Lost Rites

This is a story I wrote for a Woman's Day competition. The words "This is what being a woman means" had to be there in the text.
The peddler had scarce disappeared around the bend, his cries could still be heard surfacing above the lazy drone of the winter afternoon.
“What a life!” she thought, “hawking carpets from door to door.”
It seemed hard but invitingly different. The stream of sunlight washing into the room was illuminating the dust particles and transforming them into millions of tiny diamonds that glittered all around her. She caressed the air and its scent of latent activity. She liked the calm, it reminded her of her childhood. The telephone rang, piercing through the stillness and putting an abrupt end to her reverie. It was her husband, Mahesh and he was euphoric.
“The Doctor called Lily, he has confirmed, we are having a baby….everything’s going to change now, you’ll see. But we have to celebrate. Be ready, I’ll take you out to dinner.”
She held on to the receiver, even after the phone line went still. It was her Cinderella story but where was the happy ending?
She and Mahesh had fallen in love back in college and during their prolonged period of courtship when they often talked about the future, she had made it clear that she didn’t want a child. And it was all right.
“Anything you want” he said, “it’s ok with me.”
But things changed during the fourth year of their marriage or perhaps it had always been that way. Mahesh wanted a baby and she still didn’t.
At first he tried convincing her.
“A child will make our family complete, it will add to our happiness, its not like we can’t support one!”
And when that failed he tried reason.
“Logically speaking why don’t you want a child? You have nothing to lose, you don’t work, it wouldn’t harm your career.”
But she didn’t have an answer.
It was precisely at this point that the self-proclaimed protector of the Sengupta dynasty, Mahesh’s mother took it upon herself to forward the family interests. During her month long visit, she utilized the time trying to make Lily ‘understand’, whined to friends about the absence of an heir especially when she knew her daughter-in-law was within earshot and finally delivered sermons to her on the importance of women in society as child bearers. Lily’s parents too joined forces.
“It is children who make the most important bond between a husband and wife.” Her mother explained.
This irritated her however she soon learnt to live with it. But slowly and especially after his mother’s visit Mahesh’s “why don’t you” transformed into “why shouldn’t you”.
“Why shouldn’t you want a baby? Aren’t all women fulfilled in motherhood?” Why can’t you be like other normal women?”
Doors slammed, tears rolled and the unanswered questions haunted her, enshrouding her mind like a dark shadow till one day the unspoken was said. “Wanton sexuality” was the term Mahesh used and Lily spent the entire night crying on the sofa. It was towards dawn that he came and begged for forgiveness. The strange expression of vulnerability in her husband’s strong jaws made her afraid.
“I’ve always dreamed of a small hand clutching mine. A baby is something of you and me, it is a part of us and most importantly it is someone who would inherit the family name, I am the only son Lily, why don’t you understand?”
Lily was tired, she didn’t understand, she didn’t want to but nothing seemed to matter anymore, she simply replied ok and tried to stop thinking as Mahesh lulled her to sleep.
Months passed and yet Lily didn’t conceive, she couldn’t as they found out later. Tests showed that she had polycystic ovaries. It was as though her body had refused even though she couldn’t, Lily laughed at the irony.
The Doctor prescribed a strict diet with liberal amounts of exercise. It was expected that the recommended hormonal tablets would work but if they didn’t she would require a laproscopic surgery. All her life Lily had dreaded going under the knife. She patiently bore with all the side effects of the medication but the possibility of an operation scared her. For a year she tolerated unending nausea, bouts of constipation and abrupt hot flushes but that was the easy part, it was harder to satisfy the pointless but insatiable questions that friends and relatives raised. “Yes, I am infertile!” Lily often screamed to herself wanting to do the same to the world outside. And now she was finally pregnant. Lily felt relieved.
The maid was knocking at the door. Lily answered her. But as she turned her eyes fell on her wedding photograph, it stared back from the table. And suddenly Lily found herself asking what was her role in this family. It surprised her that the question had never occurred to her before.
“Was her sole purpose procreation? Was that the reason of her existence?”
“Is that what being a woman means?”