Maya watched the shaft of light streaming in through the high window, dust busily dancing about. She loved these moments of early morning solitude. She remembered the previous night’s dreams and smiled sadly.
“Maya………” someone screamed from the floor below. Even after eight long years she still could not resign herself to her fate. The thought that kept surfacing in her mind was “My papa will come for me...” There was a sharp rap on the door and before she knew it there was a man with her, yet another faceless customer. The faces had begun fading away long ago.
She went through the motions of sex with no pleasure or pain. She was too tired to even hate them. They were all the same; when they were done they just got up and walked away, full of guilty pleasure. Her mind wandered to her past. She wondered how she got here. She drew a blank every time she tried to recall. The last thing she remembered was anxiously waiting for her father to come back with a gift on the eve of her thirteenth birthday. The next morning she had found herself in this cursed place amidst strange men and women. She lived with just one hope –“My papa will come for me” .
The day trudged along slowly. There was a steady stream of men. In a stupor she dreamed of seas and mountains, friends and freedom, books and movies. Finally she was alone again. But she was too tired to do anything. She was praying there won’t be anyone tonight when the door opened. The man crept up to her in the darkness. What she looked like, fair or dark, old or young or who she was never mattered for this carnal desire. She stayed numb till he finally fell asleep.
She moved to a corner of the bed and plunged into a deep, dreamless slumber. It was dawn. She got up and sat by her window admiring the beautiful morning sky, enjoying the sounds of dawn. The man from the previous night was still asleep. Her gaze fell on his face and she was horrified. Her papa had come back for her.
PS: Kripa, consumerdemon, musafir, sorry to make you read it again.
