THAT LIVID NIGHT

Soaked in the hammering rain, she was running towards her home that livid night. Her hazed eyes and dizzy mind was apprehensive about what awaited for her at home. A nightmare she called it, and consoled herself every morning to wipe off the vicious memories of preceding nights. Her cell phone rang and she panicked. It was him. She was late and she feared that her explanation won’t appease his rage.  

The rain was blurring her vision but she still paced with all her might. The scars on her hands and legs hurt. They reminded her of the nights she refused to give in and the searing pain she felt as he jabbed his Swiss knife through her white skin. His lust tore apart her body and soul every night.

As she waited at a crossing for the signal to turn green, she pondered over the parallelism of her life with her mom’s. She recalled her distraught childhood when she used to spend sleepless nights sobbing and hearing her mom’s screams. In the mornings her mom wore a bright smile for her, which could never defy her bruises and swollen eyes. She had always wanted to stab her father to death but his enraged persona threatened her steps.

   

Somewhere near, a strong thunder struck and she momentarily got deafened by its roar. She headed towards the lane at the end of which stood her home, but her pace receded. In the morning he had told her about a vacation with his sweetheart. She had worked the whole day in her office with a stabbing pain and flashing memories of her father flaunting his mistress in the family parties and her mom standing embarrassed at a corner guarding the little girl holding her hand.

She was her mom’s weakness while her weakness was the profound love she had for her husband. For one long year of her marriage she had loved him dearly only to be agonized every day. But that night was asking her to stop. Amid the thunders, it yelled that her life should no more collide with her mom's. And with the last few steps she mustered the courage to free herself from her agonies.

She pressed the doorbell and as the door opened she shuddered with fear at the sight of her husband. But this time she was resolute about shrugging off this fearful life forever. She tightened the grip on the broken glass bottle she had picked up on the way and entered the home.

The next day she was found sitting on the drawing room floor staring transfixed at the dead body of her husband which lay over a pool of blood. She offered silence to all the questions posed by the police officials. Blood was dribbling from the fresh scars on her hands and legs, one of which she was still scratching with a Swiss knife. Her husband’s office bag revealed two significant documents. One of them declared a planned vacation which they were about to spend together at Paris in a few days. Another one was her medical report which confirmed her full blown dissociative identity disorder.