"Why talk to me like that? We're two people—we could just chat. Does the work have to get done?" "What do you mean, does it have to get done? Then why'd you come here in the first place, seriously? You'll leave and tell people Poly didn't give good service, wasn't friendly, wasn't nice, and then you'll get Robin beaten up, right?" I asked in surprise, "My God, what are you saying! Robin beats you? He lays hands on you?" The girl's mouth twisted into a small, mirthless smile, and she laughed—then stopped. I stared straight into her eyes. I don't know why she'd stopped speaking. So I asked her name. The girl answered with mild irritation, "My name's Poly. I told you just now—weren't you listening? It's a stage name. Nobody in this line uses their real name. Names don't mean anything here, only work does. This is a place of work, not names. Ha ha ha! Look, sir, don't mind me, but are you a virgin? I mean, you've never done anything with anyone? No wife, no girlfriend? Never had one? Or some 'just a friend' kind of thing?" I laughed awkwardly and answered, "Yeah, sorry. I am a virgin. This is my first time. I've never been to a place like this before. I had a girlfriend, but we broke up. We made out, but we never went all the way. Never got the chance, or maybe I didn't have the nerve." When Poly heard my answer, she burst into laughter—a clear, tinkling sound. I noticed her laugh was quite lovely, really. Like the tinkle of a stream. So genuine, so simple and pure. I went on, "Listen, Poly, I'll be straight with you. I won't do anything with you. I just want to listen to you. Talk to you. I don't want to say you didn't appeal to me or I didn't like your approach or anything like that. But I can't do it. My heart won't let me. Please. This is what I'm asking. Just spend time with me like this, and I promise you, Robin won't know a thing. I'll pay double. No problem! And look, I write a bit—your life story might come in handy for my work." "Oh my God! You're a writer! You're going to write a story about Poly? Is that why you want to chat with me for all this money? Wow, wow! What an expensive story you'll write, sir… and about a cheap girl like me at that!… But why should I take the money without doing the work? Am I a beggar? Are you trying to pity me?" "Please, don't take it that way. Look, you're giving me your time anyway, aren't you? The work would cost the same time as the talk. Your time has a price. You're just taking the price of your time, nothing more. It's what you deserve!" With just that, I shoved a thousand-taka note into her hand. "I'm like your brother. You keep this for yourself. I'm giving it to you extra." Poly screwed up her face at me, crumpled the note in her fist, and hurled it back. "What kind of brother act is this? I don't have any brothers—everybody's my customer. I work for my food, I don't beg. You want to talk, fine, talk. Spare me the pity." Now I was truly caught off guard. I didn't know what to do. I was nervous. At times like this, I usually eat chocolate.
He pulled another Snickers from his pocket, unwrapped it, took a bite himself, then held it out to her with trembling hands, his voice gentle: “Please. Cool your head a bit, have some chocolate—it’ll help. I’m not as bad a person as you think I am. Talk to me normally, will you? I’m asking nicely.” I saw her grow quiet then, saw her stare at me with parted lips before slowly taking a bite of the chocolate. I peeled back the wrapper a little further and said, “Go on, Poly. Eat. I’m like your brother. Come on.”
I noticed her lips were quivering, her eyes glistening, mascara bleeding down from her lashes. She stared at me with that vacant, helpless gaze. Behind those kohl-rimmed eyes, I could see so much unspeakable pain, so many unspoken words locked away. Even her expertly applied makeup couldn’t hide the language of a wounded heart.
I placed a gentle hand on her head and asked, “Why did you get into this line of work? Do you study? Who’s at home with you? What does your father do?” Poly’s head dropped. A shadow fell across her face—a kind of sorrow. A long breath escaped from deep within her, rising through her throat, touching her chest. I felt that grief reach me too.
After a while, she broke the silence and began to speak. “What will you do with my name, sir? We’re just for using, not for knowing. Apart from my parents, you’re the first person in my life to feed me chocolate with such love.” She continued, “My real name is Dina. Ayesha Siddika Dina. I’m in the honors second year at a college in my area. We’re three siblings—two sisters and a brother. Our family wasn’t poor. My father worked a small clerical job. It was enough to get by. Every morning when we woke, he’d kiss the foreheads of all three of us, and even as I grew older, I never truly grew up in his eyes. I love my father very much. I’ve always been a bit lazy by nature. Before bed at night, everyone would eat with their own hands, but I never would—I’d wait for father to feed me. Our house was filled with running around, laughter, and joy all day long. I’m the eldest of my siblings. I have a younger brother and a younger sister.
Two years ago—I’d just been admitted to college. It was a Sunday. Like every day, father had breakfast, kissed all three of us on the forehead, and went to the office. At noon I called him and asked if he’d bring pizza on his way home. He never forgot anything I asked for. Even if the world turned upside down, even if the sun melted and the moon crumbled to dust, I knew my father would come home with whatever I wanted.
