Embracing Love [✓]

ᵗʰⁱʳᵗʸ ⁿⁱⁿᵉ ✓

Some day
When I see my reflection in the window
I get locked up in thoughts.
Sometimes it feels like I'm in a tunnel
Surrounded in darkness
And with that, an unknown fear wraps around me
A loneliness that's deeper than a sigh
Fills up the long night as the storm rages on
But then I remember I have you
You, who will always be there for me
With a bright light
And so I dust myself off and get up
Knowing that, at this moment
Destiny will change
As the stars in the night sky shine brightly.

~ Imraan Quraish.

♧♧♧

"Are you alright?"
Following her husband into their room, Ayana sat beside him before asking.

"I shouldn't have gone with the therapy. I should have listened to you, to all of you. I should have."
Imraan spoke as his mother's disappointed look flashed before his eyes.
"She was right."
Indicating his mother, he added.
"I shouldn't have been so stubborn to know about the past. I should have just listened to her."

Ayana looked at him before looking at his bruised cheek. Her hand was itching to treat the bruise.
"The therapy... was it... did it retrieve any of your memory?"
Silently she asked.

"It did,"
Imraan nodded.
"Unfortunately, it did."

"She hung herself."
A few seconds of silence passed as he added.

"Huh?"

"That woman... my birth mother."
Ayana gasped.
"She must have loathed me too much to take her life."
He said with a sarcastic chuckle.

"Imraan..."
Ayana was about to touch his shoulder to comfort him when he spoke.

"I guess that's why Maa didn't want me to dig into my past."
Looking at her, he asked.
"I should apologize to her for my rude behavior, right?"

"Yes but before that the bru- Imraan!"

Without giving her the time to complete it, Imraan stood up.
"I should go to see Maa."
Without waiting for her reply he went away making her sigh.

♧♧♧

"Sherebano!"
Hakim Quraish knocked on the door before entering.

Mrs. Quraish who was sitting on the bed with tears looked up.
"Hakim bhai! I slapped him."
Sobbing, she confessed.
"How could I hit him? How could I slap my son? How could I?"

Pulling the chair, Mr. Hakim Quraish sat in front of Sherebano Quraish.
"You should tell him."

"You should tell him the truth. He deserves to know it."
He slowly spoke.
"You should tell him before he finds out from somewhere else."

"You want me to tell him?"
Getting riled up, Sherebano spoke.
"What would I have told him?"

"Should I have told him about his mother's affair with my husband?"
Shameful and humiliating tears escaped Sherebano's eyes as she recalled her husband's affair with her married best friend which happened right under her nose.

"Should I have told him how his father abandoned him and his mother after knowing about the affair? Or should I tell him how his mother, unable to endure the taunts and humiliation of the people, decided to take her life in front of her seven-year-old son resulting in traumatizing him?"
Breathing heavily, she spoke in anger and regret.