Coerced Shadow: Entrapment of my mother

[Rupakpolo1]

Mallika knocked sharply on our peeling wooden door. Not Ma. Ravi Uncle swung it open, filling the doorway. He was shirtless, covered in a slick sheen of sweat that plastered grey chest hair to his skin. He wore only a simple, white cotton dhoti – the kind my father wore when relaxing at home. It was knotted low on his hips. Mallika gasped audibly, her hand flying to her throat. Her obsidian eyes widened in genuine shock, scanning his bare torso, the sweat dripping down his temples, the state of the dhoti. "Ravi!" she hissed, her voice tight with disbelief. "What is this... appearance? You are not still... done?"

Before she could finish, I ducked under Ravi Uncle’s thick arm, the forgotten console box crashing to the floor behind me. I bolted past him, down the short hallway towards our bedroom. The door was ajar. Inside, Ma lay sprawled on our bed, panting shallowly. A thin cotton sheet was tangled loosely around her legs, but her torso was bare, glistening with sweat under the dim bulb. Her breasts rose and fell rapidly with each ragged breath. Her skin looked fevered, flushed pink. She stared at the ceiling, eyes unfocused, lips slightly parted. When my shadow fell across the doorway, her head jerked towards me. Panic flared in her exhausted eyes, sharp and terrified. "Ayan?!" she gasped, her voice raw and weak. "No! Go... go away! Out! Out of this room!" She tried feebly to pull the sheet up over herself, her arms trembling violently. "Now!"

"*Ayan" Ravi Uncle’s voice boomed from behind me, filling the cramped hallway. His heavy hand landed on my shoulder, fingers digging in like iron claws beneath the damp silk shirt. "Come." He steered me firmly backwards, away from the doorway, his bulk blocking my view of Ma. "Your mother is... unwell." His breath smelled sharply of expensive cologne and something metallic underneath. "She needs rest. Quiet." He guided me forcibly towards the living room. "Sit." He gestured towards the worn sofa. "Be good."

I sank onto the scratchy fabric, my gaze fixed on the floor. Mallika stood rigid by the door, her face a mask of fury and disbelief directed at Ravi Uncle - “I thought you would be done by now”

Ravi uncle smiled back - “She is special”

I sat rigid on the sofa, the cheap fabric scratching my thighs. Mallika's perfume hung thick in the air, mixing with the sharp tang of Ravi Uncle's sweat. He leaned against the doorframe to Ma's room, arms crossed over his bare, hairy chest, the white dhoti looking obscenely casual. Mallika paced the cramped living room, her silk sari hissing against her legs. Her obsidian eyes burned with a cold fury. "Special?" she spat, the word brittle. "This is reckless, Ravi. Utterly reckless." She gestured sharply towards the closed bedroom door. "Look at the state of you! Look at the time! What if neighbours saw? What if someone came?" Her voice dropped to a venomous whisper. "We have protocols. Discretion. This... this is sloppy.Also, You are casual about boys seeing this."

Ravi Uncle just smirked, wiping sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. "Relax, Mallika. The boy saw nothing important. And Debjani..." He glanced towards the door, a possessive gleam in his eyes. "...she understands her position now. Deeply." He pushed off the doorframe. "Alright, alright. We are going now. No one will know about this. You are thinking too much" He strode past Mallika towards the front door, not bothering to retrieve his shirt. "Rohan! Move!...let us go home now"

Mallika lingered for a second, her furious gaze sweeping the cramped room, lingering on the forgotten console box lying on its side near the door. She looked at me, sitting frozen on the sofa. "Enjoy your gift, Ayan," she said, her voice devoid of its earlier false cheer, flat and cold. "And remember... quiet boys get nice things." She turned on her heel and followed Ravi out. The door clicked shut, leaving a sudden, heavy silence broken only by Ma’s muffled, ragged breaths from the bedroom.

