"Happy Married Life, Shivya Pathak" I weakly smiled seeing my condition, mangalsutra dangling in my neck, vermilion in hair and both hands filled with gold bangles.
"Come out quickly or do you want me to break the gate," my husband knocked again...
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"Tum aaram karo, jab tak Vedant Bhaiya nahi aa jaate," the woman said softly, guiding me into the unfamiliar room-the very room I was expected to share with a man from this day forward. My husband.
The word itself felt like a jolt to my system, foreign and heavy on my tongue. The mere thought of being bound to someone-so permanently, so irreversibly-sent an involuntary shiver cascading down my spine.
My bangles chimed with a subtle jingle as she gently helped me settle at the center of the bed. The mattress, too firm and far too large, swallowed me like some ceremonial offering laid out in silence.
I felt like a gift wrapped in silk and expectations. She adjusted the fall of my dupatta and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear before taking her seat at the corner of the bed.
"Naam kya hai tumhara?" she asked, her tone light, as if we were old friends instead of two strangers bound by a ritual neither of us chose.
"Shivya... Shivya Pathak," I replied, lifting my gaze for the first time. She smiled-a gentle, almost affectionate curve of her lips.
"Bahut pyaara naam hai, Shivya," she said, nodding as if savoring the syllables. "Lekin ab se Shivya Pathak nahi... ab tumhara naam Shivya Vedant Singh Raizada hai."
I didn't respond. I didn't ask her why I had to change my name just because I had been wed. I knew the answer already. That's how things worked here. You lose your name, your identity, your story. You become someone's wife, someone's possession. And that was supposed to be enough.
She watched me in silence for a moment, then spoke again, trying to keep the atmosphere light. "What's your age?"
"Twenty-three," I said hesitantly, not sure what the right answer was-or if there even was one.
A soft chuckle escaped her lips. "Late shaadi hui tumhari. But it wasn't your fault. Vedant bhaiya never agreed to marry. Every time the elders brought it up, he'd delay it-'Next year,' he'd say. If not for that, we would have met much earlier."
Her words floated in the air like smoke-unavoidable, suffocating. I remained silent. What was there to say? That my marriage had been decided long before I could even spell the word? That while other girls were dreaming of school picnics and storybooks, I had been promised to a stranger?
I had been ten days old. Just ten. Sick and fading in a hospital bed, when the zamindar's wife-the village queen in her own right-saved my life. In return, she struck a deal with my mother. I would be given to her grandson when I came of age. That was the price of my survival.
A shudder of revulsion crawled through me. How could someone fix a child's life in exchange for a favor? A ten-day-old baby girl bartered for future possession. It was not a marriage. It was a transaction. And I was the currency.
I hate them. Every single one of them.
I hate this family that smiles with such grace while hiding the shackles in their hands. I hate his grandmother for making my mother choose between my life and my future. And I hate my mother-for choosing this. For accepting their mercy, for binding me to a fate I had no say in.
