First, Arham.

Then, Sameena.

And now, Shehryar.

Why was everyone misinterpreting his intentions for her? He didn't love her. No, not at all. He felt physically nauseated at the word. Everyone was acting insane. If only he could make them understand!

"I don't love her. I can never in a million years." He muttered to himself with his eyes fixed on nothing in particular.

"I'm only doing this for myself so that I can have my peace back once she knows everything. That's the only motive. After getting to know everything, she can go wherever she wants for all I care." He mumbled which felt more like convincing himself.

A commotion downstairs pulled him out of his reverie, and with a slight shake of his still-aching head, he waved the nonsensical thoughts off and rambled towards the source of voices.

The air in the living room welcomed him with solemn aura clouding his features with despair. But the thing that terrified him the most was that no one was sitting. There were all standing in horror.

On his arrival, their faces turned toward him, scrunched with tense and worry. His muscles tightened as he gulped heavily.

"What's going on?" He wiggled his eyes from one person to the other.

Sameena and Shehryar were constantly exchanging looks while Raina passed Arham an incoherent glance. She convulsed her head at him as if stopping him from something.

"Why is everyone acting so weird? What the hell is going on?" He howled in annoyance and fright. The beads of sweat had suddenly materialized on his cold forehead as his insides burned.

Something was terribly wrong.

What? He didn't want to know.

But he had to.

Throwing a glance of reassurance at Raina, Arham strolled towards his best friend whose already alabaster face stunk at his heart.

It took him sometime to finally construct a sentence and when he did it left Azlan's whole world collapse in front of him. Too indelible to be fixed back.

"We've a found a dead body." He said it in one go just to get done with the excruciating pain that lied within the words as they wrapped themselves around Azlan's neck like a tight noose.

He forgot to breathe, the words crashing in his throat like coal, slitting it. Slowly. Gradually. Having a fill of it. He felt blood billing up his throat which got stuck somewhere in between, all the strength leaving his body.

"We are not sure whose it is. The girl's face has completely been distorted in the car crash. But she's of Safa's age so..."

"So you assumed it's her." Azlan stepped back with a humorless chuckle. No one dared to pique in. They couldn't at the heat of the moment.

Arham plopped his mouth open to say something but Azlan didn't let him.

"It's not her." He glared at him with a challenging look. There was an eerie coldness to his tone.

"We hope that, too. But we need to confirm that to be sure."

"And how do you plan on doing that?" His voice was oddly clam. The calm before the storm one. It scared the occupants of the house.

"None of us have anything with which the girl's DNA could be matched." He glanced around at the people surrounding them. "Except for you."

Azlan gapped at him in bafflement for a few seconds when the realization dawned upon him.

"Her cashmere." He whispered, more to himself than to Arham. The bile of blood was now dissolving within him somewhere as it splashed the nerves inside of him.

Arham nodded.

"There could be something in it that could help. Her hair maybe."

"No way I'm giving you that. It's not her, I'm sure. Period." He announced with authority. Agony washed over him making him go numb, goosebumps swirling in the stagnant body. Rigid. Cold.

"Azlan, it's not your office where you can announce your decisions expecting everyone to act on them." Arham reasoned.

"I'm not announcing anything. I'm just stating facts. It's not her. Can't be. Nope." He looked away in indignation, his face a blank canvas. It was terrifying, the way he was acting. A chill ran down Raina's spine.

His father. His mother. His brother. And now her? No, he couldn't lose one more person. So, it was better not to even accept it; to not face it.

Taking calculated step, Raina approached him and took his hands in hers.

"Bhai, who has always told me never to turn my back on reality? Who taught me to be brave enough to stand erect in front of the truth and face it? You! And now when it's your turn, you can't turn away from your words. You are so strong. We all know you are. Just give Arham Bhai the cashmere. We are not trying to confirm the dead body is hers. We are trying to confirm that it's not hers."

The positivity in her words rattled the harsh demeanor he had pulled up.

He didn't know when his little sister had grown up so much to say such words of wisdom. Even in that moment of grief, his eyes shone with pride in his eyes.

He had to face the reality. He couldn't just turn his back on it. No matter how much it would hurt, he had to take the plunge. Although the knots in his stomach kept tightening with each passing moment, he didn't let the dread waver him. He could not break now. Now when courage was much needed. He could not let the turmoil brewing up inside of him eat away at him. He had to stay strong.

