Marry Me, Stranger

by Novoneel Chakraborty

  ‘Who is Prateek? Does Ekansh know about him? How can you be so mean to him?’

  ‘Why is Prateek blackmailing you?’

  The queries would give way to her father’s eventual decision: Pack your bags and come here. No need to work anymore. We’ll get you married off soon.

  Rivanah, in the end, had decided to keep it all to herself. But little did she know Prateek would actually stoop so low as to blackmail her into being his sexual slave for the weekend. She left her cubicle and rushed to the washroom. By the time she glanced at herself in the mirror, the kohl in her eyes had already been smudged by her tears. She splashed some water on her face. Why couldn’t the stranger arrange for the clip without her being the witness in the gangrape case? What was his stake in it? She immediately messaged him:

  Why does it matter to you if I become the witness in the case? Is the girl related to you?

  She waited for a few minutes but got no reply. Rivanah was about to move out when her phone buzzed with a message.

  She isn’t related to me. But by that logic I shouldn’t help you out with the clip either because you too are not related to me.

  Rivanah typed a reply and sent it back hurriedly.

  Do you even know how much of a hassle it is? It involves the law. My parents as well as the media will know and what if I get threatened by the men who raped the girl? Just so you know, I did make people aware of it by posting how I felt on my Facebook profile. I did my part.

  The stranger replied:

  Your part? What you did on Facebook is called bullshitting. Social networking sites are nothing but virtual commodes for people to shit their opinion on and then conveniently presume their job’s done. Their only agenda is to feel good about themselves by convincing themselves that ejecting thoughts is as responsible an act as producing an action. How many of them really go out of their way in the real world and do something about a matter? Did anyone who liked your post buy the girl medicines? Did anyone come forward to sponsor her hospital bill? Did you?

  How do you know I was a witness? Were you there too? If yes then why don’t you become the witness as well? Rivanah typed back.

  I didn’t see the faces of the rapists.

  May I know what your stake is if I become the eyewitness in the case?

  You are my stake.

  Why me?

  Why not you? he shot back.

  Okay, if I become the witness, what’s the guarantee you will give me the clip? Why don’t you give me the clip first and then I’ll see what I can do?

  What’s the guarantee that I won’t take the clip from Prateek and circulate it on the internet myself? The world doesn’t run on guarantees, Mini. It runs on faith.

  I don’t have faith on men anymore.

  LOL. How are you so sure I’m a man?

  Rivanah swallowed a lump. She had yet again repeated her mistake of judging the stranger too soon based on someone else’s judgement. Ishita only guessed the person was a secret admirer. And was there a diktat every secret admirer of hers had to be a man? God, she didn’t even know if he admired her or was it something else! Another message.

  Be Prateek’s weekend bitch or stand up for the girl: take your call, Mini.

  Rivanah took a moment to think: the police was not an option lest Prateek circulated the clip, her parents were not an option lest they asked her to come back home, and being a weekend bitch to Prateek was definitely not an option either. Her hands shook subtly as she typed her final decision to the stranger.

  Okay. I shall be the eyewitness but promise me you will get me the clip before this weekend. Otherwise, I won’t fullfil my side of the bargain.

  Have faith, replied the stranger.

  Rivanah picked up a local English tabloid during lunchtime. In a couple of days’ time, the news of the gangrape had travelled from the front to the fifth page. The tiny article said the girl was still admitted at the municipal hospital in Borivali where she was initially taken and the police were yet to identify the rapists because the girl was unable to give them any leads.

  Rivanah called Ishita asking if she could join her without telling her the reason or the destination. Ishita said she had a night shift in office and would be free only the next morning. It was Thursday and Rivanah didn’t want to waste a single day now that she knew what Prateek had in mind for the weekend.

