*Hi!
So, I realized that at the start of the story, I kind-of promised I'd keep this short. Not only is this no longer short, I have two versions in my head right now which are medium-long and long-long respectively. I guess I should apologize for that.
And also, fair warning for a bit of darkness in this chapter. Handle with care!
-TK*
Chapter 16
Madhu woke up feeling cold. The place looked unfamiliar, and Madhu felt pains emanate from all over her body. It was dark but the strange smell quickly reminded her where she was. She sat up and looked around, whimpering. She had been knocked unconscious, she remembered, once she had been hauled in the vehicle by Mukund and his friend.
"I just want to taste her once. I have been waiting for this for two years. I worked so hard, acted so nice both to her and that useless brother of hers who hands by my ever word. Argg..." Mukund had said as he threw her in. They'd beaten and tied her up and she had very little energy, but she still spat at him when he looked at her with her shameful eyes.
"I told you before. Control yourself. Touch her if you want but don't ruin her. Nobody pays much for used goods. But for a virgin...my guy says we can get two lakhs if she's pretty." The other guy repeated what he had been saying.
Mukund rubbed his hands all over Madhu's body, crushing her breasts and feeling up her crotch. She squirmed, but her movement only made him feel pleasured in a sick way. He held her hair back and jerked her face so she looked into his eyes. "This is what you get for saying no to me. Remember that."
...
"I'd rather die than sell my body." She screamed when they caught her, two days after being sold to the escort service.
She had been beaten and humiliated. They had torn her clothes until she had passed out crying. Women had come to her and asked her to stop resisting, promising her things would be good for her. Finally, she was sitting tired in a corner, whimpering, and others had pretty much left her alone when she realized the room was empty. She hadn't planned anything, but she saw an opportunity and decided to run. Of course, they caught her in less than fifteen minutes.
"We don't care about your life sweetheart, but you might reconsider your decision. Your lover told me all about your little brother when he dropped you here, and trust me, my men can get to Panchgani faster than you can if you run. Now I am a good man, and normally...normally I try to stay away from the child arm of the business. If you try to run again, or if you resist in any way, trust me...there is huge demand for young boys and girls these days, particularly in international markets. I can put your brother outside your reach in no time." Tony's cold voice rang in her ears.
"Manav...please...please don't do anything to him."
"I won't. I told you I'm not into that trade. I have children and a wife at home too. I deal exclusively with girls over 18. But..."
"I'll do what you say. Just don't hurt Manav..."
Manav!!!
Madhu woke up sweating from her nightmare, or rather her very accurate past. Almost spontaneously, tears burst out and Madhu felt a wave of fear take over. Yesterday's conversation with Manav hadn't gone well at all.
I never want to you see you again!
Although Madhu knew he had spoken in anger, hearing those words from her only family, her only reason to live...it broke her.
However, at the time, she was not at liberty to feel what she was feeling. She was a mistress of another man, a mistress who does not have the liberty to cry in pain and crumble in pieces whenever she wanted to, even if her whole world was coming apart. At the time, somehow, she had stopped the wave of pain and fear, boxing her emotions away. She had arrived back at RK's home relatively calm, and had even managed to stay up all night first talking to Trishna and then looking after RK who was sleeping in high fever. Having something else that needed her attention and focus was good at that time because it kept her from being flooded with pain. But she had dozed off on the chair in his room, and when she'd woken up, RK had already left. Exhausted, she slipped back into her own room and slept for a while, but now the nightmares were free to invade her.
"Manav" Madhu gasped as fear became larger than pain. She needed him to be safe. She needed him to be away from those men's reach. If anything, her talking to him yesterday had made the whole situation worse. What if he called Mukund and Mukund went to see him? She had no reservation for a second that Mukund's nice big-brotherly behavior with Manav in the past was a farce that he wouldn't continue, but she shuddered at the thought of Mukund reestablishing contact with Manav and using his innocence and distance from Madhu to possibly also sell to a child trafficking or begging racket like Tony had hinted. It was Tony who promised he wouldn't touch Manav as long as she complied. But if Mukund figured out there was money to be made...
No, no, no! The horror of the possibilities shook Madhu's soul. She had to somehow talk to Manav and convince him not to talk to or even come in front of Mukund. Last night, she hadn't been able to say the truth to him because she feared the truth would crush his innocence. More importantly, she had no answer for the obvious follow-on - if Mukund tried to rape and sell her into prostitution, how did she get out? Did she get out? Or was she a...
