Monsters...

The room was dark and forbidding. Her breath grew laboured. Her heart beat faster. She cried out loudly. The woman who was dragging her to the room didn’t let go of her hand despite her piteous cries. Pulling her along while muttering in a language that was incomprehensible to the six year old, the woman deposited her in the room and locked the door with not even a backward glance at the terrified face of the child.

She was not trying to be naughty in class. She simply did not know how to sit still. Her body was not her friend. The only time she felt comfortable in her own skin was when she moved. So she would move either her arm or leg or head so that she could cope with the difficulty she faced in sitting unmoving in class. There were so many children in class making some noise or the other. The teacher too made a lot of noise. She simply could not understand what the shouting was about – for her every noise seemed loud and jarring. Sometimes she covered her ears. Sometimes she grew distressed and cried. The other children seemed to think she was funny but not in a nice way. The teachers would grow impatient with her especially after telling her to sit still or be quiet or stop dreaming; not once but a million times a day.

This particular teacher never liked her and she knew it. She tried hard to be nice and obedient but she got so nervous in class that it was too hard for her not to be hyperactive. The more she tried to sit still, the more she moved. The teacher got very annoyed and finally told her to stand up. She shouted at her and made it clear that she found her quite a useless child and a very naughty one too. She then sent her out of the class with a maid as a punishment. The maid was to take her to another block and lock her in a dark room. After an hour of that, perhaps she would understand how important it was to be obedient.

The girl rubbed her arm where the maid had bruised it with her heavy-handed dragging. She couldn’t see much and she was so scared of the dark. At home she slept with a little light on otherwise the monsters would come creeping out of all the shadows. Everyday her father would look under the bed and behind the bathroom door for monsters before tucking her in. Everyone knew that monsters were afraid of light. What could she do now? She cowered in the corner waiting in helpless fear for the monsters to arrive.

Huddled and rocking with tears streaming down her face, she waited. In a while footsteps could be heard along with rough voices. She shrunk herself into a smaller ball hoping that they would not see her and that the teacher would come and get her. But the door opened and two men walked in. One man was the 'uncle' at the gate and the other was the teacher who made the kids do exercises. Why were they here? She tried to get up but they came closer and the teacher started yelling.

“Naughty girls deserve to be punished. Why can’t you listen to your class teacher? Only in first grade and look at your attitude! I will teach you how to obey!”

The men took turns in disciplining her. She cried till her eyes hurt. Her dress got dirty. Her skin was blotched and bruised from their hands on her. Her legs hurt and the part where the pee came from, that hurt worst of all. She cried some more, she screamed incoherently, she promised to be a good girl if only they would stop, please stop….