  She left her office an hour early to avoid the office crowd. She took an autorickshaw from Goregaon east and went directly to the municipal hospital in Borivali. The scene in the hospital was abysmal. The place was dirty, with a pungent smell of medicines lurking in the air. There were people who were either howling or running around or sitting helplessly, waiting for their turn for check-up to come. Rivanah tried to locate the reception amid the crowd, but to no success. She soon located a police constable chatting with a middle-aged man who was carrying a camera around his neck, with a glass of tea in his hand. She went to them.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she said. Both the constable and the man with the camera looked at her with an expression that said they didn’t expect her to be there.

  ‘Kaye paije?’ the constable asked in Marathi.

  ‘What do you want?’ the man with the camera translated. He seemed educated as well as less terrifying than the pot-bellied constable.

  ‘I have come to see the gangrape victim. Do you know which room she is in?’

  The constable and the man exchanged a surprised look.

  ‘Are you a relative?’ the man asked.

  ‘No. I’m an eyewitness in the case.’

  Both the men suddenly turned alarmed.

  The constable asked her to follow him. Rivanah and the man with camera followed him closely behind.

  It was not a private room as Rivanah had thought it would be. It was the general ward housing people suffering from all kinds of problems—fractures, bullet wounds, animal attack, and burns. In the middle of all this was a young girl who lay in the silence of her sleep. There was a middle-aged lady sitting beside her on the dirty bed itself. Rivanah guessed she would be her mother.

  ‘She wakes up, screams, and then the nurse has to make her sleep,’ the constable said. ‘Did you really see the guys who did this to her?’

  Rivanah couldn’t speak or move. She had a strong urge to throw up. The newspaper said the girl was fifteen but she looked much younger. She wondered if the girl would ever be able to come to terms with the wounds that had been inflicted on her soul without any fault of hers. The hair on her nape stood up thinking what would have happened if she was in her place. The girl suddenly woke up as her body started shuddering vehemently. Though her eyes were shut, she was screaming her lungs out as if the devil had possessed her. The constable yelled something in Marathi. A nurse came running towards them, blabbering something in Marathi as well, and quickly gave her an injection. The girl gradually went quiet once again. By then, Rivanah had tasted bile.

  The constable took her to the Goregaon police station with him and documented her statement. The man with the camera, who Rivanah later learnt was a small-time journalist with a Marathi newspaper wanted to click a picture of her but decided not to on her request. Soon police inspector Mohan Kamble joined them and inquired about what Rivanah had witnessed. She hadn’t sipped any alcohol the night of the incident unlike Ishita and that made her claim all the more strong.

  ‘Sir,’ Rivanah said glancing first at the journalist and then at Kamble, ‘I don’t want to be named or exposed in the media or in front of the rapists. Is that possible?’

  ‘Don’t worry madam. I’ll take care of that,’ Kamble assured her. ‘Your gesture is really commendable, otherwise who cares these days?’

  She felt like a slap of shame hit her. She knew well that the real intention behind her appearance at the police station was selfish, but a small part of her also understood what the stranger had meant when he asked her to know her worth. Though there was a dichotomy in her situation, the fact nevertheless was she did give her statement as an eyewitne
ss. She did decide to help the girl.

  ‘Do your parents know you go to late night parties?’ Kamble asked.

  ‘No,’ Rivanah replied meekly.

  ‘That’s what worries parents these days. It doesn’t matter how close you are to your children, they will never be completely honest with you,’ Kamble said. ‘I actually have a daughter your age.’ The fatherly warmth in Kamble’s demeanour was evident. ‘Her name is Smita. She works in a software company in Bangalore. It’s tough to live in a big city all alone, isn’t it?’

  With a stranger trailing me, a colleague trying to blackmail me, and me presenting myself as an eyewitness in a rape case, tell me about how tough it is living in a big city, Rivanah thought to herself and said with tight smile, ‘It indeed is. But one can’t really help it.’

  ‘I remain tensed about Smita all the time. These days, anything can happen,’ Kamble said in a worried tone. ‘Please do let me know if you ever have any opening in your company. I want her to work in Mumbai itself.’

