Is It A Sin To Be A Girl?

Darkness

The bed was decorated with marigolds. Thick garlands were wrapped around the four posters and the headboard. The whole room stank of flowers.

The odour made Kamala's stomach roil. She felt suffocated as she sat on the bed, waiting for her husband.

Presently, the door opened and in stepped Ram Raushan, and with him brought in an overpowering stench of alcohol, that filled the room. He closed the door and bolted it. A chill ran down Kamala's spine.

He took slow and deliberate steps towards the bed and lifted her veil. His lewd smile sickened her to the core. Right then, she wanted nothing more than the bed to swallow her up.

"Finally, you're mine", Ram Raushan slurred. Kamala almost gagged from the vile stench.

Suddenly, he ripped off the veil and her saree, and pushed her back against the headboard. Kamala  struggle with all her might to get free from his grips. Although she fought tooth and nail, she had already known what the night would bring for her from the moment she had entered the room that evening. There was no way she could avoid that from happening.

"I don't want this", she pleaded. That was the worst thing that she could have possibly said at that moment.

"Didn't your mother ever teach you not to talk back to your husband? How dare you?", Ram Raushan shouted.

Kamala realised that it was useless to struggle, it would further aggravate him and that would mean worse for her. Tears started to roll down her cheeks. Was it a  sin to be a girl?

Kamala's married life was worse than the twelve years she had spent with her family. It was unbearable. Every night, once her husband was through with her, she was left bleeding and covered in bruises. Even a small mistake guaranteed welts on her skin from her husband's belt. Her in-laws never allowed her to go and meet her mother. Even her family never came to visit her.

One night when her husband was passed out drunk and everyone else was asleep, she slipped out from the house and ran until she reached her village. She sneaked to the back of her house to the kitchen where she knew her mother would be.

Her mother couldn't believe her eyes when she slipped through the kitchen window. She couldn't hold back her tears.

She told her mother all about the hell that was her life.

At that moment, her mother fervently wished that there was something that she could do for her daughter. Nothing came to mind.

"Can't we run away, maa? Together?", Kamala's question caught her off guard. She stared at her blankly.

"But....we have nowhere to go."

"We'll make some sort of an arrangement for us both once we're out of here", was her reply. "God helps those who help themselves."