Sparks of Love ☑

Twenty-Eight

"What time are you getting off tomorrow?"

"Same as today, seven pm," Rafa said, flipping through a wedding magazine as she lay in bed. "Why?"

"Badr has invited us for dinner tomorrow," Abdur Rehman told, fixing his tie while watching her reflection in the mirror.

"I have to accompany Anjum to a wedding planner. It's just an engagement at this point, but Anjum's very well-connected as a CEO. And then Yahya is no small name either, his former teammates and fans will be there, or at least watching from social media."

Abdur Rehman stared at her; light hair was strewn over her unwashed face, ocean blue eyes still crested with sleep, soft lips moving as she turned page after page of the magazine nonchalantly.

It was the most she has said to him in the past two days.

It wasn't like they were cross with each other, but some tension was keeping them apart. They slept on either end of the bed, as far away from each other as they could, they no longer bickered over who turned off the light or which speed to keep the fan on. Even their usual routine of waiting for each other to finish salah before discussing the day's events and then laying down for the night had been disrupted.

"Can the appointment be moved up, or maybe you can leave early?" he suggested, keeping his tone careful.

"I can't be sure," she said, genuinely apologetic. "Can Badr change the dinner to some other day?"

He turned away from the mirror and looked at her. "I don't know, she extended the invitation to us through Mama."

Rafa's eyes lowered to the magazine again, ending their conversation. A subtle disappointment filled him as he observed the woman he loved with every fiber of his being. She wasn't like this. His wife wasn't like this, he thought. She would do anything for him, so what was this sudden coldness? This detachment?

Am I expecting too much? He wondered to himself if he expected her to cancel her plans for him if he expected her to change herself for him. To choose him over her friends.

Am I destined to be a second lead all my life?

He fisted his hands, closing his eyes to gulp down his anger. No, he was married to someone he loved, the first choice of someone he was madly in love with. Her choosing to not sacrifice herself for him just this once did not define their love in any way.

It wouldn't have been this way if she wasn't American. The thought sent a chill down his back. Oh God, no. Having watched his mother and sister and other women of his Pakistani family sacrifice their happiness, choices, and desires for others all their lives had skewed his perceptions.

He felt ashamed of himself, but somehow he could not completely dismiss the idea. He carried it with him as he lied to his mother at the door, telling her that he was fasting when she asked if Rafa had fixed him breakfast or packed his lunch. He carried it with him as he worked through the day, noticing how his female coworkers chattered on and on about taking retreats from their families occasionally, leaving their kids in the care of others while they went out with friends, or relying on pre-cooked meals instead of cooking for themselves and their husbands.

It showed him the glaring reality of women here and women back home, and he could not, for the life of him, place either in good or bad. It was in no way honorable to sacrifice yourself for others when you were as valuable as a human. But then, wasn't sacrificing yourself a condition of love?

What did he want, he wondered. Did he want Rafa to let go of the same things he had fallen in love with? Her feisty, carefree self that made mistakes he had found adorable in their honeymoon phase? Did he want her to become the way his mother wanted a daughter-in-law to be? Was he and his mother still stuck in the old mindset?