chaiNboli

Once, I loved a man with the fury of rivers. They told me faith was the answer, that prayer could stitch back what had torn. But I could not kneel before a defiance that never answered me. And thus my silence became the house pet — fed scraps of denial, told to sit quietly, told never to bite. It grew fat on my unsaid words, sleek with all the screams I swallowed. It learned to curl on my lap, its weight pressing my ribs shut. It slept at the foot of my bed, licking the wounds I would not name. Some nights it grew restless, pacing the dark rooms of my chest, snarling at the locked doors. And I —  I hushed it with lullabies, with the trembling hands of a girl who still mistook patience for devotion. It grew old with me, its fur heavy with dust, its ribs showing through the thinness of years. Still, I fed it with the crumbs  of forgiveness I could not give myself. And I told myself  You made me drown. But here I am, still breathing — underwater...

 I stand before the fridge, its hum a low animal in the silence. The door is ajar, enough for cold air to spill out—thin tendrils brushing bare skin. Inside: a pomegranate. I take it out. Its skin is wrinkled, the first soft kiss of death across its surface. My heartbeat stammers against my ribs—too loud, humiliating in its insistence. Each uneven thud carries a warning: something will fracture. Something unnamed is already breaking open inside my chest. An ache settles in the lungs, heavy as damp earth. And in that stillness, all I can think is this: I have only ever known how to exist when I am wanted. It is a quiet inheritance, passed down not in words but in gestures and silences. Worth measured by usefulness. Love rationed like it must be earned. Affection receding when you disobey. Love sharpening into blades when you reveal too much of yourself. The sigh of disappointment always louder than any punishment. So you learn. You learn to purchase love with caution. To shape yours...