Hope

BARREN

Kaveri's POV

Waking up everyday is very painful and waking up to get ready and attend your step daughter's birthday is even more painful.

Yesterday my husband's second wife called me and asked me to attend the birthday party. So, here I'm getting ready reluctantly.

My husband's second wife and I live separately but both our houses are opposite to each other but her house is filled with children's laughter whereas mine is filled with sadness.

After my husband's second marriage he would visit me sometimes but after their children's birth he stopped visiting me. Maybe he hated being suffocated with so much sadness.

Who would want to associate with sadness. Even I want to ditch the sadness and be happy but how could I? I saw the death of my four children.
I saw them taking their last breaths in my arms. How could I ever forget that.

Seeing myself infront of the mirror made me feel so weird. I was once a beautiful girl but now I could only see a walking deadbody in the mirror. Now I'm no more beautiful, I look older than what I'm supposed to look. My once flawless face now has wrinkes . My once silky hair looks so rough. My once bright eyes has no shine in them now and are surrounded with dark circles.

I combed my hair and braided them and wore a saree which was sent to me by my husband's second wife. She didn't visit me but sent the saree by her maid. I wore the saree and applied little make up to conceal dark circles.

I stopped going to social gatherings as everyone would call me barren behind my backs which always hurts me. But this is my husband's family function, so I went there. Everyone are present there. My husband's brothers and sisters were also present along with their families.They were once very close to me.

I sat among the guests and Ramya and few relatives greeted me and I greeted them back. I saw my husband's daughter coming down the stairs with her mother wearing a cute pink dress. Seeing his daughter, my husband quickly went to pick her in his arms and showered her faces with the kisses which made his daughter giggle.

But seeing all this is making me feel like dying. He was supposed to play with my children like that. After a while the birthday girl cut the cake and fed her parents.

After cake cutting, all the guests blessed the birthday girl and presented her with gifts and when it's my turn, I presented her with a gold chain and blessed her and left from there as soon as possible.

While leaving, I went to Ramya to inform her but then, I heard our relatives warning Ramya, "Don't be naive and invite her to all the functions like this, she is your husband's first wife and a barren woman and she may hurt your children out of jealousy." Seeing me there, they stopped talking and I informed Ramya that I'm leaving and left from there.

I went into my house and locked it and cried my heart out. How can anyone ever call me a barren woman when I'm a mother of four children. It's just that my children were born with genetic defects and died early. Three of them died within a month and my last born died few days before his first birthday.

Why did I even marry my cousin out of all the people in the world. I was a fool to marry him. He claimed that he was madly in love with me and would die without me. But now he married some other woman and is happily celebrating birthday parties whereas I'm left all alone like this.

I sat there numbly forgetting the time and then my stomach is making noises as the last time I ate was yesterday afternoon, so I quickly went inside the kitchen and opened the fridge to see a bread packet which made me relieved as I have no energy to cook anything. I ate the whole bread packet and drank water and switched on the telivision and sat on the sofa watching a random serial.

After watching the serial, I went to my room and changed the heavy saree and wore a casual saree and then again sat on the sofa to watch another serial.

All my days are the same. I eat once or twice a day if I feel like eating and sit hours together on the sofa watching random shows on telivision. Telivision is my only escape from the reality now. If I didn't have telivision, I would have gone mad by now.

My father passed away when I was two months old and my mother raised me with the help of her brother who is also my husband's father. He helped her when our father left the world and that was the reason, my mother wanted me to marry my cousin as she thought that would give me a good life but how wrong was she! She died  after 2 years of my marriage to my husband.

My father in-law always supported me, he was the only one who opposed my husband's second marriage. He stopped speaking to my husband after his second marriage but later he accepted the marriage after the children were born. He would always spend his time here as he knew I would stay alone here but two years back he died of heart attack.

It's been more than five years that my husband married Ramya and even though Ramya is not to be blamed, it always hurts me seeing her in my place. I'm also not very close with his children and I also intend to keep it that way.

My mother in-law who always showered me with love, avoided as soon as my husband married Ramya  and his siblings who were my biggest supporters ditched me and infact they were the one along with my mother inlaw who suggested my husband for second marriage. I thought he would oppose but he didn't.

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