Morning arrived without kindness.
Ananya had not slept even for a minute.
Her mother gently placed a cup of tea beside her, but it remained untouched. Her father stood near the window, speaking to someone on the phone in a low voice.
Police station.
Hospital.
Complaint.
Words nobody imagines for their daughter while raising her.
By noon, they were sitting in a hospital corridor that smelled of medicine and silence.
Ananya wrapped her dupatta tightly around herself though she was not cold.
People passed by casually.
Nurses.
Visitors.
Children.
Nobody knew the war happening inside her mind.
A woman officer finally came near them.
“We’ll need her statement.”
Statement.
As if trauma could be arranged neatly into paragraphs.
Inside the room, questions began.
“What time was it?”
“How many men?”
“Did you know them?”
“What exactly happened?”
Every sentence felt like reopening wounds that had not even stopped bleeding emotionally.
Then came the questions that hurt differently.
“What were you doing alone that late?”
“Did you try resisting?”
“You know karate, right?”
Ananya lowered her eyes immediately.
There it was again.
Not direct blame.
But suspicion hidden inside curiosity.
Society rarely says:
“It was your fault.”
Instead, it asks questions in ways that slowly make women wonder if maybe it truly was.
Her throat tightened.
She wanted to scream:
“Yes, I know karate.
Yes, I was careful.
Yes, I fought inside my head.
But fear froze me before strength arrived.”
Instead she remained silent.
Because exhausted people stop defending themselves after a point.
Outside the room, her father heard fragments of conversation through the half-open door.
Every word aged him.
A man who once proudly told everyone his daughter feared nobody now stood helpless against a reality he could neither undo nor fight.
When they returned home that evening, the news had already spread quietly through the apartment building.
Not because people are evil.
Because society feeds on tragedy it does not understand.
Two aunties near the staircase suddenly stopped talking when Ananya entered.
One looked at her with pity.
The other with curiosity.
Both felt unbearable.
Inside the house, Amma closed all the curtains.
As if hiding sunlight could also hide gossip.
Phones kept ringing.
Relatives.
Neighbors.
“Concerned” people.
Some cried.
Some offered support.
And some asked the cruelest question disguised as sympathy:
“What exactly happened?”
As though details were entertainment for grief.
Ananya locked herself inside her room before dinner.
She stood in front of the mirror for a long time.
Same face.
Same eyes.
Same person.
Then why did she feel like the world would never look at her the same way again?
She touched the black belt hanging near her study table.
For years it had symbolized strength.
Tonight it felt like evidence against herself.