Taking a deep sigh, he nodded.

******

He had closed the door to his room as he was sprawled on the couch by the window. The streaks of light scintillating from the streetlamp brushed against his worn out face, the bags under his hollow eyes prominent.

Arham and Shehryar had gone to the hospital. Fortunately, they had found a hair of hers on the cashmere and now were getting the DNA test done.

The pain in his head intensified as his mind kept thinking on the lines he didn't want to. He wanted to shut all the thoughts out. It was excruciating. More than death.

He was burning in the ashes of her past, her present.

Her memory.

The unnerving fright shuddered him to the pit of his stomach, his limbs losing all strength they had. It couldn't be her. No. just a mere thought of him losing her made him shiver, his spine constricting. He wouldn't let it happen. This wasn't right. This was far from being right. Life couldn't just snatch away her chance of living it. It was cruel. Harsh. Traumatic.

That chaos of his thoughts was broken by the call for morning-prayer broadcasting from the nearby mosque. He raised his head and glanced at the sky in search of his Rabb. His Rabb who would listen to him. His Rabb who knew the anguish he was going through. His Rabb, the only entity that could help him.

Standing up, he went straight to the bathroom to perform ablution. This hour when the night dissolves itself, leaving no curtain drawn between a person and his Rabb, is sacred. And he wanted to take full advantage of it.

He laid the prayer mat on the floor by the window and stepped in it. His Rabb was looking down at him. He was listening to his pleas, he was sure.

The sky took a bow in sorrow as it witnessed a nomad with his hands raised up for dua, shaking.

"Ya Allah, I've never questioned your plans. I've never complained about whatever life has always served me with. I've never, for once, pointed a finger at the cruelty it had inflicted on me. I've always accepted your plans and bore with everything. I've never asked anything from you. But today, I ask for that holy woman. The woman who left an imprint of herself on my soul. The woman whose mere presence was able to relax the turmoil inside of me. The woman who brought light in my dark life. I ask for that woman. I ask for her safety. I beg for her life."

There in that moment he had never wished for his life to be exchanged with someone more. He wanted to take away all the pain from her and go through it all by himself. He could do anything just to keep her away from the horrifyng treacheries of this world, the agonizing atrocities of this fateful life.

A lone tear rolled down his cheek.

"She doesn't deserve any of it. The pain she's been living for past, I don't know, how many years, she deserves none of it. That woman who only knows how to love and deserves only that in return." Please..." He stammered "...let her live. She's only been surviving in this gruesome life of hers. I want her to live. Please, don't take her chance at happiness away from her. Please, bring her back to me!"

He dropped his face in his trembling hands as a strangled cry left his mouth and he sobbed into the night.

******

Later that morning when the door of his room was knocked and no response came, Sameena Shehryar dragged it open and found the piece of her heart balled on the payer mat in snug embrace.

Heaving a deep breath, she strode towards him. With his knees tucked to his chest, he was sleeping like a kid. His face drenched into oblivion as the melancholic clouds of worry that had been occupying his features for the last two days were nowhere to be seen. She drank away at the blissful sight.

It was serene.

Peaceful.

Surreal.

Bending down to him, she weaved her fingers through the silky locks of his coal unkempt hair falling on his forehead.

"Azlan bachey, wake up!" She whispered in her saccharine voice.

It didn't take more than a few seconds for him to open his eyes, gleaming at her with hope.

"It's not her. It's not Safa." She smiled softly.

A smile reached his face as if he already knew. As if someone unknown had already told him.

"Here!"

She extended the cashmere towards him and he grabbed it ever so lightly as if it was a feather which would tear apart if held too tightly.

Hugging it to his chest, he inhaled deeply, devouring every inch of scent that piece of cloth possessed of hers. It was soothing against his inclement skin. Glancing out the window at the sky, his earthly eyes filled with gratitude as if mumbling something to his Rabb.

A tranquilizing calmness engulfed him as he closed his eyes and went back to slumber.

******

"Where do you think you are going?" Raina screeched as she jumped off from the couch.

They hadn't let Azlan slip away from their eyes the entire day. The reddishness in his eyes still intact was the sole indication that told them that the headache still hadn't worn off. He needed proper rest but even the sleeping pills weren't of any help. The moment he'd close his eyes, only one face would flash across his vision, making his heart go erratic. He couldn't sleep. Not unless he had found her.

"I can't just sit here and do nothing." He retorted as he stood at the exit door of the living room, barely keeping his insanity at bay. "Besides, I'm totally fine, now. The headache's completely gone." He lied.

"Fine, I'll go with you too, then." She piqued in a commanding tone.

"No, you won't."

"Yes, I will." She deadpanned with determined eyes.

"Raina, for all we know it can take us whole night." He reasoned, fighting against the urge to hiss at the piercing pain that had now started to swallow his head.

"So?" She arched an eyebrow in challenge and before he could reply, Sameena piqued in.

"Let her go. Someone needs to be with you otherwise I'm not letting you go anywhere either." She said in no nonsense attitude leaving him with no choice than to let his guards down.

"Alright, then." He surrendered before opening the door for Raina.

******

"Where are we going, Bhai?" Leaning against the head rest, she tilted her head towards Azlan.

"Karachi." His eye were focused on the deserted road ahead as he sped the car through it.

"Wait...what?" She gaped at him, her mouth hung open.

"Told ya! It could take us whole night."

"You didn't tell me THAT. What if I need to go to the washroom?" She frowned making him look at her as if he doubted her sanity.

Sighing, he took a U-turn.

"What are you doing now?" Her eyes scrunched in confusion.

"Taking you home, duh!"

"Why?"

"You just said you need to go to the washroom." He almost squealed in exasperation.

"I said 'what if.' As in you never know when the nature decides to call you. Gosh, bhai!"

"Raina!" His voice rose a bit as he shot a smoldering gaze towards his little sister.

"Alright, jeez!" She threw her hands up. "Safa was right. You really are Satan."

Her named did something to him as he shifted in his seat and a shadow crossed his eyes.

"Is."

"Huh?" She let out, perplexed.

"Not 'was.' 'Is.' Don't use her name in past tense."

A small smile with a tad of sadness reached her lips as she looked at her brother in awe.

"I'm sorry." She put a hand on his shoulder. "So why are we going to Karachi, now?"

"I'm going to Ayaan's house..." The words stuck in his mouth at the name, thick liquid taking over his orbs. That kid might not have gotten a chance to live in that house but it was his. And that's always how he'd refer it. "There's a slight chance she might be there."

"Do you think they'll tell you if she's there?"

"No." He shook his head. "That's why I didn't call beforehand. I'll raid suddenly."

"I just hope she's there." She prayed, thrusting her head backwards on the head rest.

"I hope so, too." He whispered under his breath.

******

"I hope they are not asleep." Raina glared at her watch with lines of worry etched on her forehead as Azlan rang the bell.

The lane was completely deserted and quiet at this hour of the night as the eerie silence engulfed them. Two minutes later the door flew open, featuring Mansha as she fixed the dupatta on her head.

On seeing the visitors, her mouth plopped open as her eyes glazed with shock and joy which were a clear testament that Safa wasn't here either. The building hope once again crippled inside of him as his stomach gave a lurch, the smoldering nerves in his body breaking him into smithereens. Minute by minute. Second by second. And there was nothing he could do about it. He had never felt this hopeless. Not even when he had to spend the most painful and bone crushing years in that brothel with no hope of ever getting his freedom back.

This hurt even more than that.

"You're here?" She screeched as she dragged the door and stepped aside to give them space so they could come inside.

Raina flashed a grin as she pulled her into hug.

"How are you, bachey?" Azlan asked once they pulled away. He patted her head in a fatherly manner with a small curve of his lips contorted into a smile.

It was even hard to smile.

"I'm good. Come inside."

Without waiting any further, Azlan told her everything, still spotted to his roots. Mansha's jaws dropped as the horror in her orbs was enough to tell she wasn't faking it and that, Safa was, indeed, not there.

"No...she didn't come here." She stammered.

"Will you let me know if she comes by?"

She nodded, words jammed in throat.

"Will you find her?"

The same question. The same intensity.

"I will." His voice laced with determination as his chest stiffened with a promise to never stop looking unless he had found her.

******

A/N

Alright, so I made a playlist for this book. I'm inserting the link here as well as in the bio. Don't forget to follow. Enjoy!

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6dTRFrruYgQxgC4xWKmrcK?si=xeYDLq1dS8SMqfVprjySjg&utm_source=copy-link&dl_branch=1