The clouds burst open, and if there’s one thing better than Sonaya at night, it’s Sonaya at night in the rain. The neon glows brighter and the ground shines. Puddles gather on the doorsteps of singing rooms and broken umbrellas drown in alleys like spiders with fractured legs. The monsoon season’s well and truly begun, and that’s fine by me. Every evening the charcoal heavens sing their hymns and Sonaya sparkles in the night. It’s enough to make a person thirsty.
Fairchild’s got two black eyes behind his glasses and a bandage on his nose, but that doesn’t stop him from smiling. His bony arm is wrapped round my neck and he’s wearing the ugliest pink and palm-leaf shirt I’ve ever seen, which can only mean one thing: he’s celebrating.
We’re on the third floor of a run-down building that lea
