Image: © Courtesy of Manchester City Galleries
“Applying for a visa extension?” the man behind the plexiglass in the Holborn post office asks you.
“Yes,” you say, slightly out of breath, clutching a crumpled letter from the Home Office. Your stomach had started churning as soon as you saw it this morning and you had hurried to the post office as soon as you could. Your anxiety roils inside you like the sea trying to drown Odysseus. “I am here to give my biometric details?” The man behind the plexiglass holds out his hand for your letter, your obol to cross the river Styx. He reads through the letter and grunts. “Ms. Mallika Bull. Got a job here, have you?” he asks you, handing the letter back. You are uncertain about this question. Was he baiting you? Would he call you a scrounger? Would he accuse you of stealing a job? The natural birthright given only to full citizens? Should you lie and say that you are a student? Was that worse? The silence has gone on for too long. You opt for a neutral, “Sure”.
“How long have you been here?” the postman asks, lobbing another grenade into an otherwise placid room of false ceilings, fluorescent lighting and grey carpeting. ‘Stuck in the middle with you’ by Stealers Wheel is playing in the background.
“Eight years.”
“You enjoy it here?”
This could get tricky. If you said yes, he could say, fuck you, go back to where you came from. But if you said no, he could still say, fuck you, you lazy, ungrateful immigrant, you should go back to where you came from.
“It’s alright,” you say, going for the quintessentially British answer. It could either mean that it was awful but you didn’t complain about it; or that it was wonderful but you didn’t make a big show of it; or it was over-hyped, like English tea, and you were too embarrassed to ask for something better, like a flat white.
“Alright, that’s you done here. Have a good day.”
Sighing with relief that the questioning was finally over, you walk out of the damp room, and onto High Holborn. It is a sunny day but a cold breeze is blowing. You pull down your cardigan sleeves over your hands, hunch your shoulders, pull your body into yourself to shield against the wind and start walking. This would be your last visa extension. After this you can finally apply for indefinite leave to remain. The multiple rounds of visa applications and extensions, and the gut-churning anxiety that came along with it, would finally come to an end.
Your phone beeps a reminder— you are getting late for your coffee date. Better start jogging.
#
You dream of a small subterranean office in a nondescript suburb somewhere in Little Britain. Like Watford. The room is lit by fluorescent panels. There are white bars on the skylight overlooking a derelict pavement. In the room sits your passport, in a pile of other passports, ready for sorting, in front of three grey people in three grey suits.
#
“So, what do you do?” you ask your date trying to make small talk. You are flushed and sweaty from your jog. Ben, your date, was already at the coffee shop when you staggered in, out of breath. You can feel that your face and ears are still hot and flushed, and it’s making you uncomfortable and self-conscious. The coffee shop has a glass front. You can see the park outside. In stark contrast to you, the park is a picture of idyllic calm. The sunlight is dappling the lawns as kids run pell-mell around the central fountain. You turn back to look at Ben. You had matched with him on a dating app but you weren’t very sure about him. He looked too preppy, the kind of man who would have been in the Bullingdon Club. But the app algorithm was confident that you were 95 per cent compatible.
“I work in the City, for an investment bank,” Ben says swirling his matcha latte delicately, in a clipped middle-class accent.
“I thought you might be a banker.”
“Oh really? How come?”
“Well, your clothes look rich. And such sharp fold lines. Only bankers wear that.”
“That’s funny,” Ben says but doesn’t crack a smile. “What do you do then?”
“I teach English as a Second Language at the London Met, and I do some editing on the side.”
“Fantastic. It’s nice that your day job leaves you with enough time to do another job.”
“Yeah, thanks I guess.”
“Yes, I think it is rather lovely how you people can just flit about without any responsibilities, dropping anchor where you see fit, and taking off when you like. I envy you.”
You laugh uncomfortably. Did he think having two jobs was like having two hobbies? Your mind goes to your bank balance, which was always too small.
“So, what brought you to London?” Ben asks.
“I came here to study for my Master’s and then somehow managed to stay on,” you tell him.
“Ah! Of course! Hard to leave London, isn’t it?”
Was it hard to leave London? You hadn’t left the city in the last four years— you never had the money for it. You had come because you had been running away. And now, leaving seemed so despairingly permanent. You didn’t think you could both leave and come back.
You don’t say any of this. “It is, yes,” you agree with Ben, instead. It’s easier.
“Where are you from, if you don’t mind my asking?” Ben continues, the subtextual “Really?” floating thick and heavy in the air between the two of you.
“India—”
“Oh, I love India. I went there for a holiday last year.”
“Were you? Where did you go?”
“Tons of places. Delhi, Jaipur, Rishikesh. It’s so colourful. I went with some friends on a Yoga-Vipasana retreat.”
You try very hard to stop your eyes from rolling over. “Oh really?” This man was such a cliché.
“Yes, it was great. You might find it hard to believe, but I love yoga.”
Your mother would approve of that, you think to yourself. She had been trying to get you to do yoga since you were a child. “That’s lovely,” you say with all the enthusiasm you can muster, which isn’t much.
“Yes,” he says as he reaches down carefully to unbutton his shirt. You look at him with horrified fascination as he pinches his thumb and forefinger, inserting them into his navel, and pulls out a small lint ball. “For me, doing yoga gives me the same happiness that people get from orgasming. Yoga is orgasmic,” he finishes and flicks his lint onto an unsuspecting passerby. You feel your stomach turn.
“Is that so?” you say instead with a manic, forced sweetness and get up to leave. “You know, it is such a shame, I would have loved to hear more, but I have a meeting I need to get to.”
“Oh?” Ben asks stupidly. He looks surprised and then slightly crestfallen. “Would you like to go on a second date then?”
“Sure,” you say without committing to anything specific, “I’ll call you. I might be a bit busy over the next few weeks though.”
“Of course. No worries at all.”
As you walk home, you take out your phone. The dating app has a jaunty notification ready for you, one of the many questions it asks to match its users’ personalities. “In certain circumstances, do you think a nuclear explosion would be erotic?” you shudder and delete the app.
#
There are three grey people in your dreams, in grey suits, sat in a basement office, sifting through piles of passports from across the world, slowly and painstakingly, with no emotions. The world and its people, lie on their table, waiting to be weighed and dissected. The first grey person on the left picks the passports up one by one, flips through the pages, and hands it over to the second. The second combs through the application form, looking for the tiniest excuse to reject a visa. The third reviews everything, confirms the decision, reseals the package, and drops it in one of two bins marked ‘REJECTED’ and ‘ACCEPTED’.
#
It is early evening by the time you get back to your flat, almost late for your weekly Skype call with your parents. Your flatmates are out. You trudge through the empty living room and up the stairs to your small windowless bedroom. You fling your bag on to your half-made bed, pop your laptop open and settle down on your small study desk which often doubles as a vanity and dining table.
“Hello Mynah beta,” your mother greets you, using your nickname, invoking an intimacy that should exist between you two, but had frayed into nothingness a long time ago, “How are you? Have you been eating properly?”
“Yes,” you reply perfunctorily, readying yourself for your weekly maternal boxing match.
“Hmm, yes, you do look like you have put on a few kilos. You really should watch it. And cut down on all that coffee that you drink. It’s not good for your heart you know,” your mother says, the champion pugilist, getting a few knocks in right at the start and looking for more openings, “How’s the job hunt coming along?”
“I’m looking, but I still have to hear back from places,” you tell her.
“Are you coming home for Diwali?” your mother asks. You haven’t been home for Diwali in a few years now. You can see on your computer screen that your mother has already started putting up the lights.
“I just sent in my biometric details today Ma. If I get my passport back in time, I’ll come.” Your mother notices your lack of excitement and looks disappointed by it. “Mynah,” she says in a softer tone, “I had a dream about you last night.”
“Yeah? What was it?”
“I dreamt that you were back home but were insisting on taking your bedding and sleeping in the toilet. And I kept trying to stop you, ‘Mynah why are you sleeping in the toilet, you have a nice bed, go sleep there.’ But you wouldn’t listen. You insisted on sleeping in the toilet.”
The image is both bleak and ridiculous. You can’t help but laugh. “I’ll see Ma,” you respond, “I’m trying to make something of myself here. If nothing works out, I’ll come back.”
“I don’t know why you keep hanging on there, Mynah. We’ll find you a nice boy here to marry and you can settle down. There’s a new boy that’s joined your father’s accounting firm.” Aaah, that old chestnut. She had taken her time getting to marriage. Usually, it was the first question on their Skype calls.
“I’ve told you many times already. If I want to marry someone, I’ll be the one doing the finding, not you.”
“Yes, but look at you. You’re putting on weight from all that junk food that you must be eating, and it’s not like you’re getting any younger. You’re twenty-nine already. Come home. We’ll get you in tiptop shape and find you a suitable boy.”
“That’s not fair,” you exclaim. You can feel your face heating up again. You try standing up for yourself, without raising your voice. You’re getting emotional, you’re being rude, your mother will scream back. “You can’t talk to me like that!” you say through gritted teeth.
“I can speak however I like!” your mother replies, her softness replaced immediately by her usual high-pitched screeching, “How dare you try and hold my tongue? Who are you to tell me to stay silent?”
“I’m not telling you to stay silent, I am telling you that you cannot speak that way to me.”
“I will speak as I please, to anyone I please. Do not ever dare to tell me to stay silent young lady.”
“Well, how would you have liked me to respond to you then?”
“You should acknowledge your faults, just like I acknowledge mine. You have a good personality Mallika, but you are lazy. But it’s okay, I’ll sort that out for you, don’t you worry.”
There it was. Your mother’s need to sort you out. This is why you had run away. There was no point arguing with her, you knew that from experience. If your mother had her way, she would prefer that you debased yourself, killed yourself, and replaced yourself with someone who looked like you but was docile, lobotomized. Better to cut the call, better to stay far, far away. There was no winning, only escaping. “I should get going, I have work to get to,” you say.
“Okay, make sure you eat your dinner on time Mynah,” your mother says, soft again, her perfunctory ending for every call, as if convincing herself that by telling you to eat she had fulfilled her role as a Good MotherTM. You cut the call, with the bitter taste of bile in your mouth.
#
Stubbed out cigarettes and half-empty coffee mugs were piling up next to the handling table as the three grey suits spindled out the passports. Most passports went into the two bins, but a few fell into the endless chasm between them and were lost forever. The first grey suit finally picks up your passport.
#
You knock on Laura’s apartment door, late for her house party. “Come in, come in, we’re just through here,” she says as she opens the door and ushers you into a narrow passageway which continues into a narrow kitchen which in turn continues into a narrow dining area, all of it made narrower by the press of people in the room.
“I’m so glad you made it! Come on, let’s get you a drink. What would you like?”
“Gin and tonic please.”
“One Gin and Tonic coming up!”
“How’s it going so far?”
“Not too bad! We have some finger food here to nibble on. We might get some pizzas later if people want.”
“Cool!”
Laura draws you in close and says conspiratorially, “My only aim for this party is that it doesn’t become one of your stories.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing. You have such funny stories about meeting awful people. I’m hoping this won’t give you fodder for that.”
“Fingers crossed!”
“Here, let me introduce you to my friends,” Laura takes you by the hand and leads you to a couple standing by the window. “Do you know Harry and Abigail? What were you two talking about?”
“Oh, we were talking about our weekend. We were at this lovely exhibition about slavery at the Tate Modern the other day,” Abigail says as Laura leaves you to play the host somewhere else in the room.
“Oh yes,” you say, “I went to that one. I was in tears by the end of it.”
“Well, we didn’t cry,” Abigail says, looking at you like you had admitted to shitting in public, “We thought the Angela Davis portrait was amazing.”
“And Fred Hampton’s Door 2 was fun as welll,” Harry added. “It was so cool to see all the bullet holes in the door. It must have been quite an operation, getting him.”
Why was Fred Hampton’s door, pock marked with his assassins’ bullet holes, fun? Had they not seen the tragedy in it? But then again, you think , why would they? Later, you’ll be angry at yourself for even thinking like this. They should see the tragedy! They should, they should, you will think later. But right now, you can feel your face burning again, you feel uncomfortable again, so you change the conversation. “Where are you from Abigail?”
“I’m British-American, so I keep moving around. Most recently I was in the Netherlands for a bit.”
“Oh, really? What did you do there?”
“I was interning with a law firm.”
“That’s such a coincidence. A friend of mine interned at The Hague a couple of years ago, at the International Courts of Justice. She said she liked living in Netherlands better than living in London. And that it was much cheaper too.”
“Yes, but London really is the best place to live in the world. Well, maybe New York too, but that’s it.”
“Why do you say that?”
Abigail looks at you aghast, as if you had asked her to prove why water was wet. “We’re just so cosmopolitan,” she purrs “So much art, so many cuisines. You really feel like a citizen of the world. You can’t really find this anywhere else.”
“I do like those things about London,” you say, not liking Abigail’s superior tone.
“See! And the Dutch are such…conformists.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes! No sense of individuality, they just follow whatever the norm is. And if you want to act against it, they really go after you for it! It doesn’t go down well with them.”
“How so?”
“Well, take immigration for instance,” Abigail says. Aha, you think, we could slag off Fortress Europe together. “Look at how they’re taking in so many refugees! It’s a bit irresponsible really.” Abigail continues incredulously.
“I’m sorry?” you really should have seen this twist coming.
“Yes! I mean, I know I’m in the minority here, in my generation, but I don’t think immigration is such a good thing.”
You can now feel your ears heating up with rage and shame. Your smile is frozen into a rictus of rage. “How do you mean?” you manage to spit out.
“Well, I—”
“Mallika, there you are!” Laura comes tumbling back with a few more guests. The flow of the conversation abruptly turns back to small talk as another wave of introductions takes place. You stand in the circle, but you are only partly there. Part of you is still in your conversation with Abigail, seething.
“What plans for the bank holiday weekend Mallika?” Harry asks you. You hadn’t noticed that he was standing next to you now.
“What? Oh!” you snap back to the party, “Probably just going to a park and reading, what about you?”
“We are going to Austria on a skiing trip, why don’t you come with us?” Harry offers, with the sudden generosity of the drunk.
That was dangerous, you want to tell him. You might push Abigail off a cliff. “I’m afraid I can’t,” you tell him instead, “My passport is with the Home Office.”
“What? Why?” Harry asks, “Did you do something wrong?”
“I applied for a visa extension.”
“Come on! That’s a pretty lame excuse. I’m sure you can travel without a passport?”
“No,” you say, quietly but firmly, “I can’t. I need my passport to travel,” Harry harrumphs, unconvinced. He doesn’t believe you. He moves away from you, as if being an immigrant was a contagious disease.
Later that night, when you are leaving the party, you bump into Abigail coming out of the loo.
“Off so soon?”
“Yes, I need to catch the last tube back.” And get far away from you Abigail.
“That’s a shame. I’m sorry we couldn’t talk more! I hope to contest the elections one day with the Labour Party, you know. Have a safe journey home!”
Funny, I thought you’d be fighting on a UKIP ticket, you think to yourself. It was only when you’re back on the Victoria line that you remember that Abigail had said, “Have a safe journey home!” Not, “nice meeting you”, or “good night”. It probably meant nothing, but it still leaves you feeling queasy.
#
In your dreams you see the first suit poring over your passport with spindly hands, like an overgrown cockroach. He emotionlessly passes it to the second suit. The second, also grey, also spindly, does the same and passes it to the third, also without emotion. This was not a room for emotions. Their job was to clinically unspool people’s lives. No joy, no anger, no empathy, no emotions. Sometimes, people didn’t get their lives back, but that was just how things went in this small, fluorescent-lit, subterranean office.
#
“Don’t use the pedals for now, just balance on the bike,” Daniel shouts. He is a friend from college who has decided to teach you how to ride a bike.
“How come you never learnt ? We all did when were kids,” Daniel had asked you earlier in the week.
“My mother never let me,” you had said, shrugging. You had learnt to live with that fact. “She thought it was too dangerous. She worried that I might get run over by cars. Or get kidnapped.”
“And you haven’t learnt since?”
“I keep thinking I might, but I never get around to it.”
“Why don’t I start you this Sunday? And we’ll make sure that you don’t get run over by a car or get kidnapped.”
“Are you sure? I feel uncomfortable bothering you like this.”
“It’s no bother. If I can help a fellow kid rebel against their overbearing parents, however late in life, I consider it time well spent.”
“Okay, if you insist.” You found his exuberance charming.
You meet him in front of the British Museum where he’d been standing next to a bank of Santander bikes. “These are really heavy,” you complain once you get a bike out of its stand.
“Yes, I think it’s to make them harder to steal,” David says, and catches you gallantly as you almost trip, “I’m sorry, I’ll get my bike next time. It’s much easier to handle. In the meantime, let’s find somewhere with a nice incline, so pushing the bike will be easier. You can just steer.”
You walk around with David till you get to the Senate House parking lot and find the incline he is looking for. He stands you at the gate at the top of the incline, holding you by your waist. “Okay, so I’m going to give you a push. All you have to do is make this go all the way through the lot, to the building. This is a gentle incline, so you should be fine,” he announces.
“Okay.”
“Ready?”
“Ready.”
He pushes the bike and down the slope you go, picking up speed. Suddenly, as you near the bottom, the front wheel veers to the left, and you careen into a wall. “That’s great! Let’s try again,” David calls out.
“It’s great?! I thought I’d pitch over the wall! This was not a gentle incline!”
You roll the bike back to the top of the incline and get into position. Daniel pushes you again. This time the bike doesn’t veer left. Instead, it goes straight, and you almost hit an old man coming out of the building. “What the bloody hell! Watch where you’re going!” the man shouts at you, as he jumps out of your way. Daniel is doubled over laughing as you roll the cycle back to the top. “The Empire strikes back,” you quip sheepishly. The lesson continues for a bit, but you don’t feel like you’re any closer to getting the hang of it. You do feel Daniel becoming a lot more comfortable adjusting your stance on the bike. Instead of instructing you, he moves you as he sees fit. Your hands, your elbows, your shoulders, your waist, your feet. You think you can see where this is going.
