Stuck in a Pallu

Chapter 3: A Week Later

A week had crawled by since the wedding hall collapsed around them.

Rahim had changed, not dramatically, not in ways anyone outside the house would notice, but Sameera felt it in the small silences, the slight shifts in how he moved through rooms, how he looked at her.

On the surface, he had “moved on.”

He went to the office earlier, came back later. He laughed at Aisha’s jokes a little louder than before. He helped Abbu-ji with the newspaper crossword in the evenings, offered to drive Ammi-ji to the ustadbi on Fridays. To the family he seemed steadier, more present, the perfect son who had accepted his lot and was making the best of it.

But Sameera saw the cracks.

The way his smile never reached his eyes when he spoke of the future. The way he gripped the steering too tightly on drives. The way he sometimes stared at his phone for long seconds before putting it face-down, as though Priya’s name might still appear even after the block.

Deep inside, he was still bleeding.

What looked like acceptance was coping, mechanical, deliberate, a shield thrown up so the family wouldn’t worry. He was performing “moving on” the same way Sameera performed “perfect bahu.” Neither of them believed it fully.

The chauvinism crept in quietly.

It started small.

One evening after dinner, when Sameera rose to clear the plates, Rahim placed a hand on her wrist, gentle, but firm enough to stop her.

“Let me,” he said, voice low. “You’ve been on your feet all day.”

Ammi-ji beamed. “See? My son knows how to take care of his wife.”

Sameera sat back down, cheeks warm. Rahim cleared the table, but when he returned he didn’t sit beside her, he sat at the head, like Abbu-ji, legs spread comfortably, one arm along the back of her chair. Not possessive in a loud way. Just… certain.

Later that night, when the house was quiet, he knocked on the bedroom door as usual.

Sameera let him in.

He sat on the edge of the bed, closer than before. No bolster between them tonight; it had been pushed to the foot of the bed days ago.

He looked at her in the dim lamplight. She was in a simple cream cotton nightgown, hair loose, chain resting between her breasts.

“You’ve been quiet,” he said.

“So have you,” she replied.

He reached out, brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers lingered on the shell of her ear light, almost absent. Then he traced the line of her jaw, thumb grazing her lower lip.

“You’re beautiful, Sameera,” he murmured. “Always have been.”

She didn’t move away.

He leaned closer, pressed a soft kiss to her forehead, lingering, warm. Then another on her temple. Then the corner of her mouth, not quite a kiss, but close enough that she felt the heat of his breath.

His hand slid down her arm, fingers interlacing with hers. He lifted her hand, kissed the inside of her wrist, right over the faint blue veins, where her pulse jumped.

“Goodnight, wife,” he whispered.

He stood, left for the sofa in the study.

Sameera touched her wrist where his lips had been.

She didn’t know whether to feel comforted or trapped.

Later, much later, when the house was completely silent, Rahim lay on the study sofa, eyes open in the dark.

He rose quietly, walked to the laundry basket in the corner.

Sameera’s clothes from the day were folded on top: the navy georgette saree she had worn to the meeting, the matching blouse, the cream lace bra and panty she had changed out of before her bath.

He lifted the bra first, soft lace still faintly warm, carrying her rose attar and the natural scent of her skin.

He brought it to his face. Inhaled deeply.

His body responded instantly.

He sat on the sofa edge, bra pressed to his nose, other hand slipping beneath his pajama waistband. He stroked slowly at first, thinking of scenarios that were never supposed to happen: Sameera in the saree, pallu slipping as she bent to serve him tea; Sameera in the bathroom, water cascading over her curves; Sameera in his arms, soft breasts pressed against his chest, whispering his name not as a role but as desire.

He quickened, breath ragged, the lace muffling his low groan as he came, hot, guilty, spilling over his fingers.

When it was over, the room felt colder.

He stared at the bra in his lap.

Then the tears came.

Quiet at first, shoulders shaking, then harder. He curled forward, face buried in the lace that still smelled like her, and sobbed for Priya.

For the girl who left.

For the future he had almost had.

For the man he no longer was.

He cried until his throat ached, until exhaustion pulled him under.

In the other bedroom, Sameera slept fitfully, dreaming of a man with a beard who kissed her wrist and called her wife, and a man without one who once laughed at her sharp tongue.

Neither of them knew the other was crying for someone else.

But both woke the next morning and continued.

Because that was what they did now.

They continued.