s.story 5: A Stolen Life

Part 1

Dhaka, 1970: when the city held its breath, waiting to exhale revolution. The air vibrated with the hum of change, a nation stirring in the belly of unrest. In the heart of this anticipation, Neeta was born, a fragile arrival into a world painted with hopes and haunted by whispers of uncertainty. Her family celebrated her birth like a small lantern lit in a storm, a sign of hope in a world on the brink. Yet, as history often does, life disguised its gifts, wrapping blessings in sorrow and love in unbearable loss.

From the moment Neeta took her first breath, joy and sorrow intertwined like ancient lovers, threading their way through her story. Little did anyone know, Neeta’s life would mirror the very turbulence of her country: a life of beauty touched by scars, of love stained by loss. She was born into a world where contradictions thrived, where laughter echoed through homes burdened by secrets, and happiness was constantly shadowed by the hum of pain.

Mansoor, who would eventually cross paths with Neeta, was born into a similarly precarious world. His childhood was steeped in the expectations of his family, with pride, success, and duty weighing heavily on his shoulders. Raised in a household where failure was forbidden, he was shaped to be the perfect son, the ideal man. But beneath the polished surface of his accomplishments, something quietly eroded. Resentment and fear took root, unnoticed, as he struggled to meet the impossible standards set before him.

Part 2

Neeta moved through her childhood as if carried by an invisible breeze. Her laughter was light, like the chimes hanging from her grandmother’s veranda. Her almond-toned skin soaked in the summer sun, and her deep eyes reflected the same mystery as the waters of the Buriganga River: serene on the surface, yet hiding stories beneath. She was loved, yet never fully free, burdened with the quiet weight of expectations, like the first drizzle that warns of an impending storm.

Her family took great pride in her academic brilliance. Murmurs of praise spread among relatives: “A girl who stands out more than the boys.” But while her talents were celebrated, her mother, following the unspoken script passed down through generations, began weaving a different future for her — a life marked by marriage, duty, and silent sacrifices. Though still young, Neeta sensed the subtle shift in the air. Her dreams of becoming a doctor lingered like fragile, unspoken prayers, dreams waiting to be extinguished.

Mansoor entered the picture as a solution to a future already mapped out. His name was spoken with respect, a cousin studying in London, a doctor no less. A perfect match, they said. He would bring honor, stability, and everything a family could hope for. But Neeta’s heart resisted. It wasn’t that she disliked him; it was simply that she felt nothing at all. There was an emptiness where love should have been, a void she couldn’t explain. But in those days, love was rarely the reason for marriage. Marriage was duty, an agreement, a sacrifice. And so, Neeta did what countless women before her had done. She gave up quietly, letting her dreams of becoming a doctor fade under the weight of expectation.

Mansoor, too, lived within the constraints of a script written long before he could choose his path. His family’s expectations pressed down on him like a heavy cloak, and while he admired Neeta’s independence, he couldn’t help but feel dwarfed by her dreams. He had never been taught how to love; only how to achieve, how to succeed. His marriage to Neeta became another triumph to present, another piece of the perfect life his family had designed. But beneath the surface, a quiet fear festered within him: the fear of failure, of being found wanting in her eyes. It made him distant, almost cold.

The wedding itself was a brilliant spectacle, a celebration of perfection. Neeta stood at the center, draped in gold and red, every inch the perfect bride. She was a symbol of promise, of a life yet to be lived. But as she gazed into the eyes of her family, all she could feel was the weight of expectations pressing down on her like the heavy fabric of her wedding dress. The lights were bright, but they felt blinding, as though they were illuminating the person she was supposed to be, not the one she had the courage to become. Her dreams of becoming a doctor, once so vivid, now felt like a distant star, hidden behind the veil of duty, obscured by the image of the woman she was meant to be. Inside, she felt empty, like an actress playing a role she had never auditioned for. The weight of her jewelry matched the heaviness in her heart, each piece a symbol of the life she was stepping into. She knew that her marriage was not a union of souls, but a union of circumstances.

Part 3

The early days of Neeta’s marriage slipped by like an endless monsoon, each day folding into the next in silence. Mansoor remained in London most of the time, while Neeta, still in Dhaka, clung to the last threads of her former self by continuing her studies. Her dreams of becoming a doctor, though distant, lingered like a haunting melody. But the medical textbooks, once filled with excitement and promise, lay untouched in the corner of the room, collecting dust. Their pages yellowed with neglect. Every time Neeta looked at them, she felt a pang of loss, like mourning a life that could have been. They were reminders of a path she had once hoped to walk, a journey abandoned not by choice but by the weight of others’ decisions. Her brilliance, stifled by the expectations of her family, was locked away in those forgotten books.

The nights Neeta spent awake in bed felt longer than the days. Mansoor, though physically present, was never really there. She would talk about her plans to finish her studies, but he would nod without looking up, his attention fixed on the screen of his phone. “That’s nice,” he would say, his voice flat. Her heart sank with each dismissive word, the weight of unspoken thoughts pressing deeper into her soul. It was as if they were two people living under the same roof, yet each in separate worlds: his filled with quiet resentment, hers with unfulfilled dreams.

