Healing

For the first time in my life, I have broken my own code. I have spoken where I shouldn’t have. I wonder why I feel guilty? Is it because I do not believe that I am right for saying exactly the thing that I wanted to say in exactly the same manner that I wanted to say it, or because I am not used to ever venting out my feelings verbally.

I always knew that there was a problem. Always knew that something wasn’t right.

I love husband. all said and done, I do love him. I have shared my most intimate moments with him and so has he. When did I lose my judgment and started to believe other people on face value? How did other people get more power on our lives than ourselves? When did all of this happen?

I will have to stop. Right here and right now. I do not fear anyone anymore, because I know that I am the only one here with any stakes involved. Also because I don’t have to be answerable to anyone anymore, other than myself.

It will take time perhaps, but it will happen!

Survivor

You look at the empty walls. A sigh escapes you. It wasn’t supposed to be like this… However, this is the only way it has ever been. For you and for him. It is time to move on. You wonder if you will be able to recover from this blow. This time, it feels harder, more definite. Yet you do not feel heavy. You are torn, mostly because of the enormity of whatever that’s happening.

He’s asked you a straight question. It’s your life or his. You choice is clear. Not to him, but to you of course. You choose yourself. This time, there are no second thoughts. You abdicate all ties. You pick yourself. Your Life. Your Happiness. Your Dreams. You.

Nothing will change your mind.

Nothing.

The Woman

He: “Do you think I am joking?”
She: “Umm hmmm.”
He: “What?”
She: “I mean No.”
He: “You think I am joking.”
She: “No.”
He: “I am serious. I think I have dengue.”
She: “Ok.”
He: “Why are you talking to me like this?”
She: “How else should I talk?”

He hung up after that. She knows it is going to sting him. This indifference of hers. Perhaps more than her cheek stings from morning’s violence. She knows that he is feigning sickness. He is feeling guilty about beating her in the morning and wants to take it back. But violence leaves its marks. Not only on her body, but also on her already blemished soul.

She wishes that it continues to sting her, so that she continues to sting him. She laughs at herself. The pitiable state that she has got herself into. This time, she takes the full blame because it was her own actions that brought this upon her. Not the morning’s beatings, but the general bad luck – the hoarseness from everyday screaming, the soreness from being molested day after day, the pangs of the beatings.

Bad luck, she laughs, this time a little louder. Well, talk about trivializing an issue. For the first time in her life, she identifies with half the population of her country. For the first time she feels like an Indian-born and bred woman. She laughs again. Mad perhaps with the increasing self-pity. A woman. The person who is beaten, raped, blamed, jeered and leered at. A woman. Broken. Damaged. Decrepit.

A woman.