Of Broken Hearts

four

Nothing can separate you from the people who are meant to be in your life. They will always come back.

***

Betrayal is probably the worst ever feeling especially when; it's your family who betrayed you.

Shehryaar couldn't fathom that his Agha Jaan could have stooped so low as to trash someone's name just so that he wouldn't marry her. It was something that he's finding hard to digest. But it was the truth. He has been used and lied by his own grandfather and he felt like such a fool all along.

Guilt was far from what he is feeling right now. Words couldn't describe his feelings and to think how Leila must have gone through all of this alone, has hit him so hard. He has been blaming her for cheating on him for over a year when it's him who cheated her, he has promised to not leave her no matter what and took the first step ahead to walk away when a problem came.

What he didn't understand was his grandfather; Why'd he do that? Isn't Leila his granddaughter too?

Shehryaar needed answers and he was going to get them. Taking long strides towards Agha Jaan's room, he paused at his bedroom door and before he could enter, he saw Armeena and Agha Jaan indulged in a deep conversation, their backs faced him. They had no idea of his presence until now.

"Don't worry, Meena. I'll get you married with Shehryaar and it's my promise to you."

"He still loves her, Agha Jaan. That's the only reason why Shehryaar denied to marry me." Bawling her eyes out, Armeena complaints angrily.

"So? Love is not everything. I'm letting my grandson to marry an illegitimate woman. I stopped their marriage once and I will do it again too." Shehryaar gasped at this revelation. He stood there frozen to his spot, as Armeena complaints all about her efforts to make him notice her, who paid zero attention to her.

Basheer Qureshi was a man of principles. He followed them all his life and didn't like it when someone doesn't agree with his points of view. He had three sons and a daughter. Yes, a daughter which they never spoke of, for over two decades.

He never liked to talk about his daughter, that got pregnant before marriage and refused to abort her child. Basheer literally begged her for an abortion, but Sadiya Qureshi was as stubborn as her father and never gave in. She never revealed who the baby's father was until her last breath making it all complicated. She died while giving birth to the baby.

Basher didn't shed a single tear on her death, all he could think of was that baby, which could tarnish his family's name in society and he wanted to get rid of that baby as fast as he could. All his dreams were shattered when his second son, Faik decided to adopt that misfortune of a baby which took his daughter's life away. He never liked Leila before nor will he ever like her.

He went berserk when Shehryaar announced his likings towards her, wanting to marry Leila. How can he let that happen now? What will happen to his Qureshi heir? He can't let some illegitimate woman carry the next heir of the Qureshi's. It would happen over his dead body or so he thought. He even successfully stopped the marriage but what he couldn't succeed was getting Shehryaar married to someone of his choice.

It didn't take rocket science to connect the dots for Shehryaar. Maybe that's why, his grandfather was too eager to get Leila married off quickly so that he forgets her and marries someone else, someone legitimate? What a sick man. He thought with a frown.

Armeena wiped away her tears as she got assured that Shehryaar would be hers, no matter what. When she turned around to leave the room, she got the shock of her life. Her eyes widened and her legs froze.