With Love, Inaya

The sun was hiding behind the clouds, feeling guilty for what had happened under his watch. The clouds, all dark, mourning for those who had suffered, the wind humming a slow crying sound, feeling terrible, trying to console those who are in need, but the streets were busy, buzzing with people, with shopping, sightseeing, and gossiping, no one had any heart no one cared.

"Look at her, walking shamelessly, she should be branded, for what she has done," the people who walked past her cursed her, wished she should be stoned to death. The pale skinned girl with sunken eyes, protruding cheek bone, and torn robes walked holding a pot full of water, through the street to her home away from the town. She fetched water, in the hopes to satisfy her hunger, getting out a week later the incident.

"Please, please, let my father go, he will pay back, we will pay the borrowed money back, please let us go this once, please show mercy," she begged the debt collectors. But the giant man puller hair and dragged her away.

"I will be back, you guys handle the parents," he said with a smirk and dragged the girl away to the small bedroom adjacent to the kitchen.

Mother and father struggled to stop the villain from taking their daughter away. They were aware what men like him do to young girls. A minute later, the little girl started screaming her lungs out "arghhh, stop, papa, mama, arghhhh, stop," and soon she was silenced.

Mother and father tied up lay crying on the floor. "Let her go, take my life, please let her go, let my daughter go, she is too young for this. This is wrong. You must not do this. It is a sin. Please, we will pay the money back, please let her go," but nobody listened to the words of the poor peasants.

The girl became the prey to the evils of the society. She lost her chastity, herself, in the journey of life, while trying to survive. While trying to defeat poverty, and no one cared, no one lent a hand, to stand up, but bad mouth.

Then men left the house, once they got tired of the girl, and shattered the house, every inch of it. Mother walked into the room, to see the girl left tattered and bleeding to death.

"Oh lord, why did you let this happen, why my Inaya?" mother started to cry, falling on the floor, unable to walk past the door. She hit her head until she passed out while father was lying on the floor, left unconscious wearing only hid undergarments.

Every villager entered the house, look at the three unconscious bodies, yet no one helped them.

The three bodies lay there, hurting and no one saved.

We find that, mother and father, never woke up after that. The girl who woke up, searched for her clothes, crying, and hurting. She looked at those few ladies who had come to visit the house, as if they were on display for an exhibition.

They were whispering, but loud enough to hear.

"How could a young girl let men touch her, seeing what they had done to her parents?" The little girl was shocked to here this.

'Are they blaming me? Can't they see I'm hurting? Can't they see how I have been attacked? Can't they see the bruises and wounds?' She wanted to shout out loudly.

"Let us go, we should tell the village heads to close the road to this area, who wants such a bad luck looking at them," the ladies left, covering their head and face.

The little struggled to stand up, she picked her torn clothes and covered herself, she walked towards the washroom, slowly washing herself, it ached everywhere. She then tried to wake her parents. Their cold skin sent a shiver down her spine. She began crying. "Ma, pa, wake up, wake up, please wake up," she cried."Ma, it's me, wake up, don't scare me, please," the girl was aware though.

She covered her father with a bed sheet and picked her mother from the floor where she found a pool of dried blood. Her mother had bled to death, just like her father who had turned green with all the bruises from the hits he had taken from the debt collectors.

"Please help, help me," the girl ran to the village priest, asking for her, for the burial of her parents who has met their unfortunate death.

"I will look at what I can do," priest said unable to stand the girl.

But nobody came for her. The little girl began dig the graves for her own parents, with her own hands. "It took a whole day, two digg two six feet graves with her tender hands. But she did it.

She cleaned her whole house, held the ceremony herself, and buried them, her way. She stood in front of those graves, with tears streaming down her face. "I will not let this slide, I will question every single one, I will let the fire spread all over, I will watch and then laugh, I will ask them all then, I will ask," couldn't you have just helped, and prevented the deaths, and I will show them what it felt like to us. I will show them all pa, ma, trust me on this," the little girl took an oath herself.

When she walked past the street, she didn't break, she didn't bother with the comments, she didn't care about their wish to kill her by throwing stones at her. She is not an adultress. She is not the reason for the deaths, she was treated badly by the society she lives in, she was confident about that. The girl reached back home after fetching water. She drank it all, not leaving a drop behind. And she sat in front of the graves, in the backyard. She was sharpening a knife and a machete. She covered her head, and she walked out soon.

Several hours later, there were loud cries in the village.