She walked past the ethnic wooden doors with the little diamonds carved out of them allowing the red glimmer of the dawn light into the household. She kicked the small brass pot of rice, taking her first step into the house she’d own a glamorous kitchen, cook for her husband and the many children to come. A ripe age of 19, Revathi was fair and had a brown beauty spot on her chin. Her dark eyes in addition to her well endowed body brought doctors, engineers and businessmen knocking at the door. Obviously, the best of the lot was picked. Apart from a pot belly, a 70s style haircut and a pair of thick glasses, Paresh was ‘the best’. Well, the list of educational suffixes to his name spoke for his intelligence!

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As the rice spilt around the doorstep, Revathi smelt the curry leaf infested typical Kannadigan rasam from the kitchen. A gem of a dancer, she looked forward to her new life. Her hair was studded with long strings of jasmine, as heavy as herself she looked. Not to forget the many gold chains, the rich dangling gold earrings and the well-studded gold waist belt, Revathi had put on at least three kilos overnight! The evening was colourful, the music of the rustle of vibrant coloured silk sarees as pleats hit one another, spelt the merging of two families. As the couple had walked around earlier that day, Revathi’s Pallu knotted with Paresh’s veil, the families were bound together by the ties of holy matrimony.

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As the darkness engulfed, Revathi’s aunt pulled her aside. In a staunch Kannadigan accent the words oozed out… “Tonight will be the beginning of a whole new life. You’re now Mrs. Paresh Gowda. Many things will come your way. New things. Which I cannot explain. Tonight your husband may behave a little strange. Just co-operate and everything will be fine”. Revathi shyly smiled back. The words went through one ear leaving little crumbs like Hansel and Gretel did and left the other ear. The night finally dawned upon. Revathi & Paresh had their legs pulled as the elders spoke of the ‘The warm milk theory of the newly wed’ that had been dropped. All of it remained an unopened door for Revathi.

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9 PM, the raw hour ticked. Revathi got into the bed with her newlywed. A red salwar kameez, green bangles and a fresh red sindoor. The pot bellied doctor minus his second pair of eyes, clad in a checked lungi and a banyan slept beside her. In the conscience world was a 24-year-old man building up the courage to touch his newlywed and a 19-year-old girl pre-planning the next day’s breakfast.

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A twenty minutes later, Paresh moved closer to Revathi. The crumbs in Revathi’s head joined together like magnet and iron, the last two sentences flashed. He then touched her neck and moved down to her breasts. A blob of saliva involuntarily made its way down Revathi’s throat. A deep breath followed the same way. As he rubbed his hands up and down the same path, Revathi began to bite her lip in anxiety. Paresh’s courage was now reaching its peak. He rose and put himself on her. He wasn’t as blind as you’d think he’d be without those thick glasses. Revathi closed her eyes tight as fear took over. He forcefully placed his lips on hers piercing his tongue through them. Revathi’s eyes opened wide as she screamed a silent scream in her head. Her body struggled as he held her hands tight putting all his weight on her. As he tried more of the French kissing, he made his way under her kurta trying to caress her stomach. She pushed his hands away. The enraged Paresh driven by his impatient libido flung her hands away. Her right hand hit the corner of the cot breaking her bangles and throwing glass across the room.

Overwhelmed by fear, as blood rushed through her body aimless and confused, it was too much to take in a nanosecond, Revathi’s mind and body gave up leaving her unconscious. The last thing she heard was the bangles hitting the walls of the room leaving infinitesimal dents and crashing on the floor. As she felt the minute fragments of glass prick her sensitive wrists, all alertness faded off.

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She awoke the next morning at the early hour of four. Senses flashed. Sounds of crashing glass, a creaking cot, bodies hitting against each other, raging moans. The feel of intense cold pain in the wrong place followed by warm blood flowing underneath. She rose a naked Eve next to a satisfied clothed Adam, over a gory blood red stain. She picked up her clothes strewn randomly across the room as she walked to the bathroom feeling the weak nerves in her privates pull against each other.

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There stood before her in the mirror a lady tired of life on an early morning. A tear-stained face, wolf like bite marks across her chest, wrists like engraved stones of the first civilization, blood stained thighs, she wondered if the lady in the mirror was her. As she stared into the now stale kumkum scattered over her forehead, she muttered to herself in a timid grit, “Next time, Co-operate.”