  Parents will be parents. ‘Sure,’ Rivanah said and a moment later added, ‘How long do I have to stay here?’

  ‘Some time more. All you have to do is identify the two men from a group of people we have rounded up from the area. They’ll be here shortly. You can hide your face while doing it,’ Kamble said and gestured to the female constable who escorted her to an adjacent room. She waited there for some time. In-between her mother called.

  ‘Did you reach home Mini?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m on my way mumma,’ Rivanah lied. ‘Tell me something mumma, would you like the rapists to be caught and punished?’

  ‘Which rapists? What are you saying?’ Her mother sounded tensed.

  ‘The ones who raped the teenager in Mumbai a few days back. Remember you told me about it on phone?’

  ‘Oh yes! I definitely want them to be caught and punished. They spoilt the life of an innocent girl.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Rivanah took a long breath. ‘I will call you mumma when I reach home,’ she said and cut the line.

  When the rounded-up men arrived in a police van, she was made to wrap a cloth around her face. One by one, two constables brought in the men. It wasn’t difficult for her to identify the two rapists amongst the fifteen men. She later learnt from Kamble that they worked as labourers in the nearby construction site and weren’t from Maharashtra.

  Kamble gave her his contact number and also took her office number as well as home contact information and asked her not to leave the city without informing him. Kamble had started seeing his daughter in her and wanted to safeguard her from danger. She was told that she would have to appear in the court and testify against the men once the charge sheet was submitted.

  ‘Will it take time?’ she asked.

  ‘I hope not.’

  Rivanah soon left. Kamble arranged for a police jeep to drop her home.

  At night when she messaged the stranger saying she had become the official eyewitness in the gangrape case, the stranger replied with an address in Andheri west and asked her to be there on Saturday night at nine sharp.

  ‘Why?’ a worried Rivanah asked. She was again talking aloud sitting in her flat alone when the stranger messaged her on the phone.

  Prateek lives there.

  ‘What? That’s what he wanted anyway; for me to visit his place this Saturday night. Please tell me you are kidding,’ she said sounding nervous.

  Do you trust me? the stranger asked in the next message.

  Trust a stranger? She had trusted both Ekansh and Prateek before when she thought she knew them well. Should she trust someone she knew nothing about? Rivanah took her time before she said aloud, ‘Yes.’ She hoped and prayed nothing would go wrong this time.

  15

  There was still one more day to go before Saturday night arrived. Rivanah kept leading Prateek on. She gave him forced smiles whenever he was around and accompanied him to the canteen or the no-smoking zone whenever he asked her to for some fake love talk. He asked her to come to his place on Friday night itself, but she lied to him saying she was having muscle spasms owing to an early period and would visit him on Saturday night for sure. Prateek took the bait and agreed to wait for one day more.

  Saturday arrived. Rivanah was feeling apprehensive. She had a bad feeling about what she was going to do. She wanted to share it with Ishita but didn’t because one thing she had learnt in the last few months was not to trust anybody beyond a certain limit. You never know when that person will go against you. And a friend who knows your secret can be far worse than an enemy. She had also decided this was the last time she would listen to the stranger too. She didn’t know why the stranger was so hell-bent on helping her. There had to be an agenda. But at that moment, she only cared about the clip and nothing else.

  Sipping the evening tea while standing by her room’s window, she wondered if the stranger would really help her with the clip or not. What if the stranger was Prateek? Would it be safe to go to his address at night? The world runs on faith, the stranger had said and it was faith that, owing to her experience in the past months, had depleted from her core. Well, almost.

  Rivanah finished her tea in a rush and waited for the clock to strike eight. Once it was time, she dressed herself in a jeans and t-shirt, took a knife from her kitchen and kept it in her bag as a safety precaution, and put inspector Kamble’s phone number on speed dial number one. It took her thirty minutes in an autorickshaw to reach the Andheri west address. It seemed like a posh colony from outside. The stranger had said nine so she waited at a corner outside the colony till 8:55 and then went in. The security guard asked her to write her name in the visitor’s register. She wrote a false name, a fake phone number, and a fake address after which she went inside the building looking for the flat the stranger had messaged her about.