When their daughter, Maya, was born in London, Neeta thought the tides might turn. But London, which had taken everything familiar from her, now gave her loneliness in return. Mansoor’s failures weighed heavily on him. His exams, once a source of pride, became bitter reminders of his shortcomings.

The first time Mansoor struck Neeta, it wasn’t out of rage but out of frustration, a casual cruelty that startled her not by its force but by its ordinariness. One evening, after a particularly long day at work, Neeta set the table, hoping Mansoor might be in a better mood. But as she placed the last dish down, he sneered at her, the corners of his mouth twitching with contempt. “Did you forget how to cook?” he muttered, flicking a spoonful of sauce off the plate. Neeta froze, her heart hammering in her chest. She opened her mouth to explain, but the words were strangled by the tightness in her throat. By now, she had learned not to argue. Instead, she stepped back, her hands trembling as she cleared the table. The next day, she noticed the faint bruise on her arm, the mark from the grip that had held her too tightly the night before. She did not remember when it had happened, but it did not matter. There were always bruises, always something to hide.

Neeta learned to bear it, to swallow the pain like bitter medicine, believing, like many women before her, that endurance was the only way to survive.

Maya grew fast. She did not know what a slap was until she saw the way her mother’s face turned red after her father raised his hand. She could not understand why the tears never seemed to stop, why the house felt colder after each argument. The nights were the hardest. Sometimes she would lie awake, clutching her stuffed bear, listening to the muffled sounds of her parents’ quarrels, her heart beating in her chest like a frightened bird. She wanted to run to her mother, to make everything stop, but fear kept her still. She did not know how to help.

London had promised Mansoor a future. Instead, it gave him failure and distance. The pressures of his family’s expectations, compounded by his own frustrations, began to manifest in strange ways. At first, his frustrations were aimed at himself — he drank more, slept less — but slowly, the anger turned outward, and Neeta became the closest outlet. Each slap, each harsh word, was not born of rage but of fear: the fear that he had failed again and would always fail.

Mansoor’s silence at the dinner table grew longer with each meal. Neeta would serve his plate, watching his face for any hint of acknowledgment, but his eyes remained fixed on the paper in front of him, as if she weren’t there. When she asked if he wanted more rice, he would grunt, his lips tightening as if speaking required too much effort. The longer the silence stretched, the more her chest tightened, as if suffocating under the weight of his indifference. The accusations came swiftly — about chores left undone, about Maya, about the meals not to his liking. With each blow, Neeta’s spirit fractured further, yet she endured, convinced that things would improve if only she held on a little longer. But they didn’t.

Maya hated the way her father would look at her mother sometimes, cold and distant, as if she weren’t even there. He was a stranger, someone who would yell at Neeta over nothing, only to act as if nothing had happened moments later. Maya learned early that silence was safer than asking questions, and that her mother’s quiet sadness was something to be avoided. She had seen the bruises on her mother’s back, the way Neeta flinched when anyone touched her. The pain made Maya want to scream, but she couldn’t. She could never make it stop.

Every day, Neeta moved through the house like a shadow, her footsteps echoing against the cold walls. The house, once a symbol of her dreams for a shared future, now felt like a prison. The walls, once painted in vibrant colors, had begun to fade, the paint peeling like memories that had turned bitter. The clock on the wall, ticking in rhythm with her daily duties, became a constant reminder of the time lost, time she could never reclaim, time spent in the service of others while her own life lay dormant, just beyond reach.

Part 4

When Neeta returned to Dhaka, she was a shadow of herself, her body bruised and her spirit broken. The city welcomed her back with its familiar chaos, but it felt distant, as though she no longer belonged to its rhythm. For days, she slept, her body heavy with exhaustion, her dreams dark and wordless. When she finally found the strength to speak, she told her parents everything: the abuse, the loneliness, the despair. But her words landed like raindrops on stone, failing to break the silence that suffocated her.

Her father, a man molded by society’s unforgiving rules, spoke softly but firmly, urging Neeta to return for Maya’s sake. “For Maya’s sake,” he said, as though that one reason could heal the wounds of a life torn apart by cruelty. Society’s judgment weighed heavier than their daughter’s pain, and so Neeta, defeated, slipped back into Mansoor’s world once more. Mansoor, too, returned to Dhaka.

Maya felt the familiar ache in her chest, the one that told her things were not right. Her mother had changed; she was more tired, more withdrawn. Maya didn’t know how to help. She wanted to ask why they had returned to Mansoor, why things couldn’t just be different. But the answer was buried in the heavy silence that hung between them. She missed the times when her mother was happy, when she could hold her and feel safe. Now all she felt was quiet tension, like a storm waiting to break.

Life in Dhaka settled into a strange rhythm. Mansoor found work as an anesthesiologist, a man who put others to sleep for a living, numbing them while remaining oblivious to the pain he caused at home. Neeta, meanwhile, pursued her post-graduate studies and worked under a gynecologist, bringing life into the world while her own life felt increasingly beyond her control.

