Every gentleman fears his own wife. Look into it, and you’ll find that many men who roar like lions outside mew like cats within their homes. The weaker a man is socially and mentally, the greater his domestic tyranny becomes. A man’s masculinity suits him better outside the house. Many men desperately try to hide their own inadequacies by disrespecting or dishonoring their wives. A man who is truly great never belittles his wife. Within the home, a woman’s authority looks far more beautiful than a man’s. The reverse happens only when the wife at home is deprived of the respect she deserves. And if this occurs abroad, then keeping the household together becomes a burden indeed. When women move abroad after marriage with husbands of demonic nature, they almost always become utterly helpless. The problem is, until marriage, men’s monstrous faces rarely reveal themselves to women.
Twelve years have passed since their marriage. They have two sons—one ten years old, the other eleven. Just a month after the wedding, Nadi conceived their first child. Even then, Sofi’s cruelty didn’t cease. His entire manhood seemed to manifest through physical and psychological torment of Nadi. Sofi would never admit to abusing her. “I just playfully pushed you around a bit. All husbands do that. What’s there to talk about?” Over the slightest things, his temper would explode. From the outside, there was no way to understand this side of him. Before the marriage, neither Nadi nor her family had any inkling. When you spoke with Sofi, he seemed like an absolute gentleman. Since it was an arranged marriage, Nadi never had the chance to really get to know him beforehand. When a proposal comes for a computer engineer who graduated from BUET and lives in America, many parents suffer from guilt until they practically shove their daughter into such a household. Bangladesh has no shortage of guardians obsessed with doctor-engineer credentials. Add to that an expatriate boy—what greater qualification could there be? Foreign countries mean paradise, after all! In the intoxication of knowing their daughter will live in that realm after marriage, many families hand over their girls without much investigation, practically dancing with joy. Let me share a personal experience. Once, invited to a wedding, I asked a relative from the bride’s side, “What does the groom do?” The answer came: “The boy lives in Canada.” I was stunned! What kind of introduction is that? The person who answered teaches physics at a private college. During our conversation, he asked me, “What do you do?” I smiled and said, “I live in Bangladesh.” (What else could I have said at the time!) His facial expression after hearing this was worth seeing. Not all girls who marry expatriate men actually marry the man—some marry the expatriate lifestyle itself. How many marriages are nothing more than schemes to live abroad? Yes, there are girls like that too. When they find an expatriate boy, they start jumping at the imagined prospect of frolicking in foreign air and light. Anyway, Sofi’s behavior was very sweet and amiable; after talking with him, it would truly be difficult not to like him. Only those who got close to him learned about his bad temper. Even his own family members were too afraid to say or do anything that might set him off.
After marriage, Nodi had grown quite accustomed to enduring such torment. Exactly seven years into their marriage, on their wedding anniversary, over some trivial matter that escalated into an argument, Sofi had beaten Nodi mercilessly, leaving countless bruises on both her arms. He had said, “If you ever do anything like this again, I’ll kill you and both your sons.” The reason was this: the day before, after her cousin’s first daughter was born, Nodi had taken both sons with her to the hospital to see the baby and had returned home a little late. A couple of years earlier, Sofi had stopped speaking to Nodi’s brother and sister-in-law after a confrontation about his mistreatment of Nodi, and even after Nodi’s brother had called to inform him of the first child’s birth, Sofi hadn’t gone to see the baby girl. “Why did Nodi go to see her? Why did she come home late?” Sofi couldn’t keep his head straight over this issue. On the day he beat Nodi, when Sofi went to sleep with the two boys, they were crying for some reason. Little children—they can cry. But he had deliberately picked a fight with Nodi over this and beaten her that way. The next morning, placing his hands on the heads of their 5-year-old and 6-year-old sons, Sofi had told Nodi, “I swear on them, I had a terrible headache last night, so I behaved a bit badly with you. Don’t take it to heart. Sorry.” Nodi couldn’t say anything to him, her whole body aching with pain. She was also afraid that if she said something, he might beat her again! After Sofi left for the office, Nodi packed her bags and went to her brother’s house with her two sons. She stayed there for a month, receiving treatment. Sofi would occasionally come to her brother’s house to see Nodi, bringing various gifts. He suddenly started being very cordial with those he hadn’t spoken to for two years. He apologized for what he had done and took them back home. When they were leaving, her brother had placed his hand on Nodi’s head and said, “Sister, what can you do! He’s a bit hot-headed, but he’s not a bad person. Try to adjust.” Will women always have to ‘adjust’ even after being beaten? I can’t wrap my head around it—how can a man who beats his wife be ‘a good person’?
