All is Fair

Chapter 14

     Javed woke up in a crabby mood. He sat on his plush king-sized bed for a full five minutes, glaring at the pale blue wall through narrow slits. He knew he was going to have one of those insane days where everyone around him acted like they wanted to be punched by him. He got down from the bed, the cold marble floor making him even more crabby. He went to the other side of the bed and picked up the wireless phone. He called the cook, who was in the kitchen downstairs, and ordered his coffee. He switched on the bathroom light and winced. Why did it have to be a bright white light and not a mellow yellow one? He muttered something about vampires and sunlights amd shuffled inside.

    He took one long look in the mirror. Wow, he did look crabby. He looked just like the Grinch with his tousled hair and the nasty expression on his face. He tried to smile but he was all the more horrified by what that did to his face. He combed back his hair and took a full minute to appreciate his luscious brown locks. If only he could just let them fall behind his ears and somewhere all over his face. He sighed sadly.

     There was a knock on his room door and Javed asked him to come in. It was a servant with the coffee. "Who's in the house?" he asked, just like every crabby morning.

     "Mr. Mehdi and Chota Saab." he replied, setting the coffee down on the table beside the huge maroon curtains.

     "Where is she?" Javed asked from the bathroom, deciding to get over it and brushing his teeth.

     "Mrs. Mehdi has gone out. She'll be back only in the evening."

     Javed could feel his day becoming a bit more tolerable. He had the servant get out. He pulled the maroon curtain cautiously aside, checking if his father was in the small patch of garden outside. There was no one there. So he pulled away the curtains and sat down on the sofa. He sipped his coffee and found the courage to face the day without overly damaging anything. He pulled open his huge walk-in closet, built with ebony and decorated with gold accents.

     This was the only place in the entire house that he loved. He closed the door behind him and walked into the depths of the closet. He turned on the lights there. The white light was softer than the one in the bathroom. A full length mirror greeted him. Javed stood looking at his 6 foot frame proudly. His mother would have been so proud of him. The dark blue trainers and the white shirt that he wore hugged him like a second skin. He just took off the t-shirt and threw it on the ground. He went around the closet, picking up a shirt, a coat and a pair of socks. He then rushed into the bathroom, had a quick shower and then rushed back into the closet, clad in a towel. He dressed himself slowly and meticulously, the only part of his day that actually mattered to him. He stood admiring himself in the mirror, his dark brown eyes somehow seeming genuinely happy. He had put on a navy blue coat over a clean white shirt. His onyx cufflinks shone just like the ebony around him.

     Javed had never understood his father's distaste for black. He had managed to gel back his hair. He stood looking at his outfit in the mirror, proud of what he had put together. But of course, multi-talented, boy billionaire Javed Mehdi was incomplete without his shiny black shoes. He rushed to where his shoes were kept. There were twelve pairs of black shoes, all looking brand new. People always looked at his shiny black shoes and automatically assumed that he had only one pair. And that was why they saw him as a miser, just like his father. He clenched his hands into fists. If at all anything, he wasn't like his father. He spent his money freely, but not too freely. He owned twelve pairs of black shoes, each one a different model, a different brand. But no one ever noticed that. All that they could see was shiny and black and Mehdi.

     Javed picked his favourite Derby pair, perfect for his crabby day. Then he stood in front of the mirror, thinking about how his mother might have looked at him. Seeing himself through his mother's eyes made his chest puff out with pride. He tried a small smile, one that his mother would have given with all her heart.

     Rasheed flung the shoes by the shoe stand. He was furious. He flung aside the curtain and didn't bother to greet his father who sat peering at the Islamic book in his hand through his round sectacles. He rushed up the stairs and went straight to the terrace. He began pacing about, trying to calm down. But all he could think about was going to Feroz's house down the lane and bashing him up.

     The other part of him, which always loved to question everything he did, spoke up. "Why would you want to bash up Feroz? She's his girl, not yours. He should have bashed you up actually, for stealing his girl."

     Rasheed punched the brick wall, trying to quieten this other part of him. The white paint stuck to his knuckles. Tears welled up in his eyes. If only Ameena had met him before Feroz.

     When Feroz had first talked about this sweet, sweet girl he had fallen in love with, Rasheed was curious. He had wanted to know if such a girl existed. The first time he had seen Ameena, that very first day he had spent around her with Feroz, that was the day Rasheed knew that he wanted her.

      "Nothing in this world is yours." that voice said again.

     Rasheed punched the wall again, this time the pain actually ringing in his knuckles. Getting to know Ameena was a new experience for him. The only woman in his life, his mother, had made him hate women because of the way she had behaved. And the more girls Rasheed met, the more he was convinced that they never deserved something as pure as a man's love. But apparently, Ameena was the only exception. She was everything good the world didn't deserve. And apparently, he didn't too. But what made Feroz worthy of her loyalty? What made him worthy of her ove?

     "They were the broken pieces meant to fit each other." Another punch to the wall. "Don't try too hard to pretend that your heart fits Ameena's. That sham didn't last too long." Another punch.

     Why didn't he deserve anythibg good? Why was he handed all the rotten pieces of fate? "You know why." the voice whispered.

     He punched the wall three more times then fell to the ground on his knees. His hand throbbed with the pain. But it was his heart that hurt the most. His itchy throat refused to hold back the cry of pain. And the tears fell.