Cartographer of Other People’s Pain -II
1246 Words
IV. Things Zoya Refused to Label
As evening seeped into the room, painting the walls in a wash of orange, Zoya lay back on the sofa with her arm thrown over her eyes. Aanya sat beside her, sketching quietly, the sound of pencil on paper like an anchor.
Zoya didn’t ask what she was drawing.
Aanya didn’t ask why Zoya was there.
This was the shape of their friendship:
Not interrogation.
Occupation.
Finally, Zoya spoke.
“Aanya… can I ask something?”
Aanya’s hand paused. “Yes.”
“Are you scared of someone?”
Nearly imperceptibly, Aanya’s pencil trembled.
A pause.
A long, hard pause.
“No,” she said. “Not anymore.”
The anymore was a c***k in a sealed wall.
Tiny.
But unmistakable.
Zoya swallowed. “Okay.”
Neither woman spoke after that. The silence was thick, not uncomfortable; heavy as monsoon humidity.
Zoya wanted to scream.
She wanted to ask: Who? What happened? Why are you alone in this?
She wanted answers.
But she had learned long ago that pushing Aanya into confession was like forcing a fracture back into place; it did more damage than good.
Instead, she shifted slightly, letting her knee rest against Aanya’s.
A small contact.
Barely pressure.
But grounding.
I’m here, it said.
Even if you never tell me anything.
V. Three Missed Calls
At 7:40 p.m., Zoya’s phone buzzed.
Missed call: Sharda
Missed call: Sharda
Missed call: Sharda
Zoya blinked.
“Shit.”
She scrambled up and called back.
“Where are you?” Sharda’s voice was sharp, brittle with worry. “You were supposed to send the final version of the trafficking report hours ago.”
“I......sorry.........I left the office,” Zoya said, rubbing her forehead. “Got distracted.”
“Distracted?”
Zoya hesitated. “I’m at Aanya’s.”
A beat of silence.
Then Sharda exhaled. “How is she?”
“Not great.”
“And what are you doing?”
“Existing?”
“Zoya…”
“Look, she looked like she was going to break,” Zoya snapped. “I came to check on her.”
Another silence.
The heavy kind.
The kind Sharda excelled at.
“Did she talk?” Sharda asked softly.
“No,” Zoya whispered. “She didn’t have to.”
Sharda sighed again. “Okay. I’ll come.”
“No,” Zoya said quickly. “Let her breath. She doesn’t need both of us hovering.”
“Hovering keeps people alive,” Sharda replied.
“Or suffocates them.”
“Zoya.....”
“Just… give her space tonight,” Zoya said. “She asked for nothing, but she didn’t ask for everything either.”
Sharda’s voice shifted; the medical calm fading into something more personal, more raw.
“I’m worried,” she said simply.
Zoya closed her eyes.
“I know,” she whispered. “Me too.”
VI. The Fight
Sharda arrived anyway.
She knocked softly before entering; a courtesy she rarely used.
Aanya looked up from her drawings. Zoya sat rigid on the sofa.
Sharda scanned the room like a surgeon assessing a trauma bay.....quick, precise, reading the air, the posture, oxygen of the moment.
“You came,” Zoya said, clearly annoyed.
“I am not a dog,” Sharda replied flatly. “You don’t get to tell me where I can go.”
Aanya’s eyes flicked between them, a silent plea forming.
Not now.
But the fight was already alive.
Zoya stood. “She needs space. Just today.”
“She needs support,” Sharda countered.
“She needs to not feel cornered.”
“She needs to know she’s not alone.”
Zoya threw up her hands. “You can’t treat her like one of your patients!”
“And you can’t treat her like one of your subjects!” Sharda snapped.
The room fell utterly silent.
Aanya’s breath caught.
Zoya blinked, stunned. “What did you just say?”
Sharda’s face tightened. “You chase grief. You map suffering. You think being present in someone’s pain is enough. It isn’t.”
Zoya’s voice broke slightly. “You think I don’t know that?”
Aanya stood abruptly, her chair scraping against the floor.
“Stop,” she said.
Both women looked at her.
“Aanya.......” Zoya began.
“Aanya....” Sharda whispered.
But Aanya raised a hand. A rare gesture of authority.
“You’re fighting about me as if I’m not even in the room,” she said quietly. “As if I’m a case or a headline.”
Both women fell silent.
Aanya looked at them—both exhausted, both terrified in different ways.
“I don’t know what I need,” she said, her voice trembling. “I don’t. I wish I did. But I don’t.”
Zoya’s eyes softened.
Sharda’s shoulders lowered a fraction.
Aanya continued, barely beyond a whisper:
“Sometimes I need space.
Sometimes I need company.
Sometimes I need silence.
Sometimes I need someone to knock the door down and drag me out.”
A tear rolled down her cheek.
“And sometimes,” she said, “I need you both to stop trying to save me.”
Sharda’s face crumpled, just slightly.
Zoya sat down again, suddenly small.
Aanya wiped her cheek. “I’m not breakable,” she whispered. “Just… tired.”
Sharda swallowed hard. “Okay.”
Zoya nodded. “Okay.”
Aanya exhaled.
The storm passed.
VII. Likeness Between Pain
Sharda sat on the rug now, legs folded beneath her. Zoya leaned against the sofa. Aanya returned to her drawings.
The air was fragile but calmer.
Sharda reached for her bag. “I have to go back for a late shift,” she said. “But I’ll check in later.”
Aanya nodded.
Zoya stayed silent.
Before leaving, Sharda hesitated. Then turned to Zoya.
“You’re good for her,” she said quietly.
Zoya looked down. “I’m just… here.”
“Being here is good,” Sharda said.
Then she left.
The blue door closed softly behind her.
VIII. The Interview Broke Her
Zoya didn’t leave Aanya’s house.
She couldn’t.
Not after that fight.
Not after seeing Aanya tremble.
She opened her laptop, determined to finish her article.
But as she typed, she felt a chill crawl up her spine.
She pulled up her notes from the interview she’d conducted two days ago; a girl rescued from a trafficking ring near Anand Vihar.
The girl had been fifteen.
Soft-spoken.
Terrified.
Zoya had sat across from her, recorder on the table, notebook in hand, scribbling details:
“He knocked softly before entering.”
“He always said I was too quiet.”
“He said silence was obedience.”
“He said my fear meant I belonged to him.”
Zoya had written these words mechanically.
But now...
Now they sounded like echoes.
Echoes of something she’d seen in Aanya’s eyes that morning.
Something bone-deep.
Something history-shaped.
Something she couldn’t yet name.
Her stomach twisted.
She closed the notebook slowly.
She looked at Aanya; who was bent over her drawings, shoulders tense, lips pressed together in concentration.
Zoya whispered, barely audible:
“Someone hurt you.”
Aanya didn’t look up.
Zoya wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, blinked hard, and returned to her article.
Her fingers trembled.
She typed anyway.
Pain was her currency.
Mapping it was her job.
But tonight, she realized something terrifying:
It’s different when the pain belongs to someone you love.
- Writer
