Couple Argues About Husband's Hardships Abroad and Wife's Actions

After the apple market had fallen asleep, Ganje, carrying a fishing rod and a small string of fish, came slowly to the dark, hungry hut with tired legs and a pained heart. He picked up the worn-out shawl lying carelessly outside, put it on, lit a fire in the hearth, and roasted the fish on a tin plate. The hut was very bare and sad.

Inside, Fulmaya's breathing could be clearly heard. He sensed a sign of something bad in that breathing. Lighting a lamp, he went inside and examined his wife's face in the dim light. A small wound on the tip of her nose, a bloodstain on the bridge of her nose, a bruised forehead, and a badly swollen face. Seeing her nostrils flare strangely as she breathed, he thought she must be in great pain and became agitated.

"Hey, get up," he said, shaking Fulmaya by the shoulder.

"Huh..." she said, trying to lift her head, looking up with swollen red eyes. Seeing the pain in her weary eyes, Ganje's guilt grew heavier. His soul yearned to kneel and ask for forgiveness.

Fulmaya got up without a word. She roasted four or five fish, made a pickle, and served rice and pickle in front of her husband.

"Did you eat?"

"I won't eat! I'm not well."

"Then I won't eat either."

Looking at her husband slyly and exhaling cigarette smoke, Fulmaya sat by the hearth.

"Are you upset that your husband beat you without reason?" Ganje asked, taking a drag from the cigarette his wife had given him. Fulmaya looked at her husband with expressionless eyes, then her eyes lowered.

"I couldn't see because your behavior was not good." he said in a voice mixed with regret and pain. "When people gossip, you have to be a little careful. Your honor is in the eyes of others. Everyone should stay in their place. Are you angry with me?" he asked, nudging his wife with his elbow and smiling.

"It's not anger, my heart burned seeing you go mad. What grievance could I have with you?" Fulmaya wiped her tears, lifting the hem of her sari. Then, meeting her husband's dull eyes with her moist ones, she said, "When a ghost possesses your head, you don't see and become harder than a demon. You don't understand the fire of sorrow in my heart."

Those words melted Ganje's heart. He grabbed Fulmaya's arm and caressed her palm. "You sit shoulder to shoulder with someone else in front of your husband." Ganje's voice became serious. "I never said your heart was impure. I always left you free. You have no restrictions wherever you go. No one stops you from doing what you want. If I didn't trust you, would I have left you so free? This place is so tempting. People enjoy slandering others. Tell me, do you enjoy seeing me fall in the eyes of others? If not, why do you do things that hurt me? Why do you give people a chance to gossip? Tell me... what husband wouldn't get angry seeing his wife sit shoulder to shoulder with someone else?"

"I won't say I don't get angry." Fulmaya lifted her head and stared into the darkness outside, saying, "What can I do? This is my habit. A habit from childhood. You went abroad, leaving me alone. After filling your own stomach, you didn't even mention your children. As the head of the household, how difficult it must have been for me to manage, can you say? Is it easy to survive surrounded by enemies like demons? Moreover, I am a woman. No wealth, no support from others. There is no news of whether you are alive or dead. A man's work cannot be done with his face covered, nor can shame be overcome. You have to speak when necessary. You have to learn when necessary. That's how it is, sometimes you have to play along. You don't understand my habits. You don't understand the fire of sorrow in my heart."

"No, did you stray from your virtue or what?" Ganje asked, his suspicion showing as he looked at Fulmaya.

Today, Fulmaya was very annoyed. She got angry. How many times was the same thing asked?

"Aren't you being very annoying, what's wrong?" Ganje asked one night before going to sleep.

Fulmaya looked at him with pitiful eyes and shed tears.

"Why are you so interested in that foolish Magar?" Ganje asked again, worried, bringing up the day's playful conversation.

"Are you just going to sit there like a mute?" Fulmaya replied. She didn't like seeing her husband suspect Magar Kanchha, who helped her with a pure heart in times of trouble.

"Hearing the landlady's wife gossip about you, my insides burned. Why do people praise you so much?"