Minutes crawled by. The humid Kolkata night pressed against the windows. Then, the bedroom door creaked open. Ma emerged, fully dressed in her usual faded cotton sari, her hair damp and neatly combed back into a tight bun. Her face was unnervingly composed, the frantic terror from earlier smoothed away, replaced by a brittle calm. She walked slowly, deliberately, towards the sofa where I sat, avoiding the gleaming console box on the floor. "Ayan," she said, her voice low but steady. "What did you do outside? With Mallika-di?" She sank onto the worn cushion beside me, her movements stiff, careful.

I stared at my hands. " I had Ice cream, ma" I mumbled. "At some place near" I glanced at her face, searching for cracks in the calm. "Then... Mallika-aunty took us to South City Mall. She... she bought me this." I gestured limply towards the garish box. Ma’s gaze flickered towards the console for a fraction of a second. There was no spark of curiosity, no flicker of surprise or disapproval. Her eyes, flat and distant, slid back to mine as if it were just another piece of furniture. She didn’t ask about it. She didn’t seem to hear the price tag and did not seem to be interested in listening to me about the gift.

"Ayan," she said, her voice low and steady, cutting through my stumbling words. She leaned closer, the faint scent of her soap barely masking the lingering metallic tang of sweat. Her eyes, though calm, held a desperate intensity. "Listen to me. Whatever happened... whatever you think you saw... you must never tell your Baba.*" Her fingers, cold and trembling despite the heat, gripped my wrist. "Promise me. Swear on my name. You will not breathe a word of this to Dad." The pressure of her grip, the raw plea in her usually soft eyes, left no room for argument. "Promise, Ayan."

I nodded, my throat tight. "I promise, Ma." The words felt like stones dropping into my stomach. She released my wrist, the ghost of her touch remaining, and stood up, smoothing her sari with that unnerving calm. "Good boy," she murmured, her voice flat. "Now, eat something. Sleep." She moved towards the kitchenette, her steps slow and deliberate, each movement radiating a bone-deep exhaustion that her composed face couldn’t hide. She didn’t look at the console again.

Hours later, the stifling heat and the weight of the promise kept me awake. The flat felt suffocating, thick with unspoken horrors. Needing air, or just escape, I slipped out of my bedroll and padded silently towards the bathroom. The cracked linoleum was cool under my bare feet. Moonlight filtered through the small, high window, casting long, distorted shadows. As I went inside the toilet to empty my bladder, something inside the plastic dustin beside the toilet caught my attention. As I lifted the lid of the plastic dustbin beside the toilet, I could see the item – not crumpled paper, but a thick, rolled-up pouch made of what looked like rubbery plastic, discarded near the top. It was unfamiliar, opaque, and heavy-looking. Peering closer, I saw it was knotted tightly at one end. Inside, visible through the stretched plastic, was a thick, viscous white fluid, glistening faintly. It looked alien, unsettling. My breath caught. I’d never seen anything like it in our dustbin before. A cold dread prickled my skin. Was it medicine? Something from... Ravi uncle? The image of Ravi Uncle’s sweaty torso, the state of Ma on the bed, flashed unbidden. I dropped the lid back with a soft clatter, the sound loud in the silent flat. I didn’t pee. I just stood there, frozen, staring at the closed bin, the pouch’s image burning behind my eyes.

The next morning, the pouch consumed my thoughts. At college, the humid air clung like damp cloth, amplifying the restless jitteriness in my limbs. During recess, I found Rohan huddled near the dusty tree, near our classroom. His usual quietness seemed deeper, shadowed. I pulled him further into the shade, my voice a low, urgent whisper. "Rohan," I hissed, glancing around. "I found something. In our dustbin. After... after you and your dad left." I described it quickly: the thick rubbery plastic, the knot, the thick white stuff inside. "What is it?"

