**One week.**

Only one week has passed.

Yet it felt like a lifetime, suspended in the choking fog of boredom and dread. Time dragged its limbs across the floor of this strange new home, echoing hollow and heavy with every breath I took.

I refuse to lift a finger in this house—as if I’m some kind of volunteer wife playing house in a stranger's nightmare.

Not that he ever asked me to.

That’s what’s unsettling.

He didn’t ask anything.

This time, he didn’t force words out of my clenched throat. No coaxing. No demands. Just… silence. A strange, deliberate stillness. Too cooperative. Too careful.

Unlike before.

He’d only stir me awake with his hands—tracing, nudging, claiming space on my skin with a kind of greedy patience. I’d pretend to stay asleep, face turned away, body limp. Then he’d disappear to the gym, and I’d exhale into that sliver of freedom. Sometimes I even slipped back into sleep until the shower ran—his signal that the peace was over.

For the first three mornings, he made me eat. Pressed food into my hands, sat across from me with those unreadable eyes. By the fourth, I gave in willingly. I knew better than to resist—a full stomach was less dangerous than provoking him.

And then the rest of the day stretched before me, heavy and shapeless. I wandered between the bath and the bed like a ghost. Sometimes I’d shower three times a day just to feel something other than the air pressing down on me. I’d sit by the window, stare into the yard, or sprawl across the mattress in a daze.

He wasn’t home most of the time.

This house is too big when I’m alone.

That fact unsettles me more than I care to admit. Every creak feels like a threat. Every shadow feels like it’s watching. And yet, when he returns at night, I feel both relief and terror. Relief—because no intruder would dare approach with him nearby. Terror—because what if *he* is the threat?

I asked about my father once.

He told me to be on my best behavior.

I asked again, more desperate.

He warned me—*stay put together.*

Then I begged. I was ready to fall at his feet if it meant hearing something—anything.

He leaned close, voice like poisoned honey:

"I’ll take you… if you touch me with desire."

Desire?

My hands curled into fists. My mouth shut tight. I bowed my head to hide the sting in my eyes. Silent tears slipped down, bitter with rage and shame.

Same cruel game. Same blackmail.

He hasn't changed. He never will.

So I stopped asking.

As for touching… he never truly forced me.

Never entered me.

Not with his body, not with the full weight of that violation.

But that doesn’t mean I was spared.

Every night he claimed me in other ways. With his mouth, his fingers—expert and relentless. He dragged orgasms from me like punishments, as if pleasure could be weaponized. It went on until dawn sometimes. He used my exhaustion against me—turned my daytime slumber into reason for nighttime torment.

He’d tie me up sometimes. Hold me down. Eyes gleaming with a hunger that felt inhuman. He spanked me, sharp and humiliating, and I’d bite my lip until I tasted blood just to stop from making a sound.

But he didn’t enter me.

Not yet.

And I clung to that *yet* like a drowning girl to driftwood.

He never woke me in the mornings, probably because he knew he’d already broken me the night before. I’d sleep like the dead.

But today…

Today I stepped out of that room on my own.

Out of that disheveled room that I made.

To do something big.

Something that might finally calm the fire churning in my gut.

Something that might finally make me feel in control again.

I have this bitter, crawling feeling inside me—a gnawing knot in my chest that never lets me breathe right.

He forced me to marry him.

After everything I did for him.

After all the trust I gave… after bartering my own dignity for the illusion of freedom, only for him to rip it away and steal me back like I was some prized possession.

He never played fair.

Not once.

He built castles in the air with his empty promises, fed me false hopes, and whispered of love in a voice laced with manipulation.

That alone was enough to bring tears of rage to my eyes.

As I stepped down the staircase, I forced myself to really look at the house for the second time.

The first time was right after he married me and dragged me here—when my vision was too clouded with tears to see anything.

Now, I stood still and took a slow spin, letting my gaze wander across the lavish hall, the towering ceilings, the antique furniture, the eerily perfect decor. The whole place looked like it had been plucked from a magazine, beautiful yet cold. Grand, yet suffocating.

I don’t want to be that fragile, broken thing anymore. That silent victim. That innocent cripple anyone could step over.

Not again.

I’ve fought back before.

But this time… this time there’s no leash.

No promises of freedom to hold me hostage.

He has nothing on me now.

There were massive porcelain vases on either side of the staircase, ornamental and absurd in their extravagance.

I paused.

Then, for one last time, I looked up at the wide wings of the house, filling my lungs with air and pulling every shred of courage I had into my bones.

And then—

CRASH.

I smashed the vase against the ground.

My hands flew to my ears as the sound ripped through the silence like a gunshot.

My heart thundered. My legs threatened to give out.

It was too loud.

Too sharp.

What if he heard?

But I didn’t stop.

I lifted another vase, this one taller, heavier, and I slammed it down. The shatter echoed like my screams never could.

There was a third vase—gorgeous, intricate, the kind that probably cost a fortune. My hand hesitated. My heart clenched at its beauty.

Then I lifted it and beat it against the edge of the table—again, again, again—until it crumbled.

Just like he crumbled me.

I turned, eyes wild, scanning for more.

Curtains.

Lamps.

Delicate pots.

I spun like a storm, hurling, tearing, smashing.

But then—

I saw him.

He was standing above, just past the railing on the upper floor, arms folded, eyes locked on me.

I thought he was not there on the house.

But he was watching me.

He had been watching me.

My breath hitched.

The fire that had kept me warm just moments ago turned to ice.

Fear slithered up my spine and wrapped around my throat.

But I straightened.

He doesn’t own me anymore.

I dropped my shoulders, chin high, and tore down the thick velvet curtain. I shoved planters over, spilling dirt across the pristine white floors. Then I saw it—

A shard of glass glittering like temptation.

I picked it up.

It was cold and sharp in my palm.

And then—

“Do any fucking thing except picking those shards. Throw that fucking thing down, Aasha.”

His voice cracked like thunder from above.

I looked up at him, heart pounding.

But instead of dropping it, I gripped it tighter.

That small defiance sent a ripple through him.

He slammed his palm against the railing, the echo jolting me.

“Put that fucking thing down, Aasha!”

The glass bit into my palm. I felt it slice—slow, precise. Warm blood trickled down, tickling my skin as pain bloomed in sharp pulses.

Still, I didn’t let go.

But the moment I saw him slam the railing again, eyes blazing as he *charged down*—two steps at a time, like a beast unchained—I panicked.

I dropped the shard.

Too late.

He was almost on me.

I spun and *ran.*

Not the chasing.

God, not the chasing.

That sound—the thunder of his footsteps behind me—ripped open old wounds. I knew I’d be caught. I *always* got caught.

But the chase... the chase made it worse.

It brought back flashes.

Deja vu that tasted like blood.

I pushed the front door open, feet stumbling across the yard, breath shallow, hair wild, gown torn.

And then—

He was there.

His arms wrapped around me like iron bands, dragging me back. My back slammed into his chest. I yelped.

“**Leave me!**”

“**Shut up!**”

His voice roared in my ears.

I flinched. My lips trembled.

He took hold of me tighter, hoisting me off the ground slightly as he marched us back inside.

I screamed once, but it came out broken.

My throat was too dry. My fear too loud.

He said nothing more.

And I—

I was drowning in the realization that no matter how much glass I shattered…

…I was still trapped in *his* cage.