میں چاہتا تھا مجھ سے بچھڑ کر وہ خوش رہے،
لیکن وہ خوش ہوا تو بڑا دکھ ہوا مجھے
- جون ایلیا
/////
His heart was bleeding.
The storm Mohsin was carrying inside was wrenching his heart. It was she who had brought him to a ledge from where all he could see was his destruction. He used to find his solace in her and she deprived him of that.
No matter how hard he tried to banish his feelings for her, all it took was one glance, one freaking glance and it was all back; the whirls of emotions. And now that someone else wore the ring of his name, he couldn't be any ashamed.
Was he even good enough?
His phone pinged, diverting his thoughts from one woman to another, the one who would send him a 'good night' text at this time before going to bed. He never replied to her texts but with passage of time, he had fallen accustomed to her non-stop good-nights.
It was after this little text, he knew Layla, his fiancée, used to go to sleep. But he? He stayed up, in regrets and remorse. What if I fail her too? He felt immensely bad for the girl who world called her his to be wife. But could he call her that when he hadn't given her any of the rights like this?; when his thoughts worshiped that one woman who was now someone's respect, someone's wife?
How messed up his mind was!
Taking a cold shower, he came out of the bathroom and started to dry his hair.
Walking to his paino that laid in a corner of his adjoined room, he played it. Natasha always used to leave the chores and sit for a while to listen to her son as his fingers did magic on the keys.
To the world it was just chords, beautiful chords but it was his Lord and the walls of his heart that knew he was voicing out his pain through notes.
He never stopped amazing himself. All those days he had truly missed his bestfriend but when she showed up, he walked away. It was as if he couldn't manage the sight of her. As if the look in her eyes killed him because she always looked up at him as a bestfriend but he? He considered her more than that. And nothing had purely damaged his heart like she did and that too unknowingly.
It was his phone again, the intruder. But the caller name was someone he was least expecting to talk to right now, the one he was thinking about.
"Assalam-o-Alaykum, Amarha!" He clasped the mobile between his ear and shoulder as his fingers went on the keys, seeing if any dust particle was there.
"Walaikum Assalam, Mohsin! Kesay ho?"
"Alhamdulillah. What about you?"
"Alhamdulillah."
There was silence, making him think what was taking her so long.
"You have done something to my bestfriend and I am never forgiving you for that." She said, her voice gloomy.
He scoffed, ridiculously. "Me either."
"What is wrong with you, Mo? You have always been so close to me. Don't push me away like that." Her voice was laced with sadness. "You are punishing me for something I had no authority over." Her voice broke down, and so did his heart.
"Why are you thinking like this?"
"Your behavior is making me think like that." Her voice was wavering and he wanted to facepalm himself for being the reason behind her tears. "Mohsin, I know I have hurt you but can you forgive me please."
"Stop blaming yourself." He stood up and walked to his window. "You have no idea how precious you are to me. Don't cry please."
"You are precious to me too." She sniffled.
"Where is Zaman?" He asked, all of a sudden changing the topic.
"He is in his study."
"So you are talking to me behind his back?"
They both chuckled. "He knows. I don't hide anything from him."
"Oh lucky you! If I tell Layla about this. She would shoot me." They both laughed as Amarha wiped her tears away on the other side.
"You can't assume her abusive, she's a sweetheart."
"Remember the drama she pulled on when a guy accidentally touched her."
She laughed out loud, bringing his heart to peace that she wasn't crying anymore. "Who can forget that day!" There was a pause for about ten seconds when she asked again, "so do you forgive me if I have ever hurt you, intentionally or unintentionally?"
"May naraz kab tha Jo maafi mang rahi ho?"
"C'mon, didn't you just walk away on my face in the hospital?"
"That is exactly what I would do if you'd come across me in my mental breakdowns."
"Oh wow! So a guy who treats others needs a treatment himself. Khapal wada oka Majnu' che Layla de ilaaj oki."
(Get yourself married Majnu' so that your Layla does your treatment.)
It was his turn to laugh.
"And what if Majnu's malady is incurable and Layla ends up tired of him?"
"That must be sick then."
"Yah! Pretty sick already." He huffed out a deep breath.
The oh-so-funny call was turning into a glum again. Amarha lined her lips as she heard him heave a deep breath. She knew there was something off, something that was weighing him down and it felt as if he was too tired of carrying it all on his shoulders. He wanted relief and so did she.
