episode 4

Doctors forcibly treated Aganagai, who had shaken her head saying she didn’t want to live, by restraining her hands and legs.

“Didn’t her family come?” Kantha asked his father, looking around.

“I didn’t tell them,” said his step mother.

“Love should come on its own. If they come just because my daughter attempted suicide, that’s mere pity. My daughter doesn’t need to live on the charity of their pity,” she said, her pride surging.

Aganagai’s cell phone was with Kantha. There wasn’t even a single text message from her husband.

“Where is the child?” Kantha asked.

“I think they snatched him away. She came alone. She needs to wake up and tell us what happened. Then I’ll deal with that bunch. I’ll throw the whole lot of them in jail,” Father said angrily.

Aganagai opened her eyes the next afternoon.

“Why did you save me?” she asked with tears.

“I’ll have the police come. We can file a dowry harassment case against that family. We can file a complaint for abuse by the mother-in-law and father-in-law,” Father said.

She shook her head from side to side. “I don’t want anything. I don’t want any connection with that family. Get me a divorce,” she said. She had no hope left at all. She had come to completely disgusted life. That much was clear to the three people with her.

“You both go. I’ll talk to her,” Kantha said.

The parents went outside.

She lay there with the smell of poison on her. He sat beside her and held her hand.

“Tell me what happened,” he said.

After all, they were twins! She felt very close to him. So she began to tell him everything without hiding anything.

Two weeks ago.

Kabilan and she had made up after their fight.

She believed that he would understand her from now on.

But life got even worse than that.

The next day, after he left for the office, she bathed the child and changed his clothes.

Her mother-in-law and elder mother-in-law were sitting in the hall.

“This won’t suit the family. Better to cut her off and get him married to a good girl from our own relatives,” said the elder mother-in-law.

Hearing that, Aganagai felt fear. Yesterday when she asked him for a divorce, her mindset was different. Now her mindset was different.

But anger came as usual.

“Why ruin another girl’s life? You just marry my husband yourself, you hunchbacked old woman,” she snapped.

Her elder mother-in-law immediately got up and came into her room. “Who did you call a hunchback, you?” she asked and kicked Aganagai, pushing her down.

Aganagai, who fell to the floor, was furious. The child was also scared and crying.

All these days, her husband would sometimes hit her in anger. She would silently endure it. But today, the elder mother-in-law was kicking her.

Anger rose in her, wondering who gave them this right.

Her mother-in-law came and pulled her elder sister away.

“Why are you laying hands on that wretch? Why should you earn sin?” asked Semmalar.

She didn’t understand her daughter-in-law’s pain. But she didn’t want sin to accumulate on her elder sister’s hands. Aganagai felt an immeasurable hatred toward her mother-in-law.

Once the mother-in-law dragged the elder mother-in-law away, Aganagai called her husband.

When he picked up the phone, she told him everything that had happened here.

“Do you know how important the work I’m doing at the office is? Don’t you have any conscience at all? Would they have kicked you if you hadn’t said anything? You always have to find fault. You don’t see my love,” he said irritably.

Without saying anything more, she cut the call. The tears pouring from her eyes just wouldn’t stop.

She kept crying, thinking that her life had become so wretched that even the elder mother-in-law would hit and kick her.

That evening when Kabilan came home, she didn’t even go to the entrance to welcome him.

He came by himself and opened the bedroom door. The child was sitting on the bed, playing. She was lying face down at the edge of the bed.

Kabilan silently closed the door and went to her. He placed the suitcase in his hand to the side and leaned over her back. “Are you angry?” he asked in a low voice.

She didn’t speak.

“Aunt will leave for her hometown tomorrow. She won’t come here anymore,” he said.

She turned and looked at him with doubt. Had he fought with his Aunt? Was that why the old woman was leaving the house? Had he warned her never to come to their house again? She wondered with suspicion.

He kissed the back of her neck.

