Grandmother, Who, Me?

Grandmother, Who, Me?

Chapter 19: The Remote

Shreya’s POV

Rajan had gone to the market for vegetables. The house was quiet except for the soft whir of the ceiling fan and the distant sound of a neighbour’s television.

I sat on the sofa with my hands resting on my growing belly, knowing exactly what was about to happen. Lakshmi Attai had been silent and tense all morning. The stubborn set of her jaw told me the confrontation I had been dreading (and, in a dark corner of my heart, expecting) was finally here.

She came into the living room still wearing the simple cotton saree from the morning, the thali heavy in her cleavage, the anklets giving a single soft chime as she stopped in front of me.

“I want to end this,” she said. Her mature voice was low but firm. “I can’t do it anymore, Shreya. I want to go back. I want my life back.”

I looked up at her and felt the usual mix of love and selfish hunger twist inside my chest. I knew I was hurting him. Every day I saw the quiet desperation in those eyes that still belonged to Satish. And yet the pleasure of having a complete family, a mother-in-law who cared for me, a father-in-law who gave the house a quiet male presence, was stronger than the guilt.

I tried the usual soft diversion first.

“Attai… the baby will be here soon. Just a little more time. You know how much better I feel with you here.”

She shook her head. The long hair with its few white strands moved across her shoulders.

“No. Not this time. I’ve given you more than I ever agreed to. I want Jessica to reverse everything. Today.”

The stubbornness in her voice was new. It scared me. It also decided something cold and final inside me.

I reached into the side pocket of my maternity tunic and took out the small black remote Jessica had given me weeks ago “for emergency behavioural reinforcement.” I had never used it. Until now.

I looked at my mother-in-law, my husband, and pressed the first button.

Her body jerked as if an invisible current had run through her. A sharp, involuntary gasp left her lips. Her knees pressed together hard. A dark, wet patch began to spread rapidly across the front of her saree and the petticoat beneath. The secret stimulation feature Jessica had built into the vaginal prosthesis and the cage activated fully, intense, relentless arousal with no climax, no release, no way out. Only need.

I kept my voice soft and almost tender.

“Who will believe you if you tell them you’re my husband, Attai? Look at you. Look at your body. Look at the thali around your neck. Look at the wetness spreading on your saree. No one will believe a word.”

I pressed two more buttons in succession. Her breathing turned ragged. Her hands clenched the fabric at her hips. The wet patch grew larger. Small, helpless sounds escaped her throat, the mature voice breaking under the forced, endless heat.

Tears of pure frustration and humiliation stood in her eyes. I felt a sharp, ugly satisfaction and, underneath it, a deep self-loathing.

When I finally released the buttons, she was trembling, the front of her saree visibly soaked, her chest rising and falling hard.

I stood up, walked over, and gently cupped her soft cheek the way a daughter-in-law might comfort her mother-in-law.

“Please clean this mess up before your husband comes home, my dear Attai,” I said with a small smile. “We don’t want maama asking questions, do we?”

She stared at me for a long moment, then turned and walked unsteadily toward the bathroom, the wet saree clinging to her thighs, the anklets sounding weak and defeated.

I sank back onto the sofa and pressed both hands over my face.

I knew what I was doing was wrong. I knew I deserved every bad thing that might come from it. But when I felt the baby shift inside me, a single clear, selfish thought rose above the guilt:

Just until the baby is born. Please. Just until then.