Operation: Dard and Devotion

39 | Now & Never

"Ouch, that hurt. So we're pretty much even, right?"

Narrowing my eyes at him, I said, "Churail is just something else."

"Well, I don't think of you like that anymore, Hayati. Now let's drop it." Ahsan let out a dramatic sigh. "You're ruining the moment."

The glass door open and we both spun around.

"You've got fifteen minutes more," one of the guards said before shutting the door again.

We were both quiet for a moment.

"Ahsan, isn't there some way out of this?" I nearly whimpered. "An appeal, or something?"

He smiled sadly. "No, there isn't."

Desperate for an alternative, I even had the audacity to ask, "How about you try to escape? Why don't you pull out one of the railings in the cot and maybe try to drill a hole in the wall and then-" I was cut off when he scoffed lightly.

"I think you should know that drilling a hole into the wall isn't the best escape plan."

"Right." My eye twitched at the memory. "Then maybe something else?"

"The premises are surrounded by barbed wire, and there's high security the moment you step out of this room." He exhaled deeply. "There's no point, Hayat. There really isn't."

I came to a loss for words because I had suddenly lost my ability to comfort someone. I hated that. "I wish there was something I could do."

"Oh, Hayat." Ahsan's eyes softened. "You being here is more than enough, believe me. Now, how about we talk about something else?"

"Like what?"

"Hmm." He pondered for a moment. "I miss Saad a whole lot more than I ever would have imagined."

"Me too."

"You know, Saad had called me Baba once."

My head snapped up quickly. "He did?"

"Yeah, I'm not sure why. I guess when I would show my face to him, he just figured I was his father since I was around him so much."

Random snippets of old memories slowly pieced themselves together. "Oh my God!"

"What?" Ahsan looked down at me, startled.

"There was this one time I was teaching him the alphabet, and when we got to 'B', he randomly said 'Baba' repeatedly!"

"Really!"

"Yeah! He said it so much that when I had asked him who he was talking about, he immediately covered his face except for his eyes! He was thinking of you!"

"Aw, man. I missed that?!" Ahsan's eyes glossed over. "Wow, what a smart kid."

"I know."

I felt Ahsan clench and unclench his jaw. "It still angers me that I just stood there! I could've done something, I could have-"

"No," I whispered. "As horrible as it sounds, it was the way Allah had willed it. We can't change fate no matter how hard we try. We're all just temporary beings on this planet. Some people's durations here are just...shorter than that of others. It was his time. That's all."

"I guess you're right, but still." He took a deep breath. "What were we talking about again?"

"I don't even remember."

"Time just flies, eh? Even though there's no point in saying this now, I wish I could turn back time and mend things. I wish I could go back and made my time worthwhile by doing small things."