Living with Zaman and knowing that she was living in someone's heart too, and that someone wasn't her husband but her childhood friend, was eating her from inside.
She needed to clear things up as soon as possible.
"Amarha, aren't we screwed?" Mohsin snickered.
Biting her lips, she looked out at the sky as she leaned on the opened door of balcony. "Mohsin--" she whispered his name out of helplessness.
She knew Zaman could walk in any minute. No matter how many times he said he understood her, yet she never wanted him to listen to her conversation with Mohsin. Any third person would take them for wrong.
"Answer this one question and Majnu' will go back to his Layla."
"What is it?" Her voice morose.
"What was that one thing, that one thing I didn't have which made you choose Zaman?"
She knew this was coming, one day or another. When he would want to know.
"I wish I could describe him." Said she, pursing her lips together, not knowing how to describe the man she was living with for the past one month. "Your feelings are love but his one? He has done ishq, wo Jo apko Rab se mila day." She stopped for a while, for an instant her mind trailing to the man who never expressed his love verbally, it was always his eyes that spoke volumes and his actions.
"You asked what made me choose him? I never chose him. He was written for me and Layla was written for you. It was all destined since the day one, it is us who thrive for the wrong persons."
"Amarha it's not my fault if my heart fell for you. You know this better that it's not under our control who we fall for."
"I get it."
"No, you don't! Because you have never fallen in love."
Amarha got silent, his words were harshly true. She had never loved anyone. She only had held likeness and that too for her husband.
She didnt know the pain and beauty of falling in love.
"You know that pain right? The type of pain when you love someone but can't have him/her?"
"How wouldn't i know it when every fibre of my body is going through it."
"Then don't make Layla go through this misery." Amarha whispered, more like pleaded.
His coherent breaths was all she heard rather than an answer. Her heart falling in an abyss as he didn't say anything. Wasn't he considering Layla's misery a misery? Or had he become way too selfish? These thoughts flashed in her mind, one after another.
"Mohsin."
"Hm?"
"I asked you something."
"Don't worry about her. Kar raha hn shadi us se."
"You wouldn't only marry her. You'd give her everything that she deserves."
"I can give her all those things that come in the circle of materialism. I can't say about the things other than that."
"A hollow life. Is that what you are going to give her?"
"I am going to give her my name, my companionship, my loyalty, a beautiful mother-in-law and a home to live peacefully in. Isn't this enough?"
"Mohsin, give her love."
"I can't."
"You yourself said if I answer your question, you'd go back to her."
It got eerily quiet on the other end. He had nothing to say anymore.
"Mohsin, stop thinking about me. It makes me feel sick to stomach. It disgusts me." Unknowingly her thoughts, her anger made its way to her mouth, unaware of the havoc it had created in someone's heart.
"I disgust you?" His voice came out low and uncertain, he repeated the words in his mind and he himself felt petty. A nanosecond it took for her words to change the prospective of his mind about the body it was in.
"You don't! You are my jigri dost. Remember?" Her voice was tired, and the tears in her eyes were long dried. "I want you to keep it that way--"
"You want me to go back to her? I will." He cut her and his voice was as cold as ice. "Allah Hafiz."
He didn't even let her say goodbye as the line went dead.
She stared at the mobile screen, her face contorting to a pained one. Her vision blurred as she realised what sin she had done by breaking an innocent heart like his.
***
Piles of files was all he saw and the stains of his coffee mug on his table. His computer stared at him bluntly. Taking off his glasses, he rubbed his nose bride and stood up to go to sleep and continue from here in the morning.
That was the disadvantage of running two things side by side, you just take a few days off and then there are heaves of papers and matters that is waiting for you.
Zaman pushed the door open, looking around the room. He went straight to balcony to find her. His heart calming down all of a sudden as he saw her slim figure standing in the middle of that few yards place.
She is a freaking medicine, he thought as he hugged her from behind, startling her.
"Oh, that's you." She exclaimed, as she clasped her hands on his that were tied over her stomach.
"Who else it would be?" He placed his head on her shoulder. "Why are you so stiff? Are you tensed or something?"
One thing Amarha knew, she couldn't hide herself from him, her inner battles. He could read her body language.
