Kaagaz ke do pankh leke uda chala jaaye re
Jahan nahi jaana tha ye wahin chala haye re
Umar ka yeh taana-baana samajh na paaye re
Zubaan pe jo moh-maaya, namak lagaye re
Ke dekhe na, bhaale na, jaane na daaye re
Disha haara kemon boka monta re!
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If one should ask him for the exact moment he had fallen in love with Meerab, he wouldn't be able to tell.
Because there was no exact moment.
Falling in love with Meerab was like a journey. A journey that has not found its destination and probably never will.
Like an aimless wanderer, he will walk alone on this journey full of solitary heartbreak.
It's okay though. He was used to the cold hard loneliness that came with being the head of his family, the lord of their ancestral lands, and the protector of its people.
He was, after all, Khan Murtasim Khan.
If one should ask him why he fell in love with Meerab, then he would say the answer was in the question.
Because she was Meerab. His Meerab.
In their early childhood days, she was the snot-nosed neighborhood brat who suffered from a severe case of "Daddy's Little Princess" disease.
Spoiled rotten by not one but two fathers, she was convinced the world revolved around her. The little menace would demand, no, order people to follow her around and if someone dared to ignore her wishes, she would silently glare at them like some sort of cartoon villain.
Murtasim as a child was one of the most frequent victims of Meerab's infamous glares. The little girl would scrunch her whole face in rage and stare at him like some kind of stalker from behind pillars.
Murtasim would admit now that he purposely riled her up just to see those funny faces. It was one of the highlights of his otherwise bland childhood spent mostly learning the family business.
Sometimes his teasing of her would go a little overboard like the time a twelve-year-old Murtasim had convinced her that she was cursed as a baby and would turn into a frog as soon as she turns seven.......right before her seventh birthday.
She had spent the whole time panicking while evil little him spent savoring every minute of it.
Well, she did figure out he was pranking her when she, you know, didn't turn into a frog as the clock hit twelve and he had burst out into fits of giggles.
And ladies and gentlemen, that was the day when Princess Meerab had declared him to be her sworn nemesis in front of everyone with all the flares and dramatics of a Disney antagonist.
It did not help her mood at all when he couldn't hold back his laughter after that grand announcement and spit his Coca-Cola right onto her sparkly pink dress.
Meerab had run out of the party hall in tears like some sort of movie heroin with both Waqas uncle and his Anwar uncle hot on their heels behind her.
Her over-dramatic reaction had made him laugh even more until well, his father had figured out what happened and had punished him.
That was Meerab. His Meerab.
Everything about her was just so much. When she is happy, her entire person lights up and when she is sad, her big doe eyes turn so helpless that it makes his heart ache.
She wouldn't hold back her giggles at the lamest jokes just like she wouldn't hold back those big fat tears whenever she saw something her little heart couldn't take.
Her boisterous laughter, her evil smirks, her sly remarks- she was full of expression. Full of life. Like a flower on a warm summer day.
A flower that will wither away if kept in the cold dark fortress that was his heart.
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Her existence was the highlight of his days even in their teenage years.
Meerab, as a teenager, was still a brat but now, her glares were accompanied by snarky replies and sassily raised eyebrows.
Fourteen-year-old Meerab to a nineteen-year-old Murtasim was like a headache. A particularly feisty, pimpled, and oily-faced headache.
Oh, how much fun he used to have by teasing her whenever her teenage face had gained a new pimple! Her flushed face with that mortified look made him want to annoy her more.
But every time he tried to rile her up, she would fire back with equal force. She would spit venom that would cause his blood to boil.
In a house where talking back to him was akin to sin, Meerab was the guiltless offender. And as the judge and executor, he had pardoned her of every crime.
Teenage Meerab was annoying and teenage Murtasim was busy doing what every teenage boy does best; having crushes or sneaking in cigarettes to smoke. So he ignored her in favour of chasing after the thrill.
He hadn't realized what he was losing until Waqas uncle announced his intentions of moving away to Karachi.
He had ignored the weird ache in his heart as a side effect of too many smoke breaks since his father had died and left everything on his young shoulders.
He hadn't been able to accept it for a few months that Meerab had left, always looking at the gate, expecting her to run inside with her oily braids bouncing behind.
He was the newly crowned head of the family. The immensely powerful and influential Khan of Hyderabad was now Murtasim, not Shahnewaz.
But he was far from happy. His father was no more. His sister was like a stranger whilst his uncle and mother felt beneath him.
There was no one beside him. Meerab had taken all his happiness with her to Karachi.
Now all that was left was emptiness. The terrifying cold that had taken over his heart had somehow been released into the world outside.
He had wanted to feel human again. That was why he was so mad when he met her again.
Karachi had changed Meerab. Her brattiness had turned into rebelliousness and the snark had become rudeness.
She didn't purposely pick fights with him anymore nor did she make constant demands from everyone around her.
That was not his Meerab and he wanted his Meerab back.
He had wanted her to stay the same when everything around him was changing.
How dare her world revolve around new people in Karachi whilst his was still recovering from loosing her!
How dare she grow up and change herself whilst he struggled not to change under the pressure!
He was fixated on getting back his Meerab. The one who made him feel like Murtasim, not Khan Murtasim Khan.
Maybe that was why her childish dislike for him had turned into distaste and she refused to come to Hyderabad even during holidays.
Years passed like that and the ache in his heart dulled. He was almost done pressing down the thing that was dangerously close to bursting in his heart when she had made her existence known to him again.
It was at the wedding of one of their relatives when he had seen her again.
He knew she was there from Anwar uncle's angry rant about how two boys had dared to ask her hand for marriage at the event. He had thought his uncle's oddly intense affection for his friend's daughter had made him exaggerate. The poor boys had probably asked for directions from her or something.
Oh, how wrong he was!
At eighteen, Meerab was like the flower that was done blooming after years of sunlight. Her full cheeks were flushed from the December cold, and her doe eyes sparkled with excitement. Her long straight hair bounced every time she moved her head and those pink lips became pouty whenever she was focusing on someone's words.
She still laughed with her whole body and talked with the most dramatic hand gesture as if she was telling some epic tale.
In a simple green anarkali and almost no make up, she commanded the attention of every young man in the vanue.
She shone like the brightest star in the sky and he was the mortal whose eyes weren't created to behold all her beauty.
No, he hadn't gone to talk to her or annoy her like he was planning to.
Instead he, Khan Murtasim Khan, had run away from there like a coward who couldn't bear to listen to his own heart.
He ran away from Meerab.
His Meerab.
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