About a week later. When Sofi returned home from the office in the evening, he found the two brothers, close in age, quarreling among themselves about something. Flying into a rage at them, he picked up the younger boy and literally slammed him down. He took off his belt and started beating the older one. When Nodi tried to stop him, he grabbed her by the hair, slapped her, and hurled her toward the wall. The belt buckle struck the older boy, leaving a deep wound on the right side of his face. “Don’t let him go outside until this mark heals. He doesn’t need to go to school for the next few days—let him study at home.” Sofi didn’t want anyone to know what he had done. Sofi told an abnormal number of lies, hiding his true self from the entire world. Whenever he needed to achieve some purpose, he would make all sorts of promises. Later, once his purpose was achieved, if asked about those promises, he would act very surprised and say, “What? I never said anything like that!”
After a few years of marriage with Safir, Nadi had learned very well that Safir could never be trusted, not even slightly. But looking at the faces of her two sons, she endured everything and stayed with him. The second child came into Nadi’s womb just six months after the first was born. Nadi often thought that Allah had given her two sons for this very reason—so that even if she had to silently bear everything, she would never leave Safir. After the second child’s birth, Nadi left her previous job and took another one that was part-time, with much less pressure. This way she could take care of the children and manage all the household work properly. Safir worked at an IT firm and had also opened a restaurant in partnership with a distant cousin. When the restaurant business took off, Safir quit his job to focus better on the business. Gradually, the shop expanded to three outlets. After borrowing money from the bank for business and not paying it all back, the bank wouldn’t give him a home loan. So he was forced to take the home loan in Nadi’s name. Nadi and Safir had also jointly opened a flower shop. They took that shop’s loan money in Nadi’s name too. The money for the home loan of the brother Safir was in business with—they had taken that in Nadi’s name as well, because they couldn’t manage a low-rate loan in their own names. This way, most of the business money was borrowed in Nadi’s name, but everything in the business ran under Safir’s name. Fear had crept into Nadi’s mind—if she left Safir, what if Safir dumped this enormous burden of debt on her shoulders? What would she do then?
Despite earning good money, Sofi was terribly miserly. The mere mention of this would set him off into a terrible rage, so Nodi was too frightened to say anything about it. He often said, “All my money gets wasted because of you people. I have to cover all the household expenses, I pay the utility bills too. Your food, taking you all out, the kids’ education costs, buying you makeup and clothes—do you have any idea how much money I waste on all this every month?” In the twelve years since their marriage, here were all the places Sofi had taken his family: Universal Studios, because he had to use up the miles on his credit card before it expired. Every year they went to Hershey Park and other amusement parks, because Sofi got free entry tickets from his food business suppliers. In 2007 and 2014, Sofi had taken them to Bangladesh, because he needed to look into buying some property and opening an outlet of his food shop in Dhaka. In 2012, Sofi went to Canada with the family because his older sister had gotten a Canadian visa and moved there, but couldn’t find time to visit her brother in America. His sister had sponsored their plane tickets. Every place Sofi took his family, he always had some business to attend to, or got some free offer. He never took the family out to eat anywhere, never bought the kids toys when they went places, and buying anything for Nodi never even crossed his mind. There were certain tourist spots that didn’t require tickets—like viewing monuments, walking in open parks—those were the kinds of places he’d take the family. If he ever found that a place required paid admission, he wouldn’t go inside but would buy a couple of McDonald’s burgers outside for everyone to share before heading home. This was his style of family outings. Dating a miser or being married to one—both are utterly, utterly, utterly boring!