When she didn't answer and keep staring out at the road, he turned her over in his arms. Now they stood face to face and the frown on his forehead deepend as he stared at her tear stained face.
Tucking the hair strands behind her ears, he cupped her face, worry swelling up in his stomach. "What happened, Amarha?"
It was as if his words were all that she needed when the hell of tears came loose and she fell in his arms, hicupping.
"Aray!" He pulled her to him and let her cry on his chest as he stood perplexed.
When he couldn't feel her tears anymore and her ragged breaths had calmed down, he parted her from him and stared at her red face with calculating gaze.
Holding her hand, he took Amarha inside. Ushering her to sit on bed. "Go to sleep" was all he said before going into washroom. He came out dressed in his sweat shirt and trousers.
"Amarha."
"Gee." She flinched.
He was worried rather than confused when he found her sitting on the same spot where he left her.
"I asked you to do something."
"What?"
"To sleep."
"I am about to." She nodded.
"You seem lost." He took a seat next when he noticed that she didn't rebuke him for throwing wet towel on bed. "You said you wanted to talk to Mohsin, did he say anything to you?" Zaman brought himself to conclusions.
"No." Liar. "Zaman, can you sleep in guestroom?" She absentmindedly asked.
"What?" He snapped.
"I wanted to meditate for a while."
"Meditate or cry?"
"Meditate." She corrected him.
"And you want to get rid of me for that?"
"No." She shook her head.
He breathed in sharply.
"See you in the morning then."
She blinked and when her brain processed his words, he was gone.
***
She spread the prayer mat and offered tahajud. It wasn't midnight yet but still she offered the two nafal for she had to not sleep after fajar in order to make breakfast and get herself ready for her work. That was why she used to offer tahajud at 11pm right before going to bed.
Sighing, she raised her hands.
Pyare Allah! People say that you live in hearts and I accidentally broke one. Please forgive me for that. Forgive me that I lied to Zaman. Forgive me that I went behind the back of my mehram because of a non-mehram. Ya Allah, demolish all those feelings residing in Mohsin's heart that at some point are related to me. Fill his heart with love for Layla and protect me from becoming a sinner. You know what's in my heart. You know the secrets of hearts. Have your mercy on us. Show us Sirat-e-Mustakeem.
She blew it on herself as she said "Ameen."
Folding the mat, she stood up to go to sleep. When laid down on cold bed, she acknowledged the emptiness not knowing if it was in the room or her heart.
Her heartbeats echoed in the empty valley of love.
That valley where no one lived.
She stood on the hilltop, peering down at the deserted place: the houses in it felt like as if they were never homes, as if no one had claimed them yet. It was hauntingly quiet as she stared at the worn out cottages.
Her heart was climbing to her throat. Itni khamoshi. Her eyes moistened.
Ye khamoshi tumne khud ki ha, heart whispered. It was sanding a few steps away from her, with all its glory. Its eyes on the walley too.
Me? I didn't. Why would I do that? She fought back.
Ask yourself. Heart looked at her, disdainfully. You are cursed. You ruined my valley. You ruined it!
Sheq opened her eyes and sat up with a jolt. In the chilly night of November which was welcoming winter, she felt sweat. Her subconscious shook her as she noticed the darkness in the room. Zaman never kept it this dark.
You ruined my valley.
Her shawl that she had thrown on the sofa looked as if someone was sitting there. Her abaya that was hung behind the door seemed to be a slender woman standing in black gown. Even tho she knew it was all illusions yet fear clawed her airway.
As she turned on the lamp, she took a breath and leaned against the headboard. Her eyes were shutting down tiredly but astonishingly she couldn't fall asleep. She draped the headscarf on her head and picked up her pillow.
***
The door to guestroom was ajar and she peeked in. Surprisingly he wasn't asleep too. He was sitting on the bed, his fingers were rubbing his forehead and pressing it from time to time.
She cleared her throat and he looked at her.
"You haven't slept?"
"You haven't either." She placed her pillow and laid down while he dramatically stared at her.
"I was scared." She told him the half truth.
"Done with your meditation?" He laid next to her. That bed was way too smaller than the one in their bedroom.
She didn't answer, instead she listened to the rhythm of their breaths. Snaking her arms around his forarm, she placed her head on his shoulder and soon she was asleep but Zaman? It took him quite of hours to drift away.
Happy new year! 🌷
-Sidra