in the balcony. Rajani's mother was tying the blue ribbon onto Rajani's hair. The watchman from below screamed out that the maid would not be coming that morning. "Why?", screamed back Rajani's mother. "Her daughter has caught pneumonia", yelled the watchman. "Pneumonia. Why can't these maids ask their children to be a little more careful?", she said aloud to herself as she tied the knot of the blue ribbon. Rajani touched her blue ribbon gently. As she picked up her school bag and walked down to wait for the auto-man, the word Neumonia kept running in her head. She was quite confident that her spelling was correct.