Sofi could never bear to think of Nodi leaving her job, not with Captain to think about. Sofi would tell everyone, “I forbid Nodi to work, but she won’t listen. Whatever she needs, I always buy it for her before she even asks. I’ve never kept her wanting for anything. She could quit her job and spend time with the children. I just don’t understand why she insists on working for no reason!” Nodi never said anything to anyone. In her heart, she thought: when even asking for money for kohl brings suspicious looks from a husband who demands, “What’s there to put so much kohl on your eyes for?”—well, to manage a household with such a husband, you simply have to work. Like so many other men, Sofi never wanted to understand how deeply it hurt a wife when he unnecessarily interrogated her over money for her small pleasures. Nodi herself didn’t believe in the philosophy of living dependent on others’ charity. When stretching out your hand brings not just money but also taunts and demands for justification, it’s far more dignified to save them some expenses through your own efforts. Sofi paid the house mortgage and utility bills, while Nodi handled daily necessities, clothes for herself, her husband, and the children, various kitchen needs, the children’s school fees and supplies, taking them to the doctor, medicine costs, entertaining guests—all these different expenses fell to Nodi. Even so, she had to hear: “What’s there to make such a fuss about spending this little bit of money?” They had a joint account, but Nodi spent everything from her personal account; she never dared touch that joint account out of fear. If she did anything like that, Sofi would fly into a rage and curse her mercilessly. Nodi had been forced to do this only once. Having given a substantial sum to a charity fund, she was short of cash. She’d been compelled to withdraw a small amount from their joint account to pay their older son’s school fees. Sofi had been furious about this and called her a thief. He’d said, “Weren’t you ashamed to steal my money like a common thief? I trusted you and opened that joint account. And look what you did! Disgusting!” He’d behaved abominably with his own wife over money for his own son’s school fees. After that, Nodi never touched that joint account again. Despite Nodi’s strong objections, Sofi had opened that joint account solely so he could use it to take out business loans in Nodi’s name when convenient.
Nadi could never indulge herself like other women—buying extra clothes, jewelry, shoes, cosmetics to fulfill her desires and whims. The constant struggle to meet life’s basic needs had etched premature lines on her face; she looked older than her actual years. Sofi didn’t care about that in the least. Nadi bought only what was absolutely necessary for herself and the children—nothing more. And even that she bought with money earned entirely through her own labor. Yet she had to endure criticism even for this. Sofi never bought anything for himself or his family, but whenever he saw Nadi’s modest purchases, he would fly into a rage. “Why all this showing off? Do you think I don’t understand what you’re up to? My life is ruined because I got tangled up with a woman like you. All you can do is waste money! Where two sets of clothes would be perfectly adequate, you’ve turned the place into a dress shop! Is thinking about the future only my responsibility? Don’t you have any responsibility of your own? Don’t you feel any shame?” Sometimes, in the midst of his tirades against Nadi and the two boys, Sofi would throw open the wardrobe and hurl all her dresses onto the floor, declaring, “I don’t want these dresses you’ve given me! You think buying me these few dresses makes you some kind of savior! I’m going to burn all of this.” And with that, he would kick at the scattered dresses on the floor before storming off to the next room. When women buy something for their beloved with their own money, they do so with such care and love. And when that beloved person speaks harshly about their gift, a tremendous sob rises from deep within their chest. Head bowed, wiping away her tears, Nadi would gather up Sofi’s dresses and carefully arrange them back in the wardrobe. During these moments, the two boys would hide in fear behind the door.
