How home echoes in him

T W E N T Y

The wound is the place where the Light enters you.
***

Shahmeer woke up because of the soft murmurs in his left ear. Syra was having a nightmare and was murmuring things. He looked at her distressed face and hugged her, whispering soothing words in her ears and trying to ease her shiverings. His heart was racing seeing her in this condition.

Syra was dreaming about her father's death, it had been hanging her for quite some time. Her eyes unknown to her began to water and she started crying. Syra was dreaming and sobbing and crying. Shahmeer was worried and he clasped her more tightly.

"Syra wake up. It's just a dream baby wake up, please", he said. His voice held pain.

He was shaking her, calling her name. He desperately wanted her to wake up. Syra with wide eyes woke up and gasped for air. He whole being trembling.

"Baba, Baba, baba!!" Syra sobbed, crying in his arms. A daughter's first love is her father. A father who was her shoulder to cry on and her crime partner. She cried knowing the dream was yet another painful memory of that night.

"Its okay, Ssh. Everything is fine. Uncle is in a good place." Shahmeer tried his best to console her.

"Shahmeer, baba." She whispered in a voice so broken it ripped Shahmeer's heart apart. He felt her pain and was helpless in front of the strings fate had held onto firmly.

"Baba is looking down at you from heaven right. He's proud of you. Don't cry, please".

"He is?"

"Yes, he is".

Weeping she put her head on his shoulder and let herself be calm. The nightmare borough back painful memories of that night. Memories she wished to have forgotten.

"Syra, can I ask something?"

She hummed and continued holding him.

"Why do you have nightmares so frequently. I remember once uncle was also worried because of your nightmares."

"I was twelve when it all started. No one at home knew about this. Until one day when Baba saw me crying in my sleep. I just told him that it was a bad dream and he asked me if I see them daily or more than once and I unable to lie more just said yes. He was worried but everyone he would come to my room and help me sleep. Because of him, I was freed from the clutches of these nightmares and then after his death, they came back." She replied, her voice held fear.

"Why did they come to you in the first place?" He asked hoping to end the answers and he did. Syra looked up at him and moved out of his embrace. Shahmeer felt cold but he respected her need for space. She wrapped her arms around herself and stared at him for a moment.

"I was bullied. I was 10 when my classmates started bullying me but it did not affect me that much at that time. It was a month after my twelfth birthday, my classmates made fun of my appearance and height. I was not their average height girl. I was shorter than everyone else and also chubby. So they would call me names and insult me and would say 'No one loves you' and 'You should die'. They would laugh at me and would even say 'My father will throw me out'. I used to dread school and I cried every time I would hear them. I couldn't tell anyone about this because if they knew I'm sad then they will also be sad and I never wanted anyone to be sad. So I tried to pretend I'm happy in front of everyone and would only cry in the solitary of my room. No one knows about me being bullied. You are the first person to know. You know it stung when they said, 'No one would love you' and 'You don't deserve love' or 'You should die'. Part of me not believing your feelings was this. Their words were embedded so deep in me. It was hard for me to get them out and to trust you. But I do. I trust you. I know if you say you love me, then you do love me. After school, I was never bullied but they had already weakened me so much that I lost myself to the darkness whenever I was alone. You see the reason I don't have any friends. I never made them. I just remember this little girl I used to meet at Baba's Foundation. Her name was Alia, weird right, Alia bhabhi's name was my only friend's name as well."
Syra spilled all of the pain that she had been carrying with her since childhood. She felt light and peaceful and free.
(baba=father)