“I was in a very important work meeting in the afternoon. That’s why I yelled in tension. I am sorry, Ammu,” he said, apologizing as he pressed his lips to her ear.

“Your mother didn’t say a single word for me,” she said in a hoarse voice as she sat up.

Regret showed on his face. “Amma behaved very wrongly. I’ll talk to her,” he said, trying to pacify her.

“Shall we move out and live separately?” she asked. She asked with longing and expectation.

His face changed. “My mom and dad struggled to educate me. They struggled to raise me. Are you telling me to leave them alone like orphans?” Anger had crept into his voice.

Thinking that she had unnecessarily dragged something up, she quickly said “Sorry” right then.

He got up from the bed and stood. “Don’t ever plot to separate me from my family like this again!” he said furiously and walked out.

She didn’t go for dinner that night. He too came and lay down without eating.

“My son is lying here starving. She won’t sleep peacefully until she finishes him off,” the mother-in-law scolded, standing at the doorway of that room.

Hearing the words through the closed door, Aganagai felt both guilt and even more anger toward her mother-in-law.

Situations can bring all kinds of emotions. All the emotions she experienced in this house were ones she couldn’t handle. It felt like she was trapped on some alien planet.

She even felt like it would be better if her head burst and she died.

The next day, Kabilan left without speaking to her. The elder mother-in-law kept muttering until she left for her hometown.

After she left, Semmalar kept scolding her daughter-in-law, saying, “She made my elder sister run away. She has come here just to destroy my family. Only after she kills me will she be at peace.”

They kept putting excessive pressure on her. That pressure was growing to a level she couldn’t bear.

When she came to eat in the afternoon, Semmalar lamented, “Useless mouth. Only this one stuffs herself. My son left without even eating.”

She lost all desire to eat.

The word “useless mouth” hurt. It caused her anguish.

She rushed into the room and locked the door.

In the evening, when Kabilan came home, he knocked on the door.

When she opened the door, Semmalar complained to her son, “She won’t even hand the child over to us! Only with people who are sick do they refuse to give the children. She must think of us like that too.”

“Why, nagai?” he asked with a deep sigh, but he never once asked his mother what she had done.

That night, he approached her on his own. Even though kind words wouldn’t come to his mouth, thinking that he was with her because he cared for her, she too made peace with it.

The next seven days went well. Her mother-in-law was still scolding all the while. She didn’t take it to heart. Her husband was being amicable with her. She felt that was enough for her.

On the eighth day, she returned after going to the temple with the child.

Her husband and mother-in-law were sitting in the hall of the house.

Semmalar was applying oil to Kabilan’s head.

“Do you even like her face? She looks absolutely disgusting. Aunt has found a good girl in her hometown. They’ll give two hundred sovereigns of gold and marry her off. The girl looks like a beautiful parrot. I even have her photo on my phone. Cut off this devil and marry that girl,” she said.

What Kabilan was about to say to that, who knows? But Aganagai had already flared up by then.

As she entered the house, she threw the pooja items in her hand onto the floor. Udhayakrish, who was on her hip, got scared and clung to her.

“Why are you torturing me like this? I only said I would go to my house, right? But that day you spoke like a good person,” she fought with her husband.

“Look, the wretch has come and she’s already screaming like a madwoman,” the mother-in-law said. She put the child down and lunged forward, raising her hand to hit her mother-in-law.

But Kabilan stopped that hand.

“What kind of behavior is this? Elders will say whatever they want. Will you raise your hand for that?” he said angrily.

“Why don’t you understand my heart?” she said, tears pouring from her eyes.

Continuous failure in love. She had come to dislike life completely.

“Don’t cry and make a scene,” Kabilan said, holding his forehead.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. After realizing that her tears had no value at all, even the tears stopped.

She took off the plain yellow thread from her neck, handed it to him, said “Live well,” and pulled her son along to leave.

Before that, Kabilan rushed over and snatched the child. “If you want to go, you go. You can’t take my child with you,” he said threateningly.

To be continued..

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