In 2014, when Nadi was visiting home, Sofi stubbornly insisted on buying her twelve dresses. For this homecoming, Nadi had carefully selected and ordered six dresses from an Indian online shop, because she didn’t want anyone back home to know that Sofi didn’t buy her clothes. In twelve years of marriage, this was the first time Nadi had bought so many dresses for herself at once. Sofi had simply assumed that since Nadi earned her own money, there was no need whatsoever to buy her dresses. A man who doesn’t give his wife spending money because she has a job—whatever he might say aloud—is mentally completely dependent on his wife’s income. Whether she works or not, every woman wants the person she loves to give her some spending money from time to time. This desire doesn’t come from need, but from love’s claim. A man who lacks either the ability or the desire to meet all his wife’s expenses has no business getting married. When Sofi learned about Nadi ordering the dresses, he flew into a rage and started hurling nonsense at her. “Oh I see, I don’t buy you dresses, is that it? You earn a few pennies and have to go announce it to everyone in Bangladesh. You can’t find peace without belittling me. Why do you need to buy dresses from India—don’t I understand that? What Indian boyfriend have you found who’s going to ship you those dresses?” That very day, Sofi bought her twelve dresses. Afterwards, he would constantly taunt her: “Watch it! Don’t you dare touch the dresses I bought you! Who are you trying to impress, gallivanting around in new dress after new dress? Why do you have to wear out all the dresses right away?” When buying something for one’s wife, it should come only from the heart’s love and peace, not for showing off to people or bragging about it. But Sofi did precisely the latter. Whenever he bought Nadi something, he would photograph it and share it on Facebook, announcing it to everyone. He would exaggerate the price when sharing it with acquaintances. Completely feminine behavior! In twelve years of married life, Sofi had bought Nadi a pair of diamond earrings and an expensive watch. Whenever Nadi wore them anywhere, he would tell everyone, “Look, don’t those diamond earrings and that watch look wonderful on my Nadi?” His purpose was to make everyone believe that he loved Nadi deeply and was always buying her expensive gifts. Everyone thought Nadi worked for no reason, didn’t spend time at home, didn’t take proper care of the two children. Because of a husband like Sofi, she was getting away with this willfulness. Any other man would have divorced her long ago!
Whenever Nodi would tell Sofi, “Why do you need to rush around like this? Allah has kept us well enough,” Sofi would flare up and say, “Fine then, you pay the monthly mortgage for the house. You’re living comfortably after dumping everything on me!” Sofi knew perfectly well that with the meager salary Nodi earned from her job, there was no way she could cover the mortgage payments. Sofi would say to Nodi, “What’s the point of your part-time work? Life doesn’t run so easily. The boys have grown up! You could work full-time! Instead of putting all the pressure on me alone, you could help me out a bit! If needed, I’ll do the cooking and ironing at home.” Like many husbands, Sofi never could understand how much time and labor a wife has to invest in raising children, cleaning the entire house, cooking, shopping, and all these tasks! “Fine, from now on I’ll do the shopping too.” Every time Sofi said this, Nodi understood that another promise had just been made that was waiting to be broken! It wasn’t easy to believe such words from a man who returns home at 7 PM and never spends even two minutes with his own two children. As soon as Sofi got home, he would either sit with his laptop, or start playing video games, watch TV, or fall asleep. Sofi never had to worry about any expenses for his wife and two sons—he would leave at 5 AM and return home at 7 PM, and with part of what he earned from this labor, he would pay the mortgage. Whatever remained, he would invest in buying land in Bangladesh to build a building. His plan was that after the building was completed, he could use the rental income from the flats to expand his business further. “Both your sons are here. Instead of sending all your money back home, do something for the boys here.” Sofi never gave any importance to this wisdom from Nodi. He would say, “It’s my money, I’ll do whatever I want with it. Who are you to say anything about it? Is it your money?” A household where money is divided into the husband’s money and the wife’s money—that household becomes divided into the husband’s household and the wife’s household.
To win her husband’s heart, Nadi took a full-time job at a company that allowed online work. With the opportunity to work from home, she could spend even more time with the children than before and manage the household chores more efficiently. However, this nearly doubled Nadi’s workload. When Sofi returned home and slept, Nadi would stay awake working online. With the increased income, while maintaining all previous expenses, she began paying at least half the house mortgage every month. Sofi measured everything in life by money. Money is everything—this was Sofi’s sole mantra in life. Even when he watched TV, he would think: here I am wasting time, spending on the electricity bill watching TV, what am I gaining from this? Because I’m investing this time in that actor on TV, he’s making loads of money, but what am I getting? He wouldn’t watch cricket. His logic was: what do I gain from watching Tendulkar’s century? He gets money for scoring a century, but what do I get? Sofi could never enjoy any good program. Sitting beside him, you couldn’t watch any movie in peace. His only topic of conversation was money. He would somehow bring money into any story! He would say, “I don’t understand why people say money is the second god. Come on, what’s this first and second business with God? Money is God! That’s it!” Yet the joys in life that money cannot buy are the most precious ones. Sofi had not the slightest interest in anything more valuable than money.