But now Madhu felt that she couldn't completely protect his innocence. She couldn't tell him the full truth, but she had to tell him enough that would make him realize Mukund couldn't be trusted. And then, as soon as possible and as quietly as possible, she had to send him away from Mukund and Tony's reach. Madhu didn't know how she was going to do that, considering she couldn't even go into the balcony of the room where she was confined. Maybe, the thought from the previous evening returned, maybe she should request RK. He had money, maybe he could help her.
Your brother is a really really nice man. She recalled saying to Trishna last night. At the time she was trying to console Trishna, but Madhu knew at some level she had started to believe that herself. She knew Rishabh's pain was genuine and she had seen him possible of compassion. Why, she had given her comfort and understanding in his own way, which was still greater than anything she had ever gotten for anyone except her mother.
RK had been cruel to her, but occasionally his true niceness spilled through. He hurt her, but not because he derived pleasure from her pain. She cared for him, she realized, even though she didn't think herself possible to care for anyone else. She even craved for his touch and it was more than just an escape for her now. She didn't have much to give him, but she had still hoped that her little kiss the previous night would let him know how grateful she was to him. And something more...she liked seeing him smile. She liked his soothing voice. She liked when he talked to her like a human being some times. She liked...
Sigh. There was something there, whatever it was, but Madhu knew she appreciated Rishabh and wanted him to be happy. His eyes spoke how anguished he was, and she knew how unjust his life had been to him, turning him into a monster, when really he was a saint.
Ha! the irony. Of all the men in her life, it was her eventual rapist who Madhu had the most conviction on being a fundamentally good person. A saint.
************************************
RK spent his drive back from the airport thinking about Trishna and what she said. Her words about him and Madhu had shocked him at first, but slowly he rationalized them as Trishna's desperate attempt to find happiness for her brother. He knew she was worried for him and he had tried to reassure her to his best ability. He had laughed with her, even taken her to Panchgani so she could believe he was normal and not worry. But clearly, he hadn't done a good enough job.
RK was sure Trishna was imagining things when it came to him and Madhu, but then, she didn't know the truth, so she'd probably mistaken their familiarity with each other for something else. Familiar, yes, that was the word. He was about to say friends, but RK and Madhu weren't really friends, were they?
Yes, RK admitted, their relationship had moved somewhat beyond the purely physical, purely transactional client-mistress relationship they had at the beginning. He now felt comfortable with her around, even enjoyed talking to her, and of late...of late he had been seeing her as a person, not just as the prostitute he had bought. He had found himself feeling glad when she was happy. But it wasn't still a friendship. And it definitely wasn't love!
Trishna would have seen it too had she known who Madhu was and why she really was in his house. But of course, he couldn't tell anyone that, esp Trishna. She was just an innocent kid.
What about Madhu, wasn't she innocent too, thought RK, startling himself. Why, she was almost the same age as Trishna? What would he think if Trishna was in Madhu's place?
No! he couldn't bear to think that way for his sister. Madhu wasn't innocent in the same way...she couldn't be...and if she was...if she was, well, then there has to be something else...
Is that why you left Mukund bhaiya even after everything he did for us? For him? For his money?
RK remembered Madhu's brother yelling at her the previous evening. He had no idea what the argument was about, but could it be because Madhu had for some reason chosen this profession. From her behavior these last three months, he wasn't convinced she was a greedy gold-digger per se, but maybe she needed the money for something, maybe for her brother. And then, RK remembered Madhu's muffled words coming out in sobs as she had broken down just for a few seconds.
He sold me!
Who sold her? To whom?
RK didn't doubt the veracity of Madhu's tears - her grief was too real. He just didn't know the cause. He wondered if he should ask her.
So far, he had resisted prying into her life and for good reason. He didn't want to get involved, and he was convinced he couldn't trust anyone. What Madhu did, who she was, what her story was - it was all her business. He wasn't going to open himself to emotional manipulation again by believing another woman's tears. But the one thing meeting Trishna had done was made him seen that not every woman in the world was evil.
Madhu is not Dipali, she said. Madhu had said the same thing to him months ago. Now, he saw the point. It wasn't exactly the point Trish or Madhu were making when they said those words, but RK realized that the truth was, not every woman had a malicious, lying, cheating gold-digger like Dipali. Not everyone had hearts made of venom.
