Maa

She asked her daughter, “What do you want to become when you grow up?”

“I want to become a rich man so that one day I could come here and buy you, so that you wouldn't have to lie to me and cry at night.”

Shital was dumbstruck. She always thought she was being successful in hiding her sorrows from her daughter. During the day, she used to tell her, these rich men were very sad and they took an appointment from her to tell her their sad stories, and after the counselling session was over, they paid her the consultancy.

Nidhi was 9, and Shital never wanted her daughter to know about the hideous truth of her life. She knew that her background would affect her daughter’s confidence, and performance in school.

She was herself 14 when she had been kidnapped and brought here. Initially, she was kept in a closed room with only one window, and the window had bars, like those in prison cells. It was a bad phase, painful and disgusting. She couldn’t live, and she couldn’t die, for death was a luxury for those whose life was their own.

They say it’s a trait of human race to learn to adapt to their surroundings. Shital, too learned the survival skills, and gradually got ‘promoted’ in her job. She had realized that it was her destiny. And she could either live it or lament over it.

Her daughter would never see this side of her, was her decision. She would work all day and cry all night. But that smile would never waive off her face in the vicinity of her daughter. Nidhi had to be made felt that her family was a happy family, no matter what the reality was.

Sometimes she thought that she was better than those women with apparently happy households. At least these men weren’t wearing any masks before her. At least they weren’t lying to her or trying to flatter her to get what they wanted. They could just ask for it and get it and then pay and leave. It was that simple. She wasn’t one of those unlucky women whose husband cheated on her with another woman or who had to keep calling her boyfriend every half an hour to check on him.

“Maa?” The voice of her daughter snapped her out of her thoughts.

“You’re a strong girl. And you’ll become a very brave man.” She told her daughter and nuzzled her to sleep.