Sahir Arzoo FF | Love, law, inter alia | Chapter 20: Pg 91 [COMPLETE] - Page 26

Originally posted by: _.serendipity._

😃 This weekend for sure!

Youpiii ! tell me just one thing, is Arzoo going to hug Sahir to comfort him ? That is going to help me to wait 😆

Le malheur des uns fait le bonheur des autres 😆

Originally posted by: ikhlass

Youpiii ! tell me just one thing, is Arzoo going to hug Sahir to comfort him ? That is going to help me to wait 😆

Le malheur des uns fait le bonheur des autres 😆

Originally posted by: _.serendipity._

Oho, I think you might be quite disappointed with the update then 😕 It's pretty much all written out and Arzoo is hardly in it. But perhaps chapter 12 will swing your way. Sorry for this time... It was a difficult but necessary choice that I had to make.

But thanks anyway 😳 I'll try and post the update sooner than planned to make it up to you. Cool? 😃

Oh yeah very cool ! Don't worry i'll be patient 😉

This weekend?! I'm waiting eagerly 😃

Chapter 11

Ammi

In the muddle of tangled thoughts that had ensued, the one that constantly pestered Sahir, was why he had asked Arzoo to accompany him to the hospital. He was clearly not thinking straight. She knew nothing of what had transpired, and he was forcing her to unnecessarily get involved in his messed up life.

Yet, she did not look lost or confused or perplexed in any way. She silently agreed to whatever he said as though she needed to know nothing else. And for some reason, just the fact of her being there, by his side, seemed to inspire some shreds of courage in him... courage to finally understand why his mother had abandoned him at the age of twelve and never bothered to get back in touch with him, courage to be able to see her after so many years and witness the signs of the passage of time on her face.

"Alvira Chaudhary?" he said to the receptionist at the hospital, realising with uneasiness, how unused her name sounded in his voice. After she had left, he had gone through a long phase where he had tried to hate her, before being forced to remember how unhappy she had been in that loveless marriage with a husband who found fault with everything that she did, everything that she was. Her departure had continued to sting, especially in view of the family' she had left behind for him, but he had realised with time that it was not her that he hated, but the situation that he had been thrust into.

He shook himself out of his memories. The receptionist had browsed through her records and was looking back at him, confused.

"She is in the Intensive Care Unit at this hospital," he explained, impatiently, "She was brought in this morning. Liver failure."

"Sir, I'm sorry there are no records of Alvira Chaudhary. Do you mean Alvira Qureshi by any chance?"

He felt a jolt in his heart on hearing her new name, as it struck him that she had perhaps drifted so far away from him and the memories he had of her, that seeing her would only make him realise, once again, that he had no place in her life, and that perhaps, to her, he would only ever be a reminder of the life she had led with his hateful father. Perhaps, now that he had grown older and was no longer the little boy she had left crying behind the door, his physical resemblance with that man would be even more poignant.

Perhaps his memories were best left untarnished.

He began to turn to leave, but Arzoo reached out for his hand, and for some reason, as though she had been able to read his thoughts, she said softly, "Your mother wants to see you."

He could barely see her through the tears clinging to his eyelashes, but in that moment, he thought he felt an ethereal glow emanate from her face. He knew, instantly, why he had asked her to come with him - somehow, inexplicably, he had become so used to her presence that he had begun to feel incomplete without her.

"Yes. Alvira Qureshi," Arzoo said to the receptionist calmly, and they were directed to the third floor.

Sahir felt like he was in a trance as he followed Arzoo, his eyes failing to register where he was walking or where he was going. He barely realised when they had reached outside the ICU, and a bearded man who must have seen them through the glass, stepped out of the ward into the corridor, and said,

"Sahir? I am Pervez Qureshi. Thank you for coming."

"You are... her husband." Sahir stated perfunctorily, remembering their phone conversation, as his mind continued to pound with the weight of all those unanswered questions.

"Yes, and she has missed you every single day since she left your father," he said kindly, his words ringing with the truth that Sahir had been pining to hear. He hung on to that little nugget of information, as one would to life itself, and found that his breathing had eased somewhat.

"I will wait outside," Arzoo said with a small encouraging nod, as she let go of his hand.

None of what was happening felt in any way real to Sahir. It was absurd, like a dream... Like he had stepped into somebody else's dream. The hand that pushed open the blue swing door looked deceptively like his, but how could it be? How could this be truly happening? It had to be another cruel joke. He had never stopped thinking of his mother, but time had robbed him of all hope of ever seeing her again. With time, he had lost the strength to face the perennial heartache of unfulfilled expectations... to face the fear that death would one day would come to him and mock at the emptiness and futility of his life.

Yet, there he was, and there she was.

But he could not bring himself to look at her. He could not bear the thought that the happiness that he would feel at finally seeing her before his eyes, would only be ephemeral. Life's idea of a fantastic farce before she was whisked away from him, once again.

And then she spoke, in a wheezy, feeble voice, "Sahir."

Hearing his name in her voice was enough to send warm heavy tears running down his face. He raised his eyes to meet hers. Her face was yellowed and bloated with disease, her eyes were sunken in their darkened, wrinkled sockets, but nothing had changed since the last time he had seen her - she was still the most timelessly beautiful woman in the world. She still had that delicate grace, that ocean of kindness flowing in her eyes. As he beheld her then, it became all the more palpable to him, that he could never have held a grudge against her.

"Ammi," he said, bringing his trembling hand to touch her face, and he was a little boy once again.

