She found the opportunity in the timetable: Dev Malhotra was in the library on Wednesday afternoons for a free period. She had seen his name in the library sign-in sheet when she had returned a book. The library was on the first floor, away from the main classrooms, with one entrance not visible from the courtyard or the staffroom.
Wednesday afternoon: she went to the library. Dev Malhotra was at a table in the corner, a book open in front of him. He looked up when she came in. His face did not do the group thing. It did something more complicated. Something that was, underneath the composure, very tired.
"Dev," she said. She sat across from him, not asking. "Your reflection question. The one about remembering. I want to talk about it."
He looked at her. His eyes were the eyes of a fourteen-year-old who had been handling something adult for a very long time. "What about it?" he said.
"I think you were writing about something specific," she said. "Not the book. About something you saw."
A pause. "What makes you think that?"
"Because Ms. Rao agrees with me," Naina said carefully. "She gave you an A-."
Something happened in Dev Malhotra's face that was not a fourteen-year-old's face at all. It was the face of someone who had just been told something they needed to know and had been afraid they would never know. His eyes went bright for one second — the specific bright emotion of confirmation.
"She saw it," he said. Very quietly. Not a question.
"Yes," Naina said.
He was quiet for a long moment. He was making a decision — she could feel the weight of it, someone at a threshold. Then he said: "How much do you know?"
"Not enough," she said. "I know she's missing. I know something happened at the school. I know you all know something and you're protecting it. I don't know what you're protecting or why."