  Once she climbed up the stairs to reach the first floor of B-wing, she came and stood in front of flat 103, the flat where Prateek lived. Rivanah prayed hard in her mind that the stranger lived up to his promise. She stood nervously by the door contemplating whether to press the doorbell or not. Her phone pinged with a message from an unknown number.

  The key is inside the dustbin.

  Rivanah looked down and saw a small dustbin by the flat’s main door. Making a face she bent down and picked up the key from the almost empty dustbin. With fear forming lumps in her throat, she gently inserted the key into the keyhole. There was a slight noise as the door unlocked. She pushed the door open with the tip of her finger. It was dark inside. She took an unsure step forward and then immediately pulled out. Should she enter? She closed her eyes for once, took God’s name and after a moment of resting her pacing heartbeats, advanced inside.

  To the left is the switch board, the stranger messaged. Her own phone’s beep scared her. Rivanah turned around to see if there was anyone behind her, watching her. There was nobody. Extending her arm to the left, she found the switch board. She pressed all the buttons at once. The next instant, three lights in the room came on along with two ceiling fans. She saw Prateek lying on the floor in an unconscious state. He was stark naked except for a bra around his chest. Rivanah didn’t know what to do. She went close to him to check if he was dead or alive. She noticed something was written on his stomach: world’s tiniest wonder. An arrow was marked below which aimed toward his flaccid penis. Rivanah’s first instinct was to laugh, acknowledging the stranger’s sense of humour. But she controlled herself. She now understood why the stranger had asked her to be there. She took out her phone and made a three-minute long video of Prateek. His phone was lying beside him. Once done, she quickly kept her own phone in her bag while taking out the memory card and SIM from Prateek’s phone stamped the phone out of shape. Even if he had transferred the clip somewhere else, she now had stuff to barter and shut him up permanently. Rivanah was about to get up to leave when the lights went off. She could smell the same masculine deodorant which she once did in the elevator before. She turned around but before she could see
anything, Rivanah felt someone press a cloth to her mouth from behind and within seconds she was unconscious.

  Rivanah woke up when a middle-aged woman slapped her cheeks gently.

  ‘Hello! Wake up. Can you hear me?’

  She sat up and looked around to realize she was inside her apartment’s elevator with no memory of how she came there. The woman who helped her lived in the same floor as her.

  ‘Are you okay?’ the woman asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Rivanah said holding her head which was mildly aching. She stumbled out of the elevator and went to her flat with the thought: did the stranger leave me in the elevator?

  Ishita had gone to Matheran with a guy from her office while Asha was not there in the flat. Rivanah was dying to share the entire incident with someone, but since there was nobody at home, she kept watching the video on repeat until her stomach started cramping with all the laughing. She wanted to watch Prateek’s reaction when she would show him the video in office. She was so happy that she decided to cook a new dish. Then she called her mother with whom she talked for a good one hour, the first time she had talked to her mother for so long since Ekansh left her. Her mother was immensely happy to hear her daughter speak like her old self after a long time even though she didn’t know what was really happening in her life.

  ‘Is Ekansh coming to Mumbai?’ her mother asked trying to guess the reason for her sudden enthusiasm. Rivanah had never told her of his earlier visits.

  ‘No mumma.’

  ‘Then what has happened? Are you getting a promotion?’ she egged on.

  ‘No mumma! It’s nothing. I’m just happy.’

  After the phone call with her mother ended, she spoke aloud finally. ‘Thank you stranger!’ As an impulse, she immediately stared at her phone for a response. It came soon enough.

  You’re welcome.

  ‘I think I’ll soon fall in love with you,’ she said and giggled to herself. She knew she wasn’t making any sense but she didn’t care.