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Continued in the post below

"I'm sorry Sahir," she gasped.

"No, no," he sobbed repeatedly, wiping the tears that were trickling from her eyes into her ash-grey hair.

"I have been selfish, and too ashamed to face you."

"Don't apologise, Ammi. I understand everything."

"I could not take you with me, Sahir, because I had nowhere to go. And when I did find a place, and a reason to... live, too much time had gone by. How could I face you? I knew I had been a bad mother but I could not bear the thought of you hating me for it."

"A mother is never wrong," Sahir said simply, stroking her hair tenderly, as his heart continued to overflow through his eyes.

She smiled, "When did my betu become so wise?"

"I take after my mother" he replied, remembering how, as a toddler, when relatives used to say that he looked like his father, he would petulantly insist that it was his mother's looks that he had inherited.

She let out a short, quiet laugh, as the same memory probably flashed in her mind too.

"Of course you do, meri jaan," she replied, "And... and how is your father?"

"I moved out when I was seventeen, and I don't intend to see him again," he said, with finality.

"I'm sorry I left you with him," she said sadly, reading her own past torment mirrored in his eyes, "I thought that maybe, with you, he -"

"You did not have a choice," he reminded her gently.

The regret did not leave her eyes, but she probably realised that a change of subject was in order. In any case, there was so much that she had been wanting to know.

"Are you married?" she asked eagerly.

"No," he chuckled, "I am only twenty-six. But I am a lawyer now, working at a big law firm."

"Yes, Pervez sa'ab told me. He showed me... on the internet. I am so, so proud of you. But then... who looks after you? Do you stay alone?"

"Ammi, don't be a typical mother," he joked, "I manage just fine, really!"

"Don't you feel lonely?"

"Not anymore. I have you now. Once you get better, we will all live together," he said brightly, even as the monitors and machines strapped to her body continued to beep ominously.

"You need a companion, a humsafar. We all do. Your father was not a good husband... or friend, or anything... I never thought that - But then I met Pervez sa'ab, six years ago in Bhopal, and realised that..."

Her words were cut short as her voice began to falter and trail away. Sahir ran out and yelled for a doctor, before rushing back to her side and repeating to her that he loved and needed her, and that she would be fine. But they were hollow assurances, for a few minutes later, the light had dwindled out of her eyes, and Pervez Qureshi who had been grasping her hand fearfully, reciting verses from the Qu'ran under his breath, let out a heartrending cry.

Sahir just stared at her numbly, willing her to move, to smile and laugh. How could she just go like that? He had barely had any time to talk to her, to make up for all those years that had been ruthlessly stolen away from them. He remembered how, once when they were playing hide-and-seek, he had begun to weep copiously because she was nowhere to be found. But she had soon emerged laughing from behind the sofa and pulled him into a tight embrace, ruffling his hair and telling him that she would never leave him. He stared at her immobile form, loath to believe that she had truly gone, and this time, forever. How could it be? Her face looked so peaceful. Her eyelids had been made to close and she looked like she could have been sleeping.

Slowly, the deafening silence ringing in his ears began to dissipate and as Sahir realised that Pervez Qureshi's sobs were continuing to punctuate the air, he was reminded of the reason why she had looked so serene. She had been talking about him, her humsafar.

The faintest sense of solace wafted towards Sahir, as he realised how blessed he had been to be able to meet her, and to see that she had found her happiness after all. The happiness that his father should have given her, instead of his indifference and callousness, and his inability to appreciate her qualities... she had found it in the end.

He placed his hand on Mr Qureshi's back and the latter collapsed into his chest, his entire frame convulsing with excruciating grief. And for some reason, even though Sahir knew that he should have been mourning too, he found himself smiling at the love that his Ammi had received from this man - the love that throbbed in the man's pain... for pain and love, love and pain, were and had always been inextricably linked.

And the tears that dropped from Sahir's eyes were in appreciation of the beauty of that relationship that he knew nothing of, but which moved him nevertheless. For he could not bring himself to cry at his mother's passing... it was too ridiculous to believe. He rebuked himself for thinking that she had left him. She had said that she would not leave after all. She had come back into his life after so many years, and it could not have been merely so she could disappear again. He wanted to share his thoughts with Pervez Qureshi, for him to stop crying, but found that his words would lack conviction.

So he just stood there, emotionless, patting the man's back mechanically, as people usually did in such situations.

After what felt like an eternity, Pervez Qureshi let go of him and staggered out into the corridor, muttering something about funeral arrangements or some such inanity. Sahir's eyes turned back towards his mother, but her face had been covered with a white bedsheet. He angrily wrenched it away, and cradled her face in his hands, pleading. But her face was cold, like ice, like a corpse. She did not respond to his touch, and her head lulled lifelessly from side to side. He frantically rubbed the palms of her hand, but when he let go of her hand, it just flopped onto the bed, like a piece of lead, like the hand of a dead body would have.

"She's gone, Sahir," a strangled voice said from behind him.

He did not have to turn to see who it was. He knew it was Arzoo, in a voice broken by tears. He knew she would not lie to him, but he did not have the strength to see the truth in her eyes. So he continued to gaze helplessly at his mother's inert body, fighting to hold on to his obstinacy, which was slowly vanishing away in the face of the harsh, undeniable truth that lay before his eyes.

And before he knew it, his knees had crashed onto the floor, and his pain and powerlessness began to pour out of his eyes with a burning, