HEALING TOGETHER - A Meerasim Short Story

THE ANNOUNCEMENT

It was just like every year of Meerab's birthday. She, with her parents came to Hyderabad to celebrate this special occasion. Salma Shahnawaz Khan and her brother-in-law Anwar Khan considered Meerab Waqas Ahmed as the daughter of this family God knows why and they insisted that she celebrated this day with them. Murtasim Shahnawaz Khan, son of Salma Begum and Late Shahnawaz Khan, now the head of this family after his father's untimely demise, never really understood as to why his mother and uncle considered her as family. She was his father's best friend Waqas Ahmed's daughter. However, he has already accepted this and didn't really want to think about this. The night was going really well until his mother dropped a bomb. She literally announced his marriage with Meerab which he had no idea about. To say he was angry would be an understatement. He was furious. How could she do that without even asking him? He was, for God's sake, head of this family. When confronted, his mother had told him that she wouldn't be taking her decision back.

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Meerab Waqas Ahmed, daughter of Waqas Ahmed and Anila Ahmed, was the light of her parent's life. They had raised a lovely, free-spirited, lively lady who always spoke her heart, helped the poor and needy and stood with truth. She was grateful to the Almighty for giving her such loving, caring and understanding parents. But the one thing she didn't like was the Khan mansion and it's people. They were rigid, believed in age old traditions which didn't support freedom of women and that was what made her furious. Specially that Murtasim Khan, what did he even think of himself? He always irritated her, got on her nerves and yet, her baba always urged her to go to Hyderabad to celebrate her birthday. Every year she made plans with her friends but ultimately had to give in to her father's wish.

She accepted all that but what happened today was beyond her imagination. Maa begum had just announced her marriage with Murtasim. Were they blind? Couldn't they see that they dislike each other to such an extent that they literally avoided any possible chance of being in the same room? She didn't even think of him as a friend and here they were thinking about their marriage. Huh! delusional people. She will talk to her father first thing in the morning.

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He really never understood why they despised each other so much. No, he didn't hate her; he just couldn't stand her stubbornness, her rebellious nature, her questioning of every tradition that they follow. But she, well, she definitely hated him and there was no doubt about it. However, in his opinion there was no reason to hate him. He never did anything which would harm her in any way. He just wanted her to follow the traditions that they were a part of. It's as simple as that. But she was no less. She always annoyed the hell out of him, didn't listen to him for once, always went against his orders. That's not how a woman of this family should behave. And yet he couldn't help admiring these features of her. In fact, those were the qualities that he admired about her in the first place. One reason could be that he had the same attitude in him. His self respect mattered most to him which was the first priority in her too. But that didn't mean he would marry her.

He was pondering over these thoughts when suddenly a growl took him out of his reverie. The sound was from his own stomach indicating he hasn't eater anything since the morning. At first for all the birthday preparation for that Ziddi Ladki and afterwards what his mother had conspired against him made him lose his appetite. His brain told him to go to the kitchen and eat something but his heart didn't want to leave the confines of him room. He was not ready for any confrontation which he knew he had to face after the way he denied to marry her. Okay, he would do that tomorrow morning but not now. At times like these, he hoped that his mother would just become his mother and not the Khanum of the house, to come to him and feed him with her hands or caress his hair so that he could find solace for some time and got the much needed energy to stand against all in the morning as the mighty Khan Murtasim Khan. But he knew that can't be possible. Not even his sister came here. Had anyone really cared for him? He exhaled a long sigh and headed to the washroom to get changed and ready for bed.