Zoya’s Breaking Point - I
1142 Words
I. The Morning After
Aanya didn’t wake normally.
She surfaced from sleep like someone drowning...........gasping, eyes darting around the room, breath short and sharp.
She was on the sofa in the living room, a blanket wrapped around her.
Sharda sat on the floor beside her, leaning against the sofa with her head tilted back. She hadn’t slept. Or she had, but only in fragments.
Zoya was curled in an armchair, a half-finished article draft glowing on her laptop, mascara smudged, knuckles white.
Aanya blinked slowly.
“What… what happened?” she whispered.
Sharda sat up immediately.
“You fainted.”
Aanya closed her eyes as if pained. “I didn’t faint. I...............”
“You collapsed,” Sharda corrected softly. “Your body shut down.”
Aanya’s throat tightened.
She hated the weakness implied in the collapse.
She absolutely hated the idea of losing control.
Zoya rose from the chair and sat beside her.
“How much do you remember?” she asked gently.
Aanya’s gaze flickered.
“Enough.”
Zoya swallowed. “Okay.”
Sharda leaned in.
“Aanya… we need to know something.”
Aanya tensed.
“Does your uncle...........” Sharda paused, her voice lowering.........“know where you live now?”
The question landed like a blade.
Aanya wrapped her arms around herself and whispered:
“No… I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think isn’t enough,” Zoya said sharply.
Aanya flinched.
Sharda shot Zoya a warning look, but Zoya ignored it.
“We need to know if he can find you,” Zoya said, her voice rising.
“We need to know if he’s watching. We need to know if last night—”
Aanya shook her head rapidly. “Stop.”
“..........we need to know if he followed you..........”
“STOP.”
Aanya’s voice cracked.
Her arms shook and breath became shallow again.
Sharda reached for her, but Aanya recoiled instinctively.
Zoya froze, staring at her hands like they had betrayed her.
“Sorry,” she whispered.
“I’m sorry.”
But the damage was done.
II. Zoya’s Breaking Point
Zoya stood abruptly, pacing the room like a trapped animal.
“What are we supposed to do, Sharda?” she hissed.
“Sit? Wait? Hope he doesn’t show up at the door? Hope he doesn’t follow her? Hope he doesn’t break her again?”
Sharda kept her voice steady.
“Yes.”
Zoya groaned. “That’s your plan? Hope?”
“That’s my plan until Aanya says otherwise.”
Aanya stared at the rug, her face blanking in the way trauma survivors blank out to survive the moment.
Zoya dragged her hands through her hair, frustrated tears stinging her eyes.
“He’s out there,” she said. “He’s out there living his life like nothing happened. And she...........look at her; she’s drowning.”
Aanya shut her eyes.
Zoya’s voice went cold.
“We need to call the police.”
Aanya’s breath hitched. She shook her head violently. “No. No police.”
Zoya rounded on her.
“Why? Why protect him?”
Sharda’s voice snapped like a whip.
“Zoya!”
Aanya’s face collapsed.
“I’m not protecting him,” she whispered.
“I’m protecting myself.”
Zoya froze.
The words hit her harder than any scream.
III. Confession Ripped the Room Apart
Aanya wrapped her arms around her ribs again—as if trying to hold herself together.
In a voice so small it barely formed:
“He told me he would make my life hell if I ever told anyone.”
Sharda closed her eyes.
Zoya felt her blood run cold.
Aanya continued, trembling:
Her voice cracked.
“He said no one would believe me.
He said girls like me… make things up.
He said I was ungrateful.
He said it wasn’t abuse.
He said it was ‘family.’
He said I belonged to him.”
Zoya’s knees buckled, and she dropped to the floor in front of Aanya.
“Stop,” she whispered. “Please stop.”
But Aanya kept going, because the dam had broken:
“He used to lock the door.
He used to come at night.
He said if I made noise, he’d hurt my mother.
He said if I told anyone, he’d make sure.........”
Her voice died in her throat.
Zoya covered her mouth, shaking.
Sharda reached for Aanya again; but gently, slowly, visibly, so she didn’t trigger her.
“Aanya,” she whispered, “you’re safe now.”
But Aanya pulled her knees tight to her chest, whispering like a child:
“No one stopped him.”
Zoya broke.
The tears she had held back for days burst free.
“Then we will stop him now,” she said fiercely.
“We will protect you. I swear to god; I swear; I won’t let him touch you again.”
Aanya looked up slowly, her eyes hollow.
“He already did.”
Zoya’s face crumpled.
IV. Sharda’s Medical Line
Aanya’s breathing was becoming shallow again; too shallow,
too rapid.
Sharda grabbed her stethoscope from the table.
“Aanya,” she said urgently, “I need you to breathe. Look at me.”
Aanya couldn’t.
Her eyes glazed over and body stiffened.
Her mind retreated.
This was dissociation.
Severe.
Dangerous.
Sharda’s voice dropped into professional mode.....low, calm, commanding.
“Aanya; focus on my voice.
Can you hear me?
Blink if you can hear me.”
Aanya blinked once.
“Good. Now breathe.......................... Follow my voice.”
Nothing.
Aanya’s chest barely moved.
Zoya panicked. “She’s shutting down again. Sharda, do something!”
“I am,” Sharda said, but her voice trembled.
“Should we call an ambulance?”
“No,” Sharda said instantly. “No hospitals.”
“Why not?”
“Because hospitals force questions,” Sharda whispered. “And she is not ready to answer them.”
Zoya stared at her.
“Then what do we do?”
Sharda looked at Aanya......her shaking hands, her blank stare, her disappearing breath.
And Sharda whispered something that broke her own heart:
“We will keep her alive for another minute. And then another. And then another. Until she comes back.”
She took Aanya’s trembling hand, it felt warm and fragile.
“Stay,” she whispered.
“Stay with us.”
“Stay.”
“Stay.”
Aanya’s chest rose....sharply.
Then again.
Then again.
Slowly; very slowly....her breath returned.
She sobbed through the inhale, releasing a choked, guttural sound that was half grief, half survival.
Sharda pressed her forehead into Aanya’s hand, tears slipping down her face silently.
Zoya leaned forward and pressed her palm to the floor beside them.
Three women.
One broken.
One unraveling.
One shattering.
All clutching the same moment as a lifeline.
Aanya whispered: “I can’t do this.”
Sharda whispered back: “You already are.”
- Writer
