Five years…Five years of silence, of slow erosion, of being reduced to something less than a person. Five years of shame disguised as endurance—of counting calendar days, of flinching at footsteps in the corridor, of dreading the nights marked in red on her secret mental calendar.

Five years of trying—and failing—to conceive. At first, Rajat had been impatient. Then angry. Then indifferent. Each test result came back normal, but his fury only grew. When the doctors said everything looked fine, he had laughed bitterly.

“Then it must be you. It’s always you.”

Eventually, he stopped accompanying her to appointments. She would sit alone in the waiting rooms, surrounded by glowing, expectant couples, her hands folded tightly in her lap, staring at posters that read “Motherhood is a blessing.” The words felt like mockery.

Then one winter evening—the kind where the cold seeps into your bones and refuses to leave—she was folding his shirts when he walked in. No greeting, no glance. He dropped a packet of papers on the bed, his voice emotionless.

“Divorce.”

The word hung in the air like a gunshot. She looked at him—the man who had once been her husband in name, her tormentor in truth—and waited, foolishly, for an explanation.

“You’re barren,” he said simply, almost casually. “This was a waste. I want someone fertile. Younger. Prettier. Useful.”

The words hit her harder than any slap could have. But she didn’t cry. She couldn’t.
Something inside her had long since stopped producing tears. Her fingers brushed over the crisp white papers—official, impersonal, final. They felt heavier than death, colder than mercy.

When she took them home, hoping for comfort, for outrage, for something, she found only silence. Her father’s face was gray with shame; her mother’s hands trembled as she twisted the end of her saree.

“At least you’ll be free now, beta,” her father whispered.

Free…. The word echoed in her head until it lost all meaning. Free to do what? She was twenty-four. No degree. No job. No money. No identity except that of a rejected wife and a failed woman.

Still, Ruhi signed. Because what else could she do? There was no fight left in her—only exhaustion. She packed quietly, methodically—her NEET scorecard she’d once been proud of, her old textbooks with her handwriting in the margins, and a fading photograph of her parents, smiling before life hardened them.

She folded her few belongings into a small suitcase—the way she once folded Rajat’s shirts, neat and mechanical. Her NEET scorecard, a few sarees, and a worn photograph of her parents smiling outside a temple—all that remained of her life.

She had thought her parents would be there for her in her struggle, her breaking. But while they were coming to take her home, fate was merciless. A truck. A scream. Twisted metal. Silence.

At the hospital, two white sheets ended every prayer she’d ever whispered. That night, Ruhi zipped the suitcase shut, her hands steady, her soul empty. “This is the end,” she whispered. “Maybe endings are mercy.”

That day, Ruhi lit both their pyres with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking. The matchstick slipped twice before catching flame. Her mangalsutra still hung around her neck—not as a symbol of marriage, but as a noose that refused to let her breathe.

Smoke rose into the cold sky, carrying with it everything she had ever known. Ash floated through the air, soft and cruel, landing on her skin, in her hair, on her trembling lips. And somewhere in the haze, her mind betrayed her — conjuring the smell of her mother’s gajar ka halwa, the sound of her father’s oil-stained hands fixing the broken strap of her schoolbag, the laughter that used to echo through their tiny home when the world still made sense.

Now, all of it—her parents, her dreams, her identity — had burned to nothing in a matter of days.She was divorced….Orphaned….Alone and somehow, still responsible for her younger brother’s future.

The old house was cold. Not from winter, but from absence. It smelled faintly of burnt incense and old memories. The mattress on the floor still carried the trace of her mother’s coconut oil and her father’s favorite attar.

Ruhi sat there, knees pulled to her chest, staring at the shadows gathering in the corners. No degree… No job…No money….No place that truly felt like home anymore. Only her brother — barely sixteen, too young to understand, too broken to ask questions. He sat in the corner, his schoolbooks open but untouched, his eyes fixed on her like she was the only thread keeping his world from unraveling.

And maybe she was. The government compensation had vanished into hospital bills and cremation costs. Her father’s small savings—the coins in an old biscuit tin—were all that remained of a lifetime of labor.

Her books, her NEET notes, her medical guides—they still sat under the broken table, pages yellowing, mocking her with what-ifs. She had done everything right…. Obeyed. Sacrificed. Endured…. And still, here she was—standing on the edge of absolute ruin, watching the world move on without her.

A few days later,

That was when the phone rang. It was a number she didn’t recognize. When she answered, the voice on the other end carried a faint echo of the past.

“Ruhi? It’s Ishita…”

Ruhi blinked, her lips parting slightly. Ishita. A senior from coaching classes—kind, confident, the girl who’d once told her she’d make it big.

“It’s been years,” Ishita said softly. “But I heard about your parents. I’m so sorry.”

Ruhi didn’t reply. Sorry, had lost all meaning. There was a pause, then Ishita’s tone shifted—cautious, careful.

“I wouldn’t have called unless I thought it could help. There’s a job. Not here… abroad.”

Ruhi frowned. “Abroad?”

“Italy… Domestic work. Full-time. Lodging included. The pay is good, Ruhi—better than anything you’ll find here, especially without a degree.”

The word "Italy" tasted foreign on her tongue—distant, impossible. She swallowed. “For whom?”

A silence stretched across the line. Then Ishita said, quietly —

“The Colombo family.”

Ruhi froze…. The name was familiar—whispered in news reports, in half-truths, and in the kind of conversations people had in lowered voices.

“You mean…” she exhaled. “The mafia?”

“They don’t call themselves that,” Ishita said. “But yes. It’s dangerous. Still—they don’t hurt staff. Not unless you talk too much or cross the wrong line. You’d be a maid. Just keep your head down, do your work, and you’ll be fine.”

Mafia…. The word pulsed through her veins like fear and curiosity blended into one. She had only heard stories—of men with power stitched into their suits, of families who ruled cities with blood and silence.

“Why would they hire someone like me?”

“They don’t care who you are,” Ishita said. “They just want obedience. I have a contact there—a girl from Kerala. She’s been working under them for years. She can vouch for you. I can get your papers processed in two days. But you have to say yes now.”

Ruhi looked around her apartment—at the peeling blue paint, the cracked photo frame with her parents smiling from a different lifetime, the untouched tiffin on the stove, and the flickering bulb that buzzed like a dying fly.

Her eyes fell on her NEET scorecard, tucked neatly in a file that had once held her future.
She had passed. With good marks. But good marks didn’t feed a child. Didn’t buy rice. Didn’t pay tuition fees or rent.

She reached for her passport—the one her father had insisted she apply for after her exam.

“Bas ek din tu foreign jaayegi, beti,” he had said, pride shining in his tired eyes. (One day, you’ll go abroad, my daughter.)

A tear slipped down Ruhi’s cheek. She let it fall. Just one.

“I don’t have a choice, I will go” she whispered finally, her voice barely audible.

Then, quieter still —

“I’ve never had one.”

And so, the girl who once dreamt of saving lives—the one who used to stay up late memorizing anatomy charts under the dim glow of a flickering bulb—boarded a flight to a foreign land.

Not as a doctor…. Not as a daughter….. Not as a wife… But as a maid. A maid in a mafia household—nameless, voiceless, replaceable—flying straight into the den of wolves with nothing but desperation in her eyes and dust in her pockets.