He was on his way back with the pizza. In a rickshaw. Dusk was falling. The rickshaw was moving. Suddenly, a covered van came from the opposite direction and hit the rickshaw hard. Father was thrown from it, landing fifteen or twenty feet ahead on the road. Just then a long-distance bus coming from behind ran over his leg. One leg was severed completely. In tremendous pain, father screamed just once. After that, nothing. When he regained consciousness, he found himself lying in a hospital bed. One leg completely gone, the other barely hanging on.
My father was the only breadwinner in our family.
The doctor said that the remaining leg would also have to be amputated below the thigh. Both of my father’s legs—legs that had carried the weight of an entire family of five—had to be cut away. The sole source of income for our household was severed.
We sold whatever savings we had, whatever land remained, and spent it all on my father’s treatment. We got him back alive, but completely impoverished—though “alive” is perhaps too kind a word for the state he was left in. It was worse than death. My father couldn’t work. My mother had no employment. And there were three of us children, growing hungry by the day. Even though my father’s legs had become useless, our stomachs certainly hadn’t. No one would lend us money anymore. I took up tutoring, but the pittance from tutoring wasn’t enough. What kind of income does a second-year girl studying Political Science at National University expect from tutoring anyway? My younger brother was in ninth grade, my sister about to sit for her matriculation exam. Darkness fell upon our carefully arranged home.
My mother grew ill from the weight of worry over my father. For a while she worked in the homes of some relatives, taking on whatever tasks she could, but illness took even that from her. Now both my parents lay bedridden. I wasn’t old enough then to bear such weight, but life’s cruelty aged me beyond my years. I could see no way forward. My studies, my father’s treatment, my mother’s treatment, caring for my younger siblings, the household expenses—everything fell on my shoulders. What was I to do? Who would hire me? Who would pay for their medical care? Who would look after my younger brother and sister? Society? This country? Tutoring couldn’t possibly sustain us all.
One day, through a friend, I met Robin bhaiya. He listened to my story. When I finished, he asked: “Who’s going to give you a job? Even if someone does, you won’t make more than eight or ten thousand a month. What good will that do? Your parents will die without proper treatment right before your eyes. Your studies will stop. Your brother and sister will wander the streets. What good is it? Who will take care of them?” Then, in roundabout ways, he came directly to the point: “You’ll have to sell your body. Your body. Can you do it? You’ll make real money! Spit in society’s face—and your home will be saved. You’ll be fine too. You could make thirty, forty thousand a month. Do some asking around—most good jobs don’t even pay that much. Can you do it or not?”
When Robin bhaiya spoke those words—sell your body—my mind kept spinning with only one thought: I have to save my family. Whether I sell my body or do anything else, that’s beside the point. Thirty thousand a month—that’s a fortune! My family would survive. To me then, my worthless body mattered far less than my family, far less than society’s opinion. I thought for a while. What could happen if I stopped caring about society, about what people might say? Would anyone come and give us two takas? Has society ever come to lift the lid of the cooking pot in my kitchen to check if there was rice being cooked today? No. Society doesn’t have the time to put two mouthfuls of rice into a hungry mouth. Where God himself fears to enter a hungry home, how can society dwell there? The society that doesn’t know whether my belly is full or empty—should I sacrifice my family for the sake of its approval? How could I?
That very day, I decided. I would enter this profession.
# The Girl They Rent
When hunger claws at your belly, who has time to worry about society’s approval? My youth, my beauty—I sold them for money. I spat in the face of society’s iron rules and became what I am: a full-fledged prostitute, a whore, a call girl—call it what you will. Yes, brother, I’m that call girl. The one men sleep with, but won’t walk beside. The one they need in life, but can’t keep in it.
At first, it was agony. I hated my own body. But when this body—this despised body—could feed my family two meals a day, pay for my parents’ medicine, when it could keep us alive, I began to love it. Yes, I love this flesh that feeds on men. I take good care of it, maintain a proper diet, even go to the gym. Ha, ha, ha!
But men—the very men who pay—they torture this body with their hunger. They squeeze every last taka from what they’ve already paid. Some get drunk and beat me savagely. They want no protection, stub cigarettes on my skin, grab my hair and body, wrench and pull for no reason—as if pain is their pleasure. When I resist, they say, “I’ll tip you extra, just take it.” If I still refuse, they threaten complaints, beat me harder. We have to swallow it all. Some offer marriage, drown me in their “I love you”s until I can’t think straight—it makes me laugh. I know they’re high. Once the high wears off, I’ll be gone. And that’s exactly what happens.
