The Unventured Passions

Simple Solutions

Jogen Mullick was a busy man, perhaps the busiest in entire eastern Mymensing... For, his eldest daughter was to get married the next day.

"Just a day... Just a day... And so much to do!!" Mullick patted his half bald head restlessly, eyeing the decorations at the entrance to his back Verandah.

"Aye... Fix that carpet..." He yelled at one, "yes, yes, that red one for the groom!"
The hustle bustle continued, and seeking a little seclusion to calculate the expenses so far, Mullick entered the decorated courtyard, adjacent to the canopied ground where sitting arrangements were done meticulously for the guest from groom's side.

"Ogoo..." A quivering female voice had interjected, and turning around, Mullick's facial expression changed at once.

"Why are you out here Pushpo?" He growled at the woman, his wife, and the dark complexioned fearful lady opened her mouth to speak once again, conjuring all the strength that her mother's heart could bore.

"I... I'm saying... Please... Please think twice... Our Jhinuk is only a child!"

"A child?" Mullick almost spat fire at his wife.
"A child? Have you seen her dark ugly face? I'm sure you have..." He let out a spiteful exhale.
"It's my forefather's good deeds that Bharat Chattujjee has agreed to make your ugly duckling his wife."

"But... But... He's fifty two!" PushpoMala let out a suppressed cry, tears rolling down her swollen eyelids, as she pleaded to her husband with folded hands.
"Please... Please, Putul's father... Please don't let her die like this!"

PushpoMala had sank down on the floor, her hands grabbing Jogen Mullick's legs, as she buried her face in his feet shedding tears.

"Leave... Leave me you disgusting thing!"
Mullick had fisted his hands, as he glanced around once before grabbing his wife's hair tightly in his fist.

"Ahh...ahhh... It's hurting..."
PushpoMala cried out, and Jogen Mullick landed a hard smack on her cheek in response.

"You fifty woman! It's your fault... All your fault!" Mullick kicked her away from his feet, hitting Pushpo's stomach, and she lay tattered on the floor, a little away from him, her face buried in the scarlet wedding carpet, and her forehead banging on the ground in helplessness.

"You have given birth to five girls! Five Fucking Girls!!" Jogen Mullick spat at her in disgust.
"Not a single son you wretched witch! And all five of them as ugly as their deepshit mother!"
He eyed the flower-clad entrance, ensuing this little act of his was unnoticed, and spitting at his weeping wife once again, he left the place.

"Hey Maa Durga... Durgati Nashini... I beg you Maa... Please... Please save my daughters!" She banged her head on the hard carpeted floor of their modest courtyard, her heart lacerated, and her face bruised.
"If I've ever been an honest woman, a chaste one, save my daughter... I beg you!" She lamented continually, her warm tears soaking the rough ground, her heart desparately looking for an answer... and, before she could make any more laments to the goddess, a soft gentle hand touched her shoulder.

"Maa...!"

PushpoMala raised her head and looked up. It was her youngest daughter, Putul, standing infront with a rag doll cradled in her left arm, and her right hand held another's hand, a white rock glowing on her ring finger... And somehow in her mother's heart, Pushpo knew at once that if anyone could help her daughter, that would be the owner of this hand... the hand that perhaps Maa Durga had sent to her, her rescuer, her refuge, her only hope!

"I heard some of it... But, tell me Didi, why do you not want your daughter to get married?"
The owner of those gentle pristine hands had now sat down infront of her, on her ground, her face slightly visible behind the veil of the old saree that had covered her face, a pair of calm bright eyes staring back at her with compassion.