The Sharma household lay cloaked in a suffocating midnight, the monsoon's damp heat seeping through the walls, the air heavy with the scent of wilted jasmine and the distant wail of Aryan from Radhika's room. The courtyard, scoured raw by Aradhya's bleeding hands, gleamed under a sickle moon, its silence shattered by the storm brewing within. Aradhya, in her cramped room, scrubbed a stain from a kurta, her body a map of pain—fresh welts from Vijay's leather strap, crusted blood on her arm, bruises from Meena's endless tasks of hauling water and beating rugs. Her heart burned with defiance, a vow to survive despite the house's cruelty. I'm not their tool, she thought, I'm alive, for me.