The charcoal hair fell over his strained forehead, amongst the obsidian eyes, mimicking the turmoil sweeping across his bones. He had never felt this weak. This hopeless. This fragile. Losing her was something that never crossed his mind let alone it happening, and on top of it, hurting him. Why? Why did it hurt so much? It didn't make sense, but then again, when has love ever made sense? Love is stupid. It happens on its own accord. It doesn't take anything into account. It just happens. And then, it hurts...so much!

The harsh veins jutted through his forearms as his grip on the steering wheel tightened. The sleek vehicle ran harshly through the secluded roads of Islamabad as the mountains cowered ruefully as if aware of the tragedy. In this time of catastrophe there was only one person he needed. Someone who understood him and loved him more than anyone in this world.

******

Sameena folded the prayer mat and put it on the table. Taking the drape off her head, she turned around and a loud gasp escaped her lips. There, by the door was standing a crestfallen Azlan. Hair disheveled, eyes bloodshed.

"Azlan, my bacha! (Azlan, my baby!)" She let out as she almost ran towards him. "Are you okay, bacha? What happened?" She held him from his biceps as his shoulders slouched and head drooped.

"Nothing's okay, mom! Nothing is okay!" He rasped as he shook his head repetitively.

"Ya Allah! What is it?" She cupped his face.

"I lost everything, mom!" His breaths came out in staccatos as he rested his chin on Sameena's shoulder. "Everything!"

"Come on, now, you are scaring me." Horror evident in her widened eyes.

A muffled cry escaped his lips, inexorably, as he held on to her. "Ya Khuda, Azlan!" Wrapping her arm around his shoulder, she made him sit on the south side of the bed and poured some water in the glass. "Here. Drink it!" Reluctantly, he took a sip and put it back.

Sliding down he flopped down on the floor and put his head on Sameena's laps. "First, I lost them. Maa and baba." He barely spoke, his voice wired pain as it grazed his body, shattering each and every bone. Nothing could match the hate he had grown up possessing for his parents. His real parents. But, now everything had turned into a fib.

She stayed quiet and let him vent as her hand ruffled through his unkempt hair, but nothing could sooth the tornado coiling around him. Not even the holier touch of the woman who gave him his life back and became his entire world in no time.

"Then, I lost Irtiza. My baby, my brother whom I had promised to always protect. But, I couldn't." His eyes welled up with umpteen tears. "I couldn't protect him." He sniffed as a thirteen years old Azlan came alive in his eyes.

"But why are you telling me all these things again all of a sudden?" She wiped his tears away.

Because today, I lost someone else as well." He rasped.

"What do you mean?" Her brows knitted as concern took over her face.

"I didn't go to USA for business purposes. I went there to meet him."

"Him who?" The frown on her forehead deepened.

"Haani. Saqib Bha..." As if it would cut his tongue, he stopped midway. "That animal's friend!" He let out with clenched teeth.

Perplexed, she kept glaring at him in wonder as to why he accosted Saqib like that. As far as she knew, he had always admired Saqib for how he risked himself to save the two of them when they were being abducted.

In the brothel, Saqib had managed the act of being their victim just like them in front of Azlan and Irtiza for a few weeks. When he was sure the boys trusted him enough, he stopped the act and started focusing on what he was there for. The two boys were told their big brother had been shifted to another brothel in another city which they, of course, believed.

Life took an abrupt change when on one of his trips to USA with Raina, Azlan met Saqib after years. To say he was shocked would be an understatement.

"Oh, My God! Azlan, my baby, you are alive!" He had said, feigning to be excited on seeing him. Further, he told them how he was told that both Irtiza and Azlan had died which gave him the strength to lose himself form their shackles as well somehow. As for Azlan, he couldn't believe he got at least one of his brothers back. He was beyond exhilarated.

The two started meeting each other. Saqib had lied that he was running a small business there. When he got married to Hafsa, Azlan was in Pakistan having no clue about it. On his visit back to USA, when he went to Saqib's house to meet him, there was a party going on in there. There, in that crowd when Saqib introduced him to Hafsa was that he finally got to know about their marriage. Since he was there on business purposes he had to leave quickly and that was the only moment when the two nomads had seen each other.

A couple years later when he went to meet Saqib, no one opened the door. For as long as he was there, he would go to his house everyday but when no response came even after a week, things started to feel off. So his next step was to go to Haani, his accomplice, who told him how Hafsa was having an affair with someone and when Saqib caught them red handed, they killed him, and ran away. It was as if someone had ripped his life all over again which ignited the fire of revenge inside of him. Since he had no idea about Hafsa's background, it took him a long time to track her location down but eventually he did, with a promise to make her life a living hell.

"Safa Hayat was Saqib's wife, mom." He clasped Sameena's hand.

"What?" She squealed.

"Yes." He nodded. "I lied to you when I told you he met with an accident. I was told she's the one who killed him which is why I set up this entire game to make her move to Neelum Valley so I could avenge Saqib. But everything was a lie, mom. How can a woman so pure, so angelic commit a deed so horrendous? Finally, when I was enough convinced there was something more to it, I went to USA and threatened Haani into telling me everything." He shut his eyes tightly, the beads of tears materializing on his long lashes. "Saqib was nothing I had always thought he was. It was him from the very start. He's the one who had us abducted. He's the one who snatched our lives away. He's the one because of whom my Irtiza is dead. He's the one because of whom Hafsa is dead."

"Hafsa?" She was confused.

"That's Safa's real name. He married her and then tortured her, raped her countless times, with Haani, too. So she killed him and rightly so. And with him dead, she murdered the real her, too, and impersonated someone else. Safa Hayat. A celestial woman who only knows how to love. Even after everything what happened to her, she didn't lose herself. She's so strong that sometimes I get envious of her. Yet I'm so proud of that woman. That woman made of steel. Unbreakable. The iron lady."

His eyes held so much admiration, pride, and love for that woman which, then, started streaming down in full torrents. "But now, I've lost her, too. She hates me, now, and I can't even blame her for that. I deserve it. But, I don't why it hurts, mom. It hurts too damn much. I want to die." He hollered as he broke down. "I can't afford to lose her. She's too damn precious for me. I just can't." It was as if a knife was being jagged into his heart that his throat became so excruciating for him to voice anything.

Sliding down beside him on the floor, Sameena held his face and made him face her. His eyes were hollow, sunken deep into their sockets. "You'll get her back if you really love her."