Until today, I haven’t met a single man who’s looked at me with tenderness, with real love. Take Robin. If I ever mess up with a customer, he treats me like garbage right there in front of them—speaks to me with such cruelty, sometimes even raises his hand. He’ll short me on money, keep some back. With customers, he’s an angel. With us? Worse than a dog. You can’t say a word to Robin because then he might not send you customers, might forget you exist. That fear keeps your mouth shut. Besides, Robin can blackmail you somehow. He’ll earn your trust, burrow into your mind, then reveal his true face and strike the final blow. You won’t even see it coming. So be very careful.
But my income is decent, I’ll admit. There are two middle-aged businessmen who keep me. One of them took me traveling to three countries. He’s older than the other one—you could call him an old man. Old men are better. Less work, less time, more money. They want a little companionship, a little warmth, a little loving smile—even if it’s false. They’re starved for love! Many customers tip me generously when they’re happy. My regulars sometimes send me money by bKash. Brother, I’ve learned to keep my hand out, hoping for extra after I’ve done my service.
This society walks on our backs. Big men—important men—have come to my bed. I’ve seen their faces up close. Many of them are respectable people, the kind you see on TV talk shows. Yet this society has no place for us. It only knows the gentleman’s mask, not the face beneath it. Perhaps it simply doesn’t have the courage to look.
This society can’t help Poly, but the judge comes running quick enough. A society that ignores my hunger but keeps watch over my body—I spit on such a society, I kick it in the face!
Think your parents don’t know what you do? I’ve told them at home that I work as a sales representative for a foreign company. The job keeps me out and about. I’ve fed them a few more stories like that. That’s all they know. That’s all they want to know. Maybe nobody in that house has the means, or the will, or the courage to know or understand anything more.
…and with that, Dina couldn’t say another word. She broke down crying. I watched her bury her face in the pillow in front of her and sob—that deep, wordless sobbing. I couldn’t stay composed watching it. I went to the washroom. I turned on the tap and splashed water on my eyes over and over until they were red. What good would it do to show her my tears?
When I came back to the room, it wasn’t Poly anymore—it was Dina, still crying. The clock on the wall ticked on. Tick, tick. The busy city announcing its busyness through that clock. No one has time to ask about anyone. In society’s eyes, she’s a whore. But she’s also the responsible head of some family. By selling her body, she puts rice in five mouths, tends to her ailing mother and father, pays for her siblings’ education and her own. When these Polys go hungry, society never feels the obligation to feed them. But the moment Poly undresses her body to keep her family alive, to survive—suddenly society’s eyes fly wide open. Yet even kicking such a society in the face, the Polys live on.
While other girls sit on park benches with their boyfriends, eating peanuts, squandering their fathers’ money, Poly descends into the world’s ugliest path out of necessity—for life, for livelihood. In the years when Poly should be studying, wandering through life, savoring it—instead she carries her whole family on her shoulders, passes from hand to hand, becomes a practiced lover in a stranger’s bed. This too is a life! In society’s eyes, the Polys are defiled, untouchable, unclean. Society has given them a name—whore. But those who defile them, those respectable gentlemen—society has given them no such name.
Dina is still crying. Down her cheeks, tears fall like dreams fragmenting. Those dreams hold the face of an ailing father, an ailing mother, five hungry people. No one will ever ask about them. I didn’t stop her. Let Dina cry. Let Poly cry! These girls are always so busy—maybe they never get time to cry. So today, let her empty her heart, let her weep.
Meanwhile, time had slipped away. Nearly two and a half hours had passed. I was stroking Poly’s head, wiping her tears away with tissue. Suddenly, with wet eyes, she startled me—she kissed the back of my hand and whispered, “Brother, no one has ever shown me such respect. No one has ever held me with such tenderness. I can be loved too—not just this body, but my heart can be seen if only there were eyes to see it. As long as Poly lives, she will carry the memory of you in her heart.”
# The Gift
“A sex worker will remember you every day, will raise both her hands in prayer for you.”
She stepped down from the bed and picked up the crumpled thousand-rupee note and the Snickers chocolate from the carpet. Then, holding my gaze with those gentle eyes of hers, she said, “Brother, I will never spend this money. I’ll get it laminated and keep it. This note wasn’t given to me by a customer—my brother gave it to me. A man loved me enough to think of me as a sister and give me this. Brother, one day I’ll have a family too. One day I’ll have children. I’ll show them this note and say, look, your uncle gave this to me out of love. And this Snickers chocolate, brother—I’ll keep this too. One day the expiry date will pass, someday it won’t be fit to eat anymore, but I’ll never open the wrapper. It will stay with me my whole life as a memory of my brother.
As she said all this, holding the note and chocolate, Dina pressed her forehead down on my hand and began to cry again, her whole body shaking. Some time passed in silence. Then, wiping her eyes, she placed her hand on my head, and in a tone that was half-demand, half-plea, she said, “Brother, swear to your sister—you’ll never come to places like this again! This is my demand. A sister’s demand on her brother.”
