Stranger (4)

She was sore all over. Her body hurt from exhaustion and from the beating it had received from him. The telltale white strands in her hair told her that she was too old and too tired to fight it anymore. 

She hadn't bother disguising the swollen red cheeks or the fact that she was deaf in one ear thanks to all the eardrum shattering slaps it had endured. With a sigh... she willed herself to walk when the music wafted in.

Hamsadhwani she muttered. The notes of the flute mingled with the rock and roll of the drums and struck her rooted to her place. She hummed along... she knew the arohanas and the avarohanas of the raaga. Eyes closed, hands and feet in sync with the taala of the raaga .... The soreness in her body drained away. Music is spiritual. Even to an atheist.

He spotted her in the crowd. Her presence was like the smell of mogra and jasmine. A breath of fresh air in an otherwise rank odor filled life. He watched her sway to the music.... imperceptible movements of her fingers tapping rhythmically on her thigh. 

Her hair a tangled mess, her dress a little too tight and a little too middle class. No makeup no jewellery and a red swollen cheek. A stark contrast to the beautiful and coiffed ladies and gentlemen around. Yet he was drawn to her... His eyes never left her face though a million and two people walked about.

The song tapered to an end and it seemed like the weight she was carrying flew back on her shoulders. Soreness and pain returned with a vengeance and she fell back to reality with a thud. She opened her eyes to find him watching her and a wave of self consciousness swept over her.Her dress was faded, was a size smaller for it was a dress that was a decade old. Her hair in a messy bun... her face streaked with dried tears and wet sweat. She wished he hadn't seen her  .... not this way. 

Averting her eyes, she walked away. 

He stood watching her .... oblivious to the words of the world.

And no. He didn't know how the events transpired as well. Little did she know. But there they were. 

Her hot fingers touching his cold earlobe. The clink of her earring with his watch... His palm on the mole on her cheek. Her hands in his hair.. The little tickle of his stubble, a drop of blood from his lips.. her gasp and his tongue kissing her teeth.

The drawing away of his mouth from hers. His lips on her nape. Her hands on his back. His fingers on her neck. A hickey that would need to be hidden, a scratch on the back that would need some creative explanation.

The loudspeaker announcing the next band. The quick parting of the couple (?).hurried steps in opposite directions.

It wasn't love.

It wasn't love.

It wasn't love.

It couldn't have been. 

Because.

It wasn't love.

It wasn't love.

It wasn't love.

It...........wasn't. ......... love ?

the freedom

She shut the door closed. And then, that was done. The flood gates opened up. Finally, they could run free. As she wept her anger way, the tears left her with a sense of void, a vaccum that surprised her. She had expected relief, not this dull throbbing nothingness.
There was no telling about what she wanted, after a long bitter battle , she had finally closed the doors and had vowed never to look back.
Why the ache in the pit of her stomach then?
~~~~~

she had opened herself up to accomodate him.
Her body, her mind, her life, her habits, everything moved to accomodate him. Everything she did, now had his tinge, his musky smell a mixture of deospray, cigarettes and his sweaty chest- which she hated at the beginning, but had now begun to tolerate, and God help her, almost even like.
She began to accept those phone calls which irritated her in the beginning to be a part of life, as did she began to accept those stubby hands that crept up her waist destroying her REM cycle. his baritone, his slight deafness, his "Im always right" attitude,
she had just adjusted herself to work around this. She had retailored her life around him, his whims and fancies.
And then came the daughter, and life, if she did have any semblance of it left, just ended as she knew it. Equations changed, words and their meanings changed, colors changed. time warped. everything was distorted now; everything was lost, and nothing was found. It was this nothing that she still held on to, she told herself, if I think hard about it, this, uncomfortable feeling, this sense of being choked, might actually feel good. It might actually turn into love.
~~~~~
What triggered it? She would later think about her history teacher telling the class that the wars that changed the landscape of the earth, often began with a small transgression, which otherwise would go unnoticeable in the canvas of world history.
Whatever led to it, however it had shaped up, she had reached this point today.
She was back where she started, albeit minus her youth, her vibrancy and her will to live. She was altered in a way that could not be "unaltered", she had changed in ways that were almost unimaginable, her outlook to life, her responses to life, everything, including the color of her hair had changed.
Time isnt furniture that once changed, you can drag it back the place that lounge chair was, so the room looked the same again.
Time was everchanging, to yearn and want the past might be human nature, but is the impossible, the one thing that Man hasnt learnt to manipulate.
~~~~~
The aching void gave way to a fit of laughter. The realisation that she was now alone. That she could finally smell and hold silence, that she could sigh and hear the sound echo around the house, that she could order a pizza without being lectured about cheese, that she could watch TV and play a game all at the same time, without demands for coffee and milk and a thousand other tiny things.
That she could be a human being, and not a work mule from egypt, that she could stand in the mirror and like what she saw, without having to avert her eyes.
And she laughed. the sound felt foriegn to her ears. It was ages since laughter had bubbled up like this, ages since laughter had actually emanated from the depths of her soul.
She looked at the papers she clutched in her hand, un-creased them, re-read them, tears streaming down her face, tears of joy, of happiness. and in that instant, she almost believed. that instant, she WANTED to believe. in god. for delivering her freedom back, for allowing her to respect herself, her gender, her likes, her demands, her sense of self, her soul.
Divorced. she whispered to herself. Divorced, she shouted out to the world, heard the echo in the empty house, Divorced - she called out to her dead parents.
Divorced, and she began to laugh again. Laughter filled with joy and relief.
Laughter that came 10 years too late.

helpless

Only when you go through it, you realise why they use adjectives like "shocking" and "gory" and "mindnumbing"; and only when you go through it, you realise why all those adjectives are useless in describing what you have just gone through.

and no, im talking about Cancer.

What  i AM talking about, is domestic violence. Physical domestic violence.

People have a cure for cancer, they help you through it, you are given medicines to kill it. you are allowed to kill the cancerous cells and remove parts of your body that might potentially cause cancer in the future.

What about domestic abuse? You act as if it doesnt exist, you pretend everything to be okay; a ruptured ear drum? a dislocated jaw? internal bleeding?

nothing happened. nothing really.fell down a flight of stairs; wasnt watching where to step; had a minor accident on the two wheeler. really?

really?

how could a flight of stairs rupture a eardrum? How could a jaw get dislocated if one hit the head on the kitchen cabinet? how do you manage to get massive internal bleeding if you dont drive a two wheeler?

no questions asked. questions will never be asked. we all want to pretend it did not happen. how do educated people allow it to happen? what about social standing?

finally, "who doesnt have problems in their marital life" and "all a part and parcel of marriage"

domestic abuse. part and parcel of life. nothing really happened. and I wont listen to what you tell me.

simply because, with a ruptured ear drum, i really cant hear you.