Baila

She was sobbing like a tormented soul on his shoulder. It was their third night together, consecutive. She could barely find her voice. And he was at an utter loss of words or actions. The sensual woman he had always loved and longed for was lying naked in his arms. In the muted glow of the night lights all he could feel of her body, were the salty tears, running from her clinched eyes to his cheeks. She was clinging onto him like a man grasping for the last life line in turbulent seas!

“Baila. . .”, he spoke as if to the air. He wasn’t so sure the name belonged to the lady. Baila, was an enigma in her own self, a woman as fiercely independent as Satan cut them out to be. A confident and witty female thriving in a man’s world. Men frequently fell in and out of love with her, the women adored her. She had a way with all around her. Seemed like her universe was at her beck and call, and a nod of her head could change the scenery around her. A loyal friend and confidant, Baila was always in control of people around her, a Czarina of her Own.

But, was this sobbing girl still Baila!? 

This night was supposed to be the landmark in Dara’s life. Despite his repeated confessions and expressions of his lasting love and affections, she would not trust him or believe in the heroine called love. He had achieved this semblance of intimacy after a grueling courtship of five years. He had felt, at last, inside her outer hard shell of the strong headed persona, and definitely touched a chord deep inside her. That’s why he was seeing her in this pitiful crying fit third night in a row. 

Dara had been seeing her fold and unfold in front of him. To him she was the mistress of mysteries, there was always something unknown and distant in her. One minute she was fun and frolicking all over, the next she would totally shun him out, like an utter stranger. At times like these, Dara would be left totally confounded in a mish mash of disjointed strings trying desperately to figure out what went wrong. 

This was their third night together, and it was turning out to be was no different than any other time. Dara had failed to consummate his love even on the third night.

He could not take it anymore. He had to confront her. He was ready to know why she could not accept him in the bed and why was she not opening up to his affections.

It was in the wee hours past midnight that she finally came around. In the darkness of the hour, lying in the embrace of his arms, Baila found the strength to overcome her shame. She was sure he cannot see her face; otherwise she would never have had the courage to face even her own self. She had to reach deep down into her soul and dive into the depths of her long gone childhood to find reasons for her adult behavior. 

Baila, the child, was a typically quiet and shy one, living in a typical Sub Continent joint family setting. The family was close knit and lived amicably in the big mansion of their forefathers. Baila’s room was filled with coloring books, paints, few dolls and fear. 

She had recently turned 11. Her eldest cousin, around ten years elder to her, was her best friend. The one who treated her like a little princess and indulged her every wish. That was why fear was the last thing to be felt when he entered one night late into her room and stood near her bed. She was sure he was up to one of his surprises and soon she will be the happy recipient of some sweet shared secret. May be a midnight ice cream scoop or chocolate in bed. She was smiling broadly up to him from the bed covers. 

He moved closer to her bed and sat beside her. His hand reached below the depths of the covers and reached her arm. He began caressing her arm and moved to her chest and stomach. Soon his hand was inside her night shirt, and Baila’s smile vanished and fear took its place. She was frozen with shock and shame. The places where she felt his hands were not meant to be touched. She tried to move, but felt his other arm on her hand. He was directing her hand towards his trousers. She was too petrified to struggle or react. 

The next morning she threw up the chocolates her cousin had lovingly presented her.

He didn’t come the next night, or the night after that. But when he did come, his appetite had only increased for more. He began to explore her deeper and deeper. He enforced her to explore his body too. He would take pleasure in caressing himself by the limp hand of a mere child. 

During day time Baila's immature mind tried to forget the night escapades. But come twilight, she would cling to her mother. She begged her mother for sleeping with her. Her mother would then ask her cousin to look after Baila, since she was his pet. 

Nobody could figure out why Baila started wetting her bed occasionally especially because she had never been a bed wetter even as a toddler. This nightmare only enhanced her shame further.

It went on repeatedly. Sometimes every night. Sometimes not so often.  Usually on the nights that he was kept away due to any reason, she would sleep restlessly. The dreams would be vivid with her fright and she would wake up with a pounding heart.

On her 12th birthday, the touching game was over. It took a whole new dimension. She became fully conscious of the openings in her body. It was a new kind of pain, one that could not be seen and could never be explained in words. This pain didn’t even leave a mark on her body, just some blood on her legs.

She suffered high fever after that and was under constant watch by the hired nurse. She had been violated and soiled. She felt insecure in the confines of her own bed room. The darkness of the night frightened her. The sole male figure in her life had scarred her body with his “love” and his body. She felt dirty. The child’s brain could not analyze the happenings but knew it was not “Right”.

The ordeal came to an end only after her cousin’s family moved abroad. Baila’s father soon shifted town.

Finally, she was totally out of the sights and sounds of her tormented days.

Baila was a grown up successful lady. People were mesmerized by her looks, her well proportioned curves, and her charismatic appeal. Her smile was her most powerful tool, and few ever realized that they were being consciously put under a well rehearsed spell. Baila’s life seemed full. Baila was an envy.

The dark side of her past remained inside her perpetually over shadowing her rationalization of relationships, intimacy and her capability to love dearly. The only remnant of the past was an occasional stammer and a loss of words when she was disturbed.

She never felt capable to love or to be loved. She felt the compelling need to be respected at all times. She had an instinctive feeling that people need her as a commodity and only come to her for their own needs. Her own needs were not meant to be catered; neither would she allow them to be. People mislabeled her inability to accept even genuine help as self respect. Whereas the reality was quite contrary. She felt she was expected to return favors by paying a high price for which she was not ready.

She had already paid her share of prices long ago.

She was determined to be successful and at the top of her career. That was the only thing she could ever trust to be lasting; and that too because she had made it herself.

She was a good friend, but her heart was fickle. Her mind in her self-defense had analyzed people to be commodities which were easily discarded no matter how dearly she cared for them. Baila was fickle, and that’s the end of it.

She had come to see sex as the dirtiest of deeds. She was deeply offended by the romantic gestures and loving caresses that Dara offered from time to time.

Dara was holding her in his arms her tears long dried up. Many of his questions were answered. And he was left with just one. Could his male ego bear a “tainted and tampered with body” all his life.

This question had suddenly become most important to him than mere love! 

--Scarlett