Had I known you, I would have possessed you, and had you known me, you would have possessed me. But then you and I would not be.

— Mahmoud Darwish

The surrounding is a blurry mist, void and silent. All the background noise is swallowed away as the air is stills. Nothing else matters in that moment, but just the two of them.

She doesn't know how his eyes can be so brilliant— both humanly and predatory, alive yet savage. His touch, his hand holding hers, is like him not letting her away this time. As if this time it's different.

Why is Burq so different?

So different than Asfandyar.

Yet so similar.

Asfand and Brekhna belong to each other. Always did. Always will.

The spasm of her heart is chaotic. Her nerves disarrayed, she feels vulnerable. Subconsciously she squeezes his hand, and Burq squeezes back.

"Leyla?"

She looks at him, completely at loss of words. What is the meaning of telling him about their relationship when it was meaningless from the beginning— when both of them were only trying to find refuge in each other from their demons, without ever knowing a thing about each other's pasts.

Why does she feel like she has been using Burq? What more can she do to get rid of this guilt?

"What do you think of us, Burq?" she asks him instead, not letting go of his hand.

"That's the problem: I can't think of anything." He smiles, but Leyla can see it's sardonic and strained. "You say you don't want anything from me, yet you give me all of you. How does a man believe such actions to be motiveless?"

"You don't trust me?"

"Were I not trusting you, would I be still seeing you?" He nods towards her. "It's you who don't trust me, Leyla."

He's right, but he doesn't know he has given her reasons not to trust him with their relationship. He couldn't accept it before, and only kept the pretense of being okay with it only for so long, until he couldn't anymore. How can he accept it now? More importantly: will he divorce her then? Isn't that what she wants?

"You think I've been lying to you?"

"Haven't you?"

"What more could we be if not friends?"

He chuckles at her response, his expression tinting with amusement. "Don't try to trick me again by beating about the bush." He looks down at their interlocked hands and so does she, before meeting each other's gazes again. The gold in his eyes is afire. "You're always so oblivious to our touches, our proximity, that I can't help but think you're used to it."

She tries to pull back her hand from his but he doesn't let go.

"Uh huh, I might have been ignoring this but I'm no fool, habibi. Unless you see me as a foolish man."

"You're anything but foolish, Burq," Leyla replies right away.

"Then why lie to me?"

You're not my wife, but my friend. Don't you think a friend is better than a spouse, Leyla?

What a deception. Only if she could understand the meaning of his words back then: how he could never accept her as his wife because he didn't nurture any romantic feelings for her. But entitled her his friend to chase away his loneliness.

They both have been unfair to each other.

"You told me you only see me as a friend. So when you asked me who I was to you, that's what I told you: your friend." This time she gently tugs her hand free. "I didn't lie to you on your part."

"But what about your part?" He retracts his arm but doesn't let go of her eyes. "Do you see me only as your friend too?"

She takes a long moment before replying, "Your breakfast is getting cold, Burq."

He smirks, reaching for his cup and lifting it to his lips. She busies herself with her own plate. This time, she has been cornered.

She cannot play games with him for long, she knows. Soon, he'll discover the truth, one way or another. Burq isn't the kind to let go of something easily, but just ignores it for a time being.

"When I woke up after my accident," he says and her attention is instantly back to him, "the last memory I had wasn't a pleasant one. So I tried to look past it, but the further I went into my mind, the uglier it got. Then I tried to search forward in my head, but realized it was empty. It was scary, Leyla."

She has no idea why he's telling her this. Burq hardly ever displays his thoughts, except what his eyes express. But she listens attentively without interrupting.

"I realized I had lost a great part of my memory— about a year. And that year was important because it was the progress I had made in moving on from a terrible heartache. I had lost all that progress and felt like restarting. It hurt."

He smiles, and for the first time his smile is genuinely broken. Heartache. Leyla particularly notices this one word.

"What happened?" she asks, curiosity gnawing at her own heart deep inside.

"My brother married the woman I wanted to marry," he says passively with a wooden face. The apathy in his voice makes Leyla doubt his answer. But something within her ribcage sears agonizingly.

As if any wife can be okay with her husband loving another one, no matter the circumstances.

Then again, it wasn't as if she didn't know this already. At least bits of it— at least already knowing there was another one ruling Burq's heart.

"You loved her?"

She regrets her question once it's out.

He chuckles humorlessly. "Love is an understatement, habibi. I don't think there's a word even close to describe what I felt for her."

She doesn't want to hear anymore of it, so she goes to sipping her tea and staring out of the window. Her question was totally ridiculous.

"You won't ask me for more, Leyla?"

"It doesn't concern me," she lies.

"It does actually," he presses and she looks back to him. "Her name was—"

"Doha," she cuts in before he can complete his sentence.

The surprise on his face is only brief. He tilts his head. "I don't think I would've told you that, unless I was out of my mind."

Now she smiles, rubbing her vacant ring finger subconsciously. "You've mistaken me for her many times in your sleep. In the hospital, and that night at your home." Even before that. She doesn't add, trying to conceal any dismay or ache her expression might give away. "I know nothing more of her except that she's your lover."