Without any comprehensible reason, Sofi’s moods would swing wildly. He’d fly into sudden rages. And when anger seized him, he’d do whatever came to mind, consequences be damned. This kept Nodi in a constant state of fearful vigilance. Though since sharing half the mortgage payments, he no longer laid hands on her. Unless absolutely necessary, Nodi and the two boys never spoke to Sofi. Nodi reasoned that if the household was to survive, there was no better way. The mute have no enemies. Perhaps staying silent would somehow make everything right? One evening after the children had fallen asleep, the two of them sat watching television. Nodi knitted a sweater without saying a word. Suddenly, out of nowhere: “What’s the matter? Why aren’t you saying anything? Thinking about some boyfriend all the time? What’s his number? Do you work from home all day, or when the kids go to school do you fool around with your boyfriend?” He launched into more such nonsense, hurling abuse at Nodi. At some point, fed up, Nodi said, “I can’t live with you anymore. I want to divorce you.” The moment he heard this, Sofi exploded: “Oh fine! I’ll bring you divorce papers tomorrow, sign them. It’ll be convenient for you. Now you can sleep with whoever you want. Why do you think your cousin comes by every other day? You think I don’t understand? Even a little boy would get what you’re trying to say, laughing and chatting with all these men!” Her cousin, ten years younger than Nodi, had gone to America on a scholarship to study. He would visit his apu occasionally. Since Sofi became jealously enraged whenever she spoke to other men, Nodi had stopped talking to them altogether out of fear. Sometimes she’d respond so poorly to someone’s simple “hello” that they’d think her arrogant.
In the last five years, Sofi hasn’t laid a hand on Nodi. But the psychological torment he has inflicted has been more agonizing than several deaths combined. When the body is struck, blood flows, and with time, the bleeding stops. But when the heart is wounded, the blood keeps flowing, keeps flowing, and never stops. Because it can’t be seen, no one ever knows of its existence. Physical pain heals with medicine, but what can heal the pain of the heart? Nodi sometimes thinks, “Oh! If only Sofi would beat me like before, it would be so much better—I could show everyone, tell them, look, see the real face of the man you all think is so good! But wounds of the heart can’t be shown to anyone. Even explaining them is quite difficult.” Especially when Sofi treats everyone else with such kindness, helps outsiders in various ways, speaks with a smile to the whole world—that’s when this desire grips Nodi’s heart even more fiercely! If most people knew everything, they would probably tell her, “Even if it’s just for the sake of the two children, grit your teeth and endure it with patience.” That’s what Nodi is doing now. But she often wonders, “Is what she’s doing actually good for her children?” Recently, Nodi’s elder sister got divorced. Her parents are in great distress over it. If something similar happened to her now, they simply wouldn’t survive. Many men maintain such wonderful relationships with their wives’ parents and relatives that they can’t even imagine how much suffering the man causes their daughter! Nodi’s parents also know something about Sofi’s bad temper and habit of lying, but Sofi enchants them too with his extraordinary behavior. In fact, sometimes they tell Nodi, “Look, dear, Sofi is a very good boy. Good people’s tempers get a little hot sometimes. You try to get along with him. You have to raise the two boys.” Hearing such things, Nodi can no longer bring up the subject of divorce with her parents. Her two sons don’t feel much attachment to their father either. Sofi doesn’t want to keep the boys with him if divorce happens anyway. Though he didn’t spend time with the children before, lately Sofi chats with them cheerfully for about ten minutes on weekends. Even this much is a lot for them! They never got even this much from their father before. The children also want their mother not to stay with their father. For all these reasons, Nodi actually wants the divorce to happen between them. She has already consulted with a lawyer about this. Learning of this, Sofi didn’t speak to Nodi for a month. Then he came and asked her, “Are you alright? Why are you thinking about divorce again? What’s your problem with staying with me? If I’ve made any mistakes, I’m saying ‘sorry’ to you for that. Don’t you really know that I love you more than anything else in this world?” Such words are nothing new for Nodi. After hearing them for so many years, she has memorized them. Having been deceived again and again by believing in Sofi’s false assurances of love, Nodi doesn’t feel much love for Sofi anymore these days. Now their entire arrangement of living together is simply habit, or the inability to separate.
