Razia comes to her ammee once again and says the same thing. Her male cousin sexually abuses her each time he visits their home; she threatens to tell her parents and he laughs to her face.

‘Look at you,’ says her ammee, ‘just look at you. All skin and bone, why would he even want to touch you? Your elder sister was beautiful before we got her married last year, if he was so bad, would he have not done something to her instead?’

‘He has,’ replies Razia.

‘You are so shameless, first you want to spoil your cousin brother’s name and now you want to ruin your sister’s marriage.’

‘He has, she told me on her wedding day.’

‘Why did she tell you?’

‘She wanted me to know that now that she was not in the house anymore, he would do all those dirty things with me.’

‘Have you told her anything after that?’

‘No.’

‘Good girl, at least you have some sense to keep the family’s izzat.’

Razia asks of her ammee, ‘Don’t you want to know why she did not tell you?’

‘Hush.’

‘I want to tell you, she said she did not tell you because you would not believe it since he is your sister’s son.’

‘Hush, I said.’

Razia begins menstruating. Razia’s ammee visits her sister in Secunderabad and tells her what has been happening to her daughters.

‘Hush,’ says Razia’s ammee’s sister to her, looking around quickly to see if her mother-in-law has heard. She lowers her voice to a whisper, ‘Men are men, what can we tell them? And even if we tell them, can they control themselves? You know, and I know, what every girl goes through. So it is better you keep an eye on Razia in the house and tell her not to excite him.’

Razia’s ammee tells Razia that she should make sure he does not put his thing into her thing otherwise a baby will be born.

Razia laughs, she laughs so much that her bony body doubles over with the convulsions, ‘Will you,’ she asks, gasping for breath between the shouts of laughter, ‘stand there and make sure it does not happen? I don’t see how I can. If I do, there will be commotion and if there is noise abba will beat me up and stop my painting classes.’

Razia’s ammee tells Razia’s abba that their daugher now runs the risk of getting pregnant.

‘Pregnant? Pregnant! Where have you been all this time? What have you been doing? Why have you let matters get till here? What kind of third-rate family do you come from where the men don’t know how to respect their own sisters? Why did you not tell me earlier? So that you could protect your third-rate sister and her family? What kind of blood runs in your family’s veins, this is disgusting! Now I will have to sort out this matter which has been started by your family.’

Razia’s abba sends for the male cousin and confronts him. ‘Tumney hamarey khandaan key izzat pey haath dala hain.’