"Was," he's quick to correct. "She's my sister-in-law now." His sour tone doesn't go unnoticed.

"Your brother didn't know of your feelings for her?"

Burq scoffs. "He was the first one I told her about. Raad, he's my half brother, from my second mother. But he was blood, and I never considered him any less, ever. Yet he stabbed me in the back."

"And her? She didn't know you love her?"

His jaw clenches and unclenches. "She did," he grits.

"Then why did she choose your brother over you?"

He smirks ironically, his gaze becoming distant as if recalling a memory. "She said I was a difficult man to live with— to love. And that Raad was different— better."

Her heart splits this time, and she has to break eye contact with him so as not to be swept away and drowned by the havoc in them. She looks back at him seconds later, this time extending her palm to him across the table.

Unlike her, he doesn't take her hand right away. He stares at it a long moment. "Do you pity me, Leyla?"

"No. It's something more."

He arches an eyebrow. "Name it."

"It's incomprehensible. I cannot name it." She smiles and his lips pull back into a grin of his own.

He holds her hand in his. "I pray you find a name for this something incomprehensible," he speaks teasingly.

"Ameen." Leyla fits her fingers into his again. "Now tell me why did you tell me all this?"

His orbs glitter admirably. "You know me too well, habibi. It makes things difficult for me."

"You don't seem to mind."

"I don't." He caresses her thumb with his. "When I saw you for the first time in the hospital, though not technically for the first time, and you told me you were my friend, I never believed it. I've very few friends, and women among them being none. Doha was a exception in my life, and after her I vowed to stay away from her kind. So accepting what you were telling me was difficult."

"So you chose to ignore it?"

"Right, because I thought my memory loss to be temporary. But I'm growing restless with time when I still cannot remember anything."

"And that's why you're confronting me?"

"Yes, because just like you know details of me, I've learned details of you too."

Her pulse jumps but she manages to calm it, appearing unaffected. "Pray tell, what are they, my lord?"

The corners of his lips twitch again as he holds her eyes confidently. The sun rays filtering through the window plays with his hair, his curls appearing a lighter shade and irresistible to touch. His hair has grown long, she thinks. But she finds it attractive on him.

"You're a rare kind, the type that believe in fairness— that live on the narrow edges where fantasies meet realities," he says and she sucks her cheeks at his poetic statement. "You're always very careful with your words; it's like you measure them before you speak them. You challenge me when you disagree with me. If your mouth doesn't scold me, your eyes do. And you've a unique way of reprimanding me for my ways. You're very different than me, Leyla." He unhooks their fingers and caresses her knuckles with his thumb. "I've never appreciated your kind. Instead of going with the flow, you stand against what doesn't appeal to you. You're strong and you infuriate my sanity— disarray my intellect. I like to be a realist, but you're an optimist. Our outlook on life is not parallel. Yet you touch me with familiarity and speak to me with history. I've been difficult to you too; I should have repelled you. But unlike Doha, you always returned. You stayed. Why, habibi?"

This time when she replies, she doesn't measure her words but let her heart speak, "Because when the heart chooses someone, even a difficult person becomes our better."

➳

"Brekhna!"

Leyla beams as her sister runs towards her; Spogmay practically jumps in her arms. She laughs.

"Spogmay, I've missed you so much."

"I missed you too, sister."

They both pull away from their embrace and kiss each other on both cheeks. The wide grin on Spogmay's face is happy and childlike.

"You didn't tell us you would be landing tonight," Gulalai says, smiling at Spogmay. "We would've made arrangements for you."

"I'm no guest, Gul." Spogmay smiles back at her reassuringly. "I wanted to surprise you guys."

"That's a pleasant surprise," Gulalai replies.

"Where's Mustafa? I want to meet my little prince."

"Already asleep," Leyla answers her sister.

"Well then, he'll get his surprise in the morning." Spogmay falls back on the living room couch, stretching her arms above her head. "Feels like heaven to be home."

"You must be tired, sweetheart. I'll prepare your room," Gulalai suggests. "Would you something to eat? Or drink?"

"Just green tea. I'm cold."

"Coming right up."

"Thanks, Gul."

When Gulalai disappears, Spogmay turns to Leyla. She pats the space beside her and Leyla sits down with her. Her cheerfulness begins to dissipate slowly as her dark eyes tints with worry. Though she might be younger than Leyla, but has the same features as her sister's. Just not her personality.

"Something troubles you, my moon?" Leyla asks, sensing the shift in Spogmay's mood.

She hums. "I didn't want to tell you in front of Gul."

"Tell me what?"

She licks her lips and tugs at her sleeves uneasily. "I saw Asfandyar at the airport."

Just one simple statement sucks the air out of Leyla's lungs. Her eyes widen. "Did he see you?"

"No." Spogmay covers her face with her hands and exhales in them. She looks back at Leyla. "But we can't hide forever. It won't be long before he finds us."

"We'll do something. Don't worry."

"I don't worry for myself, sister. I worry for you." Spogmay reaches to take both of Leyla's hands in hers. "He can do anything to get you back, Brekhna. If he could kill lala (brother) for not letting him marry you, then surely he won't hesitate killing your husband for marrying his betrothed."

➳

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