"Why do you think that?" Fulmaya asked, annoyed.

Today, the suffocated truth in her soul found a way to reveal itself.

"How do you think I managed for so many years?" Fulmaya said in a harsh voice. Her words spoke of honesty. "But that didn't break my heart. When crushed by the mountain of adversity, people go mad. But I didn't lose courage. I didn't go mad. You used to love your children more than your own life, and I loved you, dedicating my life to you. Whatever I did, I did to sustain the lives of the children. I did it to please you. I could have left you, I could have died. But for your happiness, I gave my all – my life, my youth, and my happiness.

I know how much my liver burns when I have to do disgusting things. I know how much my heart hurts when all the enemies gossip. Do you know why I did all this? For you. For your children. No matter how low I fell in my own eyes, there was no one else in my heart but you. Your image, your love, the dream of your happiness...

"No, did you really fall that low?" Ganje was stunned.

"Can you find a purer heart than mine anywhere? Your head is full of nothing but dung. Did you think God blessed your hut with food for so many years?"

"So you rotted, didn't you?" Ganje's face became extremely distorted. An earthquake shook his heart. "So you were wasted, weren't you?"

"Did you leave me a golden granary when you went abroad? Did you ever think your wife and children were starving? If I rotted, I rotted for your good. If I fell, I fell to protect your lineage. If I was wasted, I was wasted because of your stony heart." Fulmaya's face burned with anger. "Who wants everyone to despise them? Who doesn't care about honor? Those who open shops of youth when they have a way to feed themselves are pigs. Those who feast on others' youth are also pigs. Do you have no mercy for those forced to live a pig's life due to hardship? You are a stone idol. You don't understand gratitude. You agree with whatever others say. Your mind is empty. Filled with dung."

Ganje became numb, his emotions as dull as a burnt matchstick. A whirlwind of conflict swirled in his mind, but he understood nothing of that whirlwind. He had never imagined in his dreams that such terrible words could come from his wife's mouth.

***

It had been six months since Ganjbahadur Gurung returned from abroad. As dusk fell, he suddenly arrived at the hut. A worn-out umbrella under his arm and a dirty bag in his hand. His seven years of earnings consisted of three packs of Parbat cigarettes, two packets of glucose biscuits, five or seven raw mangoes, a worn-out lighter, thin brown sideburns, a terrible heart condition, and fifty to sixty rupees in his pocket.

Carrying the heavy burden of life with hopeful aspirations and unfulfilled desires, he arrived at the dark hut where she had been waiting for him for years, almost empty-handed, making it even darker. Fulmaya had prayed to God every day that her husband would come to support her in carrying the immense burden of life, but the merciless God had made Ganje himself another burden, pouring him onto Fulmaya's weak head. Thank God!

Nepti was surprised when Ganje, the thread of hope for her hungry family, suddenly arrived home. Hearing her mother repeatedly talk about her father, an indistinct but loving image of her father was etched in her innocent heart. She stared at her father with eyes full of surprise. Not matching the image in her mind with the reality of her father, she felt a little uncomfortable. Ganje looked at her with loving eyes, pulled her by the arm, placed her on his lap, and kissed her soundly.

"What did you bring me, Father?" Nepti asked in a thirsty voice. Ganje looked at his daughter with defeated eyes, his face sour.

"The people from the house above almost killed us, Father! They destroyed our house." The daughter complained to her father.

Ganje stood stunned, looking at Fulmaya with despairing eyes.

Fulmaya told him the story of the village's broken customs, the hellish life in the apple market, and the cruel deeds of Sahukanchha's family.

"The poor are looked down upon everywhere. Here, and abroad too." Ganje expressed his opinion in a tired voice.

When her husband arrived, Fulmaya felt more anguish than joy and more shame than pride. At least she had a reason to boast to her neighbors that her husband was employed in the country, but now even that was gone. The husband and wife sat with their faces down until late at night – silent, dejected, and bewildered.

"It's good that you came. Don't worry. As long as I have strength, we will somehow manage."

"But my arms have also become weak. I am ruined."