Rohan flinched, his eyes darting mischievously before fixing on mine. He laughed hard. "It's... it's a condom," he mumbled, his voice barely audible over the distant shouts. "Men... men use them. When they... do it with women."

"Why?" I pressed, my stomach twisting. "What's it for?"

Rohan shuffled closer, lowering his voice further. "Protection," he whispered. "So women don't get babies." He glanced around again, his face pale. "When a man... puts his thing... inside a woman... Some Stuff comes out from the man. It is called  Sperm. It makes babies happen. The condom catches it. Stop it going inside her."

My stomach clenched. "So... that white stuff...?"

"It's sperm," Rohan confirmed, voice flat. "My dad released it for your mom last night." He kicked at a pebble. "He always uses them. With his girls as well. I know about it. My dad is just making sure that your mom does not get pregnant”

The word "sperm" hung in the humid air, thick and ugly. My mind raced, trying to fit this horror into the world I knew. "So... that white stuff... that's how...?" I couldn't finish. The image of my parents flickered – Baba’s gentle smile, Ma’s soft hands. "Is that how I was born? Did... did my Baba put his... sperm... inside Ma? And his... sperm... made me?"

Rohan stared at the cracked earth beneath the neem tree. "Yeah," he mumbled, kicking a clod of dirt. "That's how everyone starts. Your dad and mom... they must've done it. To have you." His voice was flat, matter-of-fact, stripped of any tenderness. "But with my dad... it's different. He uses the condom. Catches it. So no baby happens. He doesn't want babies from... from his girls. Like your ma." He spat out the last words, his face twisting with a bitterness far too old for him. " If your ma become my dad's wife, he might have treated her differently.  He brought me in this world by giving his sperm to my mom”

The image of the knotted pouch in our dustbin haunted me. Days later, while searching for a lost marble under the sagging sofa, my fingers brushed against another one – identical, thick rubber, knotted shut, heavy with its viscous load. It lay half-hidden in the dust bunnies near Ma’s knitting basket. A cold wave washed over me. Then, emptying the small bin beside Ma’s dressing table – another one, crumpled beneath used tissues. Every few days, like a grotesque scavenger hunt, I’d find them: behind the water drum in the bathroom, tucked under the edge of the thin rug in the living room. Always the same thick, opaque plastic, knotted tight, filled with that glistening white fluid. Ravi Uncle’s signature and presence was always evident in our home, left like trophies, or simply discarded trash in the home. I realized Ravi uncle was continuously visiting mom during my absence and probably violated her in every place of our home.

Each discovery tightened a vise around my chest. I couldn’t tell Baba. But the evidence piled up, invisible to everyone but me. The house started smelling different when I returned from college – a lingering mix of Ravi’s cloying cologne and something sour, underlying, that wasn’t Ma’s soap or cooking.

One Saturday morning, Ma moved stiffly, brewing tea with unnerving focus. Her eyes avoided mine. "Ayan," she announced, her voice unnaturally bright, brittle. "We're going out today. With Ravi Uncle. Shopping. Then maybe a movie. Dinner somewhere nice." She poured the tea, her hand trembling slightly.

My stomach clenched. "Shopping?" I echoed, disbelief thick in my throat. "With him?"

Ma flinched, busying herself with wiping the counter. "Yes. He wants to... to buy you some new clothes. Something nice." Her voice sounded strained, rehearsed. "Be ready by ten.”

She retreated to her room. When she emerged an hour later, I froze. She wore her best silk sari – the deep blue one with silver thread Baba had bought her years ago for Durga Puja. Her hair was oiled and coiled elaborately, not her usual loose bun. Kohl rimmed her eyes, making them look bruised and enormous against her pale skin. Rouge stained her cheeks unnaturally bright. She looked like a garish imitation of herself, dressed for a festival she despised. She hadn't worn makeup since Baba left. Last time when we went out with Ravi uncle she did not wear makeup. Her lips was shining with lipstick. She avoided my stare, fussing with her purse.