During these days, Neeta saw Aysha. The first time was at the coffee shop in the Pan Pacific Sonargaon Hotel, where Aysha sat with Mansoor. Their hands brushed in subtle intimacy, and Neeta caught a fleeting glimpse of their connection. Later, she saw them laughing together in Mansoor’s chamber, fingers entwined like promises unspoken. Neeta had never imagined she would find him there, laughing softly at a corner table, his hand resting too familiarly on Aysha’s. At first, she stood frozen in the doorway, her breath catching in her throat. Their laughter echoed in her ears, too bright, too careless. She stepped back into the shadows, hoping no one would notice her, but it didn’t matter. She had already seen it, the way Aysha’s fingers brushed against his, the way they shared a look that Neeta had never received. The emptiness settled over her like a thick fog, numbing her to everything around her. She wanted to cry, to scream, but it was as if she no longer had the capacity. Instead, she walked away, her footsteps muffled, her body feeling like it no longer belonged to her.

Mansoor’s affair with Aysha was not born of love, but of an aching void inside him, one he couldn’t fill with anything else. He had failed at everything: his career, his marriage, his ability to make Neeta happy. Aysha was just another attempt to prove to himself that he was still worthy, still someone who could control his own life. But when Neeta confronted him, the walls he had built around his insecurities crumbled. His fury surged, untamed, masking a shame he had never learned how to confront.

The confrontation arrived like an unexpected storm, fierce and unrelenting. Neeta had no idea how much had been bottled up inside her, how many unspoken truths she carried, or how deeply she longed to fight for herself. That night, words shattered the air like fragments of broken glass, sharp and irretrievable. Mansoor’s rage became a force of its own, crashing into Neeta with a violence that left nothing untouched.

Maya was just a wall away, her small presence pressed into the shadows. She heard it all: the shouting, the anger, each moment unfolding like a terrible secret whispered in the dark. Maya’s heart raced with every word, her small body trembling as she clutched her knees to her chest. She knew it wasn’t right, the way her mother and father fought, but she didn’t know how to stop it. Her hands shook as she held onto her stuffed animal, the comfort it once provided now distant and hollow. When her mother’s cries echoed through the walls, Maya couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. She wanted to run to her, to make everything stop, but the fear kept her rooted in place, as though an invisible chain held her back.

Part 5

The night Neeta died was deceptively ordinary, draped in the monotony of time passing, the kind of night that could easily slip away without notice. It was their wedding anniversary, a day marked not by love but by obligation. Her mother, more out of habit than celebration, prepared a feast. But Mansoor, as always, was absent, his promises long dissolved into indifference and neglect. Frustrated and weary, Neeta kissed Maya goodnight, her daughter who had grown more familiar with her grandparents’ home than her own. Unaware that it would be the last time she would hold her daughter, Neeta left the comfort of her parents’ home. In her hands, she carried food boxes, a small, futile gesture of peace, as if the simple act of kindness could somehow mend a soul shattered beyond repair.

Later that night, the call came, slicing through the quiet like a knife, sharp, sudden, and cruel. “Neeta Bhabi had a heart attack,” Mansoor’s sister whispered, her voice trembling with something that wasn’t quite grief, perhaps fear, or perhaps indifference. By the time Neeta’s parents reached the hospital, it was too late. Neeta’s body lay still, cold, wrapped in a silence that would never be broken.

No one knew exactly what happened behind those walls. Whatever transpired was quietly dismissed, labeled a “heart attack.” But there were whispers, whispers that lingered in the corners, too quiet to be heard in the moments that mattered most. Only Maya knew the truth, clenched tight in her small fists, her heart breaking under the weight of a revelation too heavy for a child to bear. “He killed her!” she cried, her voice cracking with the truth. Yet, as always, the world turned its back on the voices of women and children, burying their cries beneath layers of indifference. That night, the rain fell with a relentless fury, as if the skies themselves mourned a life stolen too soon, weeping for the justice that would never come.

In the morning, as Neeta’s body was prepared for burial, the women found grains of rice tangled in her hair, remnants of the domestic life she had tried to maintain. Bruises darkened her skin, silent testimony to the violence she had suffered. The whispers began: of relatives who found an anesthesia vial under the dining table, of the guards who saw a woman run from the house just moments after Neeta’s arrival. They all spoke now, but it was too late. Whispers are no match for the deafening silence that had swallowed Neeta’s voice.

Maya stood at the edge of the funeral, watching the rain mix with the tears of those around her. But she wasn’t crying anymore. She couldn’t. The truth was too painful to bear. She remembered that night, the way her mother’s face had looked so still, so lifeless, the way her father’s words were hollow, void of grief. In the hushed moments of the funeral, Maya whispered the truth to herself, the truth that had lived inside her like a wound too deep to heal. “He killed her.” Her voice cracked, but the words were clear, a child’s accusation against the man who had stolen everything.

At the funeral, wrapped in white and diminished by suffering, Neeta looked smaller than ever, as though life itself had shrunk her soul to fit into a coffin too large for what she had never been allowed to become. The rain washed over her one final time, mingling with tears uncried, as the world moved on, oblivious. And in the end, only silence remained: silence of a love never given, of a life never fully lived.

~ October 2024