Chapter 8Sukanya worried that the more she walked, the easier it would be for something to happen, for someone to stop her. She had to get off the street someplace safe, to sleep. The drugs were easing, but she didn’t feel tired. Her body felt heavy, as if she were carrying someone on her back. She went into a convenience store and bought rice crackers, coconut Pocky’s, and another hot tea.
Outside the store, she squatted down, uncomfortably, on a landing two steps up from the street. Nearby, schoolgirls in uniforms chatted in quick, cut-short phrases, checking their hair in little mirrors and fondling their cellphones.
Sukanya leaned back against the glass of the convenience store. The rice crackers had no spiciness, but she had to eat something. The little chocolate Pocky sticks at lea
