The Winter's Widow (MISHBIR VERSION)

Part Three~

Remember that warning about traumatic material? This part has a bunch of it, please read with caution and if you find any of it upsetting and need to talk, my inbox is always open!

Abir does not wear cologne.

For the past twelve years he’d see the small black box wrapped in cellophane in the nest of presents his family had sent his way, at first he’d open the package, screw up the clear paper in his fist and smash the bottle to pieces hoping it would mend as the liquid seeped beneath the floorboards.

It never did.

And neither did his heart.

He was seventeen when his heart crashed to the ground, the arteries splitting and allowing blood to flow into the river of doubt he’d stopped in front of to wash away the dirt and grime in his veins that only he could see.

On occasion when the cold bit his skin too hard he could still make out the impression of the buckle on his taut muscles, still feel the heavyweight of leather strapped to his wrists as he led there bound and at someone else’s mercy. With that came the familiar echo of his own screams, it never went away, but he always wished it would.

As the head of the shower splashes water down his form he recalls what else had splashed there before, the white, thick liquid of release that tainted his soul and scarred him for an eternity or more. Even now he scrubs it with salt rocks, not stopping till the brown turns red and the burn soothes the itch he longs to rip apart with his own hands just so his nails can be chopped away to rid him of what once was.

He’d always been told in not so many words that he was too masculine to be a victim, too coloured and too old. It was held in his parent’s eyes as he’d disclosed his trauma, it lingered on their hands as they brushed him away.

“Your uncle is not gay” his mother spat.

“With those muscles, why didn’t you just fight back?” His father yelled.

“That doesn’t happen in our culture” they both responded in unison.

But it did.

It had.

Because it had happened to him.

Paedophilia was a sexual attraction in itself, it did not care for gender. A thick stick of want and desire inserted into his most sensitive area did not equal gay, not when a child had been involved, not when that child had been him.

When his face was shoved into a pillow so his screams sucked in fluffy clouds of disappointment rather than oxygen and his uncle’s pent up frustration was spent over his shaking body, his contused hands forming bald patches as he ripped out shreds of his hair, he did not know how to fight back, his muscles had become stationary as the real battle took place in his head.

White, black or brown, was being a victim also being a colour? If he had to imagine, he’d pick grey. The colour of neither or, the shade of unknown. Abir Rajvansh did not know who he was, what he was or why he was, all he knew was that he had pulled away every inch of brown to reveal red that soaked him from the inside out. Perhaps he is a victim now?

When he climbs into bed, the creaks of the mattress resound around him, drowning him in memories of shaking posts and lightning strikes against the windowpane. His tears mingle with the rain, the soil as wet as the dampness on his back when he finally makes it to the toilet and tries for the tenth time to let go of everything within.