Maybe This Too Has a Kher

Somewhere Between Dua and Goodbye

It's 2 a.m., and I'm staring at nothing. The flashbacks keep taking over, one after another.

No tears. No anger. Just a blank heart and a mind that won't stop wondering where I went wrong.

I had nothing left in me. I was like broken glass, my pieces scattered everywhere. And somehow, I was the one left alone to pick up every piece and mend myself after someone else had broken me.

Every night was the same now. I would get up, perform my wudu, and sit on the prayer mat.

Some nights, I would cry my heart out. Other nights, I would just stare blankly at the wall, wondering where it all went wrong.

What did I even do to deserve this?

A few years ago, I fell in love with this man. And honestly, in the beginning, it felt too good to be true.

Everything was perfect—the dreams, the little imaginations we shared, the future we would picture together, and all the promises he made.

For a while, everything felt surreal. Like I had finally found the kind of love people only dream about.

Little did I know it would turn out to be the biggest lesson and the deepest heartbreak of my life.

The kind of heartbreak that doesn't give you panic attacks or leave you screaming for someone to save you.

It just quietly eats you alive from the inside, slowly killing parts of you that you didn't even know could hurt.

Everything was online. I had never met him in real life, but somehow, it all felt real.

I had joined a group chat. It was my first one, and maybe, looking back, the biggest mistake I ever made.

Before that, I was never really fond of interacting with guys. I was the kind of girl who genuinely believed that only arranged marriages had a certain charm to them—a kind of love that love marriages could never have.

I still don't know what had gotten into me that day. Maybe it was curiosity. Maybe it was just a random decision that meant nothing at the time.

Whatever it was, I accepted that group invite on Instagram.

And I had no idea how much that one little decision was about to change my life.

Slowly, I started bonding with everyone in the group, but there was only one person who truly matched my vibe.

I would sing songs to him in the group chat when no one else was online, then delete the voice notes as soon as he had heard them. He would make fun of my accent because I was a Pashtun, especially when I said "matak matak." Somehow, it always sounded funnier coming from me, and he never missed a chance to tease me about it.

Back then, it was all so innocent.

At least, that's what I thought.

Everything went well. We slowly shifted from the group chat to DMs, and that's where we started talking about anything and everything.

Soon, we were sharing our worries, our family situations, our little struggles, and the things we never really talked about with anyone else. Somewhere along the way, we became best friends without even realizing it.

He once went on a trip and bought me a keychain. He kept it with him, waiting for the chance to finally give it to me. I still remember how much that little thing meant to me.

He even gifted me bangles on my birthday.

I also remember one night when his friend got into an accident. He was out of the house until 2 a.m., and I couldn't sleep because I was worried about him.