The notebook remained on the low shelf near the balcony doors, its black cover slightly warped from the constant humidity of the monsoon. By the middle of the seventh week it held seventeen dated entries in Rajesh’s handwriting, some short, some spanning multiple pages, each one a precise accounting of names, order, number of finishes, which clusters of bruises had been renewed, and how many times he himself had taken his wife during the collection. The memory card sat beside it, containing the voice versions of the longer nights. Both objects had become as ordinary and as permanent as the unlocked door.

On a Thursday evening in the eighth week the original man arrived with her father-in-law and Vikram while Rajesh was already home. He did not begin with orders. He picked up the notebook, opened it to a recent entry, and read aloud in the quiet living room while Priya stood naked under the gray light from the open balcony doors, the continuous dark map vivid across the soft undersides of her breasts.