Fulmaya couldn't sleep at all. Her body was exhausted from tidying the hut. Now her heart was also exhausted. Ganjabahadur, who was robust, ruddy, and youthful eight years ago, had returned looking like a sixty-year-old sick man. Seeing her husband's condition, she felt her own age was also rapidly passing.

The day after Ganje returned home, a crowd of relatives and friends gathered. But as soon as they saw his appearance, everyone's face fell.

"Look at the state of our soldier brother!" was the gist of everyone's comment. Ganje and his wife felt the unbearable sting of ridicule in that summary, and their faces fell with shame.

"You always exaggerate your own troubles." Ganje said, too lazy to chew the mouthful of rice. "Who listens to the hardships I've endured?"

"You are a man. Whatever you say sounds good. Whatever dirty work you do is considered good. I am a woman, I am lowly. Thousands of eyes are eager to scrutinize a woman's every step. As soon as someone utters a word of slander, a woman's life becomes disgusting. To hear a woman's tales of suffering, you have to open your chest." She said, touching her chest. "If you could see the image within this chest, you would be stunned."

"You would have come to your senses if you had seen the face of abroad." Ganje revealed the extent of his suffering. "The hardships I endured are like a speck of dust compared to the mountains. They say there is hell beneath the earth; this is a lie. This is a fanciful imagination. If there is hell anywhere in the world, it is abroad. Standing at the employer's door for ten to twelve hours with a stick in hand... Oh God! How slowly time passes there? The world is alien. No friends to talk to, no place to entertain the mind. No words of love, no glances of compassion."

Ganje sighed, as if he felt his mind becoming a little lighter by pouring out his troubles. "Life is like a prisoner in the enemy's jail. Always curses, always heart-piercing abuse – a Gurkhali bull who can't even get a bowl of gruel. 'Hey brave, do this,' 'Hey brave, do that.' Like a bear decorated by people to entertain the mind. Woken up by the landlady kicking you in the backside while you're enjoying a sweet dream. You don't even get a moment to revel in the dream. Apart from lice, bedbugs, and mosquitoes, you have no one to call your own. And then, a dacoit's attack. Well done, brave! The employer calls you a bull when you are yoked to work. A donkey who came here because he couldn't be sold anywhere. The employer curses. Oh! I lived the life of a donkey. That is the true hell. You curse, saying your husband enjoyed himself and spent money. Did you ever ask me nicely how the money came and went?"

He lit a stub of cigarette by holding a coal with tongs. He took a long drag and blew out smoke like a needle.

He glanced at his wife's face in the puff of smoke and, sensing that the story of his suffering had made a deep impression on her mind, he took another drag.

"After being away from the embrace of loved ones, there is no peace of mind, no comfort in the body. Today, restlessness, tomorrow, restlessness, and the day after, restlessness. When the restlessness becomes unbearable, I go to the liquor store like a madman. This liquor is a powerful thing; the more you drink, the more the heat in your heart rises. And when you get drunk, only then do you feel relieved for a while. Tell me! How can the money be saved then?"

"If you had gotten circumcised in time, would your head have fallen?" Fulmaya said in a choked voice.

"A person who leaves home and hearth to wander like a hermit, would he just get circumcised?"

"What have you achieved in all these years?"

"Did your body burn when I came, you shrew?"

"You are a water-waster, a water-waster." Fulmaya snapped in a harsh voice. "You lick the feet of that demon from the house above. Can't you talk proudly in front of her? 'This is how it is, that is how it is!' Is she a lord of rags? Why flatter a dacoit with whom you share your bed? And then agree with her? If I were a man, I would have taken revenge on her for life."

"Don't talk too much." Ganje rolled his eyes as if he would swallow her. "Do I act according to your will?"

"You are a coward, born to be a servant. A servant abroad, a servant in the village. You have no more honor than a woman."

"Enough... I won't live with a whore."

"You made me a whore." Fulmaya raged. "You are the horse of that hunter from the house above who slandered me."

Chature, awakened from sleep, looked at his parents with surprised eyes. A moment later, breaking the silence of the night, the rooster crowed – Cluck, cluck, cluck...