Surely his sister wasn't one of them. Manorama mami wasn't. Three months back he was too broken to realize this, but now he felt sane enough to realize that not every single person was malicious with a hidden agenda. Only MOST of them. 99% maybe, but not all.
He wasn't ready to put Madhu in the trustworthy category - far from it! - but he did feel a curiosity to find out more.
Almost on cue, just as RK finished that thought and parked the car in front of his home, his phone rang and RK picked up without checking the caller ID.
"Hello"
"Hello RK Sir. Good morning."
"Who's this?"
"Tony. Itni jaldi bhool gaye humein sir?"
"Hmm. What do you want?"
"Sir, hope everything is good with the item we supplied. I mean, you're enjoying..."
"Come to the point" RK cringed. Hearing him refer to Madhu like that somehow pinched very bad.
"Oh well. I was wondering sir...you still have a week to go, but would you like a replacement. We have a lot of fresh inventory. I will even give you a discount. I just needed Mitasha back early."
"Why?"
"Sir...there's a foreign delegation coming for a few weeks. It's a wholesale deal. They asked for Mitasha as part of the consignment."
"No."
"But sir..."
"I said no. She's mine." He screamed in anger.
"Sir, aap to gussa ho gaye. That chit of a girl is nothing, not worth your anger. I only asked sir because I thought maybe you're bored with the same piece for all these weeks. But no worries, I will manage. I can send her late, after she comes from your place. It's only a few days."
RK didn't respond, so Tony continued.
"Ok sir. Let me know if I can serve you in some other way. I will call you in a week and I'll bring new pictures."
The phone disconnected, and RK thought back to the night, 12 weeks back, when he had called Tony in a fit of haze and rage and ended up buying Madhu.
(12 weeks back)
"This is RK. I need Mitisha for the night."
"RK sir, sorry, Mitisha is not available. She's with someone else. But, I have lots of other options. Much more beautiful, much fresher than Mitisha. Wait, I'll send you some pictures." Tony answered.
"I want Mitisha"
"Sir, I told you. That can't happen. She's already booked for the night."
"I will pay you double."
"Sir, it's not just the money. It's against the rules. You have had her every night for the last 15 nights. And she is new, so she has not been with other clients yet. My bosses don't allow it. Next week, I will send her to you again."
"Not next week. I want her now."
"How much would it cost to buy her off...permanently?"
"Sir, relax. Don't make a rash decision."
"I said, what would it cost to buy her off...permanently."
"Okay. I will have to check with my bosses."
"Call me back."
(5 minutes later)
"How much?"
"Seventy five lakhs. She's new and...anyway...But I have a deal for you. I know my bosses have way over-priced her. Besides, what will a man like you do with her for the rest of her life? You want her for some time, right. Buy her for three months. Use her. Do whatever. Just make sure she does not escape. Then after three months, return her to me."
RK thought about that. Tony was right. What was he going to do with a mistress for the rest of her life? He did feel intensely that he needed her that second, but once the madness subsided he would have to dispose of her. Besides, he didn't want any permanent relationships in his life anymore, much less one with a prostitute.
"Ok. How much for three months?"
"12 lakhs. Cash. 10 to me and 2 to the girl. My payment would be upfront. You can pay her at the end of three months. Any expenses would be extra."
"Fine. I am sending the money with my driver. The girl should be here in an hour."
One week.
He had forgotten about it, but one week was all Madhu had left. One week was all he had left. And then, she would go back to Tony. To the world she came from.
Deeply unsettled, RK walked up the stairs to his room. Surely, he had to let her go. Making her stay here wasn't an option, was it? Maybe he could extend it, but for how long? For how long was he going to turn to her for physical solace? Was it just about physical solace then?
He knew Madhu wasn't going to be here forever. Of course, she wasn't. Then why did the thought of Madhu's departure being only one week away feel so revolting?
He needed more time, he figured. But time for what?
Besides, everyday she stayed here, the risk of people finding out her identity increased. Hell, Trishna had almost discovered it! The reputational damage that would come out of that was totally not worth it.
Still, as he entered the room and his eyes fell on the chair Madhu had been sleeping when he had left in the morning, an unknown ache intensified inside him.
He couldn't keep Madhu, but he couldn't let her go either. Not yet.
Torn, Rishabh sat back on his bed. His eyes fell on the side-table next to him. A small box was kept there. He opened it and saw a pen with his initials inscribed.
"Happy birthday Rishabh ji" read the note. RK stared at the gift wide-eyed, his heart beating too fast.
Edited by teekay - 10 years ago
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