Love doesn’t bloom overnight after marrying a complete stranger—it takes time to grow. It’s impossible to suddenly start loving an unknown person right after the wedding. Like any other girl, Nodi had waited day after day to witness that miraculous moment when love would be born. How much longer would she have to wait before she too could experience the birth of arranged marriage love like everyone else? The love that had been declining from the very beginning and had now hit rock bottom—what miraculous spell would shelter Nodi for the rest of her life with the uncertainty of such love? Was it even love at all? Nodi no longer believed she could make Sofi happy. No tenderness worked within Nodi for Sofi anymore, no love functioned either. What good would it do Sofi himself to maintain such a merely functional relationship with Nodi day after day like this? Sofi would never change. How long can one keep giving someone time to change? Nodi couldn’t think about what she would do, why she would do it, or what awaited her in the days ahead. Every moment, Nodi waited for the birth of that unwavering mind within herself—the one that, once born, would enable her to tell her parents about divorce. When she spoke with her parents on the phone, she couldn’t explain how she was doing. Being unable to make loved ones understand your suffering was even more painful.
In clinical psychology, there’s a term called ‘narcissistic abuse.’ Those who are narcissistic tend to be obsessed only with themselves. Disregarding others’ dignity and emotions, they act or behave in ways that make people around them feel low for as long as they remain in their proximity. This pattern of feeling good about oneself while making others feel terrible through conversation, behavior, and actions is what constitutes ‘narcissistic abuse.’ Maintaining a personal relationship with such a person diminishes both self-confidence and self-respect. The decision to stay away from someone like this is the best decision. While Sofi’s behavior displays most characteristics of a narcissistic person, she isn’t completely narcissistic. For instance, whenever Nodi falls ill, she skips the office to stay home and care for her, checking what she needs, giving her medicine. These behaviors don’t align with narcissistic character types. Besides, divorcing someone simply because they’re narcissistic doesn’t seem right either. Sofi appears wonderful to everyone outside. Only with her own family does she show all her anger, behave badly, and fail to properly fulfill her responsibilities toward them. The funny thing is, she believes such arguments happen in all families, and there’s no way a marital relationship should end because of this. Most women silently endure life with such men, thinking only of their children. Nodi thinks the same way, but lately, she’s noticing that Sofi’s behavior and actions are severely affecting their two sons’ thoughts, actions, and behavior. Their moods are often harsh, they don’t treat anyone well, and they fight among themselves over trivial matters. Both brothers have learned to accept these things as completely normal parts of life. Nodi understands very well that if they divorce now, she’ll have to live separately with the two boys, and her sons will grow up as children of a broken family. But she also doesn’t want her two sons to grow up to be like their father. When thinking about all this overwhelms her mind, she sits down to pray. Perhaps Allah is testing her patience. But how much more? Sofi herself claims that since returning from Hajj a few years ago, she has changed significantly and no longer argues like before, fulfilling all responsibilities toward the family. But Nodi and her children know that Sofi remains the same as before and will very likely never change. Nodi keeps praying for Sofi because at this moment, there’s nothing more she can do. Nothing brings any change. While Sofi used to raise her hands against Nodi and the two boys before, which stopped after returning from Hajj, everything else remains exactly the same. She’s still a habitual liar, telling countless lies while constantly making various promises and breaking them. People like Sofi generally never realize they have problems. Since Nodi is needed for Sofi’s business, she doesn’t want to let Nodi go either.
The river begins to feel that Sofi is actually using her this way.
One day, when the river’s usefulness runs out, she’ll toss the river aside like a used tissue. Thinking such thoughts makes the river feel suffocated. Even after twelve years of marriage, the river still can’t understand Sofi. Despite everything, like any other Bengali woman, she too wants to believe, “Everything will work out. Let’s see what happens…………”
The river
and Sofi—two banks, with
their two children in between—a bridge. Where the two banks refuse to become one, there the bridge’s claim to existence becomes meaningless.