After what you think was a futile lesson, you get onto the Victoria line together. “What’s your biggest fear?” you ask Daniel. “Immigrants,” Daniel says drily, and you burst out laughing. “You’ll have to deport me then,” you say. “Oh no!” he says in mock horror, “and I was teaching you how to cycle too. I can’t deport you now, you’ll just cycle away! Or run me over!”
“I promise to try my best,” you say, smiling.
“What’s your biggest fear?” Daniel asks.
“Currently? That I’ll be stuck here, unable to stay, unable to leave. That I’ll be alone, without hope. That I’ll find a person I love, but they won’t love me back.”
“That does sound terrible. Can I give you a hug?” Daniel offers with a kind smile, and you gladly accept. “You know, if I were dating you, I’d never let you get away.” You are silent and look up at him. You want to kiss his goofy face so you reach up and do it. But Daniel pulls back, suddenly serious. “Mallika,” he says, in a pitying tone, just as the tube comes to a stop, “I’m so sorry. I thought you knew? I have a girlfriend.” You don’t know what to say, you can feel your face burning from embarrassment. You quickly apologize and get out of the carriage, even though you’re a stop away from where you meant to get off. You walk the rest of the way home, cursing yourself.
#
“Back again?” the postie says. You are surprised he remembers you. ‘Stuck in the middle with you’ is playing again. Did they always have it on or does their music system know, through some cosmic connection, to put it on whenever you step into this post office?
“Yes, I got a message that I have a letter from the Home Office waiting for me?”
“No worries. What’s your name?”
“Mallika.”
“Great, if you can just wait a minute, I’ll go look for it,” the man disappears and reappears a little later with a letter and hands it to you. The letter reads—
Case reference number: 023152117
Regarding applicant: Ms. Mallika Bull, 17 December 1989
It is important that you read and understand this letter. If you cannot understand anything in it, please find someone to help you.
Dear Ms. B—
It is with regret that you are informed that your passport has been misplaced. It would be recommended that you report this to your embassy and the police at the earliest, and apply for a new passport as soon as possible. Please be advised that if you plan to leave the country without your passport you might be stopped from leaving, or, alternatively, from returning. You are reminded that without a passport you shall have no legal standing as a person.
Your application fee for this visa will not be refunded. Once you get your new passport, you can apply for the visa again after paying the full fee and immigration surcharges.
In the meantime, this letter will function as proof of temporary leave of stay that shall expire 15 working days from the date of the letter.
If you fail to apply within 15 working days, your application will be rejected as invalid, and you will be deported to your home country promptly, and banned from applying for another visa to the UK for 10 years.
To find more information about applying for a visa, please visit our website.
Please do not email us for any purpose.
Please do not respond to this letter in writing.
You don’t scream, you don’t cry, even though you want to. Your mother’s words came back to you. Maybe you should have gone back like she had said, but to what? An arranged marriage with an accountant of marriageable age? She will be smug about this. There would be more uncertainty, more bureaucratic limbo, and more visa fees for you. More standing in queues, waiting on supercilious embassy officials asking for more papers. And you, stuck here paying them even more money for the pleasure of their incompetence and malice. More more more more more, the word hammers away in your head. More more more more more, you keep thinking as you trudge back home and slink into your bed.
That night you don’t dream of the three grey suits. In your dreams you are at the South Bank book market under Waterloo bridge. You come here often to look at books but not to buy them. Books will only weigh you down if you have to move. You’ll buy them when you feel more stable you tell yourself, but you haven’t bought a book in eight years.
But in your dream, you buy books, an even dozen, without thinking twice about spending the money. You pile them up next to you as you sit opposite the Palace of Westminster across the river Thames. Sunlight wanes, and the street lamps come on. You can see the Parliament lights reflected on the Thames. You keep sitting there, in the dim light, reading. Like you belong in this city. Like you are no longer just a visitor. Because you have found your place and made it yours, like a proper Londoner.
Chinmay Sharma is an assistant professor in the English Department at Shiv Nadar University (Delhi NCR, India), where he teaches Critical Theory and Postcolonial Literature and Theory. He specializes in South Asian studies, cultural studies and comparative literature. His essays have been published in South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies (2025), Journal of Hindu Studies (2025), Parapolitics (2021) and Indian Genre Fiction (2018). His short story ‘Hostile Environment’ was published in Wasafiri 111 (2022).