I understood she was overwhelmed. I nodded and ran my hand over her head to calm her. I bent my index finger under her chin, tilted her face up, and with the back of my other hand, wiped the tears from her eyes. I saw Dina looking at me with such tenderness. Perhaps she was thinking: not all men are customers; some are brothers. Not all men’s touch carries desire; some men’s touch carries compassion. Not all men only touch sex workers’ bodies; some men also touch their hearts. Not all men are merely men; some men are human beings too.
Dina asked for my number. I gave it. I asked her to give me a missed call. She didn’t. She said, “Brother, maybe I’ll call you one day. But not for anything I need. Just to check on you. If we happen to run into each other on the street someday, will you recognize me? If I call out ‘Brother!’ and come stand in front of you, you won’t pretend not to know me and walk away, will you? Will you remember my name?”
Poli came out of the bathroom, freshly showered. Sex workers need to stay fresh. After so much conversation between the two of them, I took my leave from Poli and stepped out of the room. And yes, the two packets were still in the left back pocket of my jeans.
Outside the room, I saw Robin sir and Jayanta by the door. They were smoking More brand cigarettes and chatting. The moment Jayanta saw me, he burst out, “Man, you really went for it! Almost three hours! How many times did you go at it? You’re going to make it big, buddy! Your future’s bright! Best of luck!” I said nothing, just kept a mysterious smile on my face. Robin sir put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Congratulations! Well done, brother! The service was good, right? No trouble?” I smiled faintly and said, “Sir, everything was perfect! No problem!” Jayanta whispered in my ear, “You did two rounds, right? Give me eight—four for you, four for me. I’ve already settled mine.” I gave Robin sir eight thousand rupees for two “programs,” and he handed me back a thousand, saying, “Brother, this is a special discount for you.”
He had just come today…keep my number, give me a missed call. Your name is Rokib, right? I’ll save it as Rokib Joyanta for easy remembrance. Dial the number…zero-one-eight-one-four…’ Meanwhile, a question keeps hammering at my mind: is this one thousand taka a discount? Or an instant refund?
We—Joyanta and I—stepped out of that flat and walked down the tarred road. Joyanta was whistling…hai apna dil toh aawara… Neon lights glowed dimly on both sides of the street. I was stepping out of a world of ‘glittering darkness’ back into my ordinary, familiar life. My long shadow trailed behind me. The neon light didn’t dazzle my eyes; it was the light from one woman’s life that dazzled them. Before me bowed my head—before someone who was a fighter, hardworking, brave, self-reliant, and utterly complete. Society calls Poli a whore, but I call her the heroine of some great novel. Meeting her has taught me that the lanes and byways of this world hold countless untold stories. Each person is like an entire epic. Smaresh’s Deepavali pulled at me greatly, but today Poli is pulling me a hundred times more! This pull is not born of desire, but of reverence and love.
My friend Joyanta now winked at me with mischief in his eyes, breaking my train of thought, and asked in a lust-struck voice, ‘So, brother, how was the game? Got enough thrill? She’s quite a player, I tell you! How many styles did you try? Not bad at all! You can’t claim to be a virgin anymore, you bastard! Poli’s had her fill of you, mate!’ He burst into laughter. I kept saying ‘That’s it, that’s it!’ and ‘Absolutely, absolutely!’ enjoying his enthusiasm. My mind still floated with the image of a woman fighting, struggling. Again and again, my heart whispered, ‘You be well, sister!’
I took out the two ‘packets’ Robin sahab had given me from my pocket and placed them in Joyanta’s hand. My friend seemed to fall from the sky. His mouth hung open as he asked, ‘Did you do it raw? No protection? Wasn’t it risky, brother?’
‘Ah, no big deal! Raw feels better!’
‘True enough. And Poli’s fresh, no problems there. Worked out well—I’ll put these to good use! You know how annoying it is to go to a shop and ask for this stuff! Thanks, mate!’
We walked on. Now I was whistling…chalo ek baar phir se ajnabi ban jaye hum dono… My eyes were wet in the yellow drizzle of neon light. I felt both melancholy and dejected at once. It seemed I’d left someone somewhere, abandoned them…someone, someone no longer there. A kind of emptiness opened up inside my chest. I thought: was this supposed to happen?
Many years have passed since then. I haven’t sought out Dina anymore. She never called me either. Some relationships endure—beyond all communication, beyond all reason. I don’t know how Dina is, perhaps I never will; but the promise I made to her, I keep to this day…I’ll keep it until death. Why will I? I don’t know. I truly don’t know. Yet I will keep it—that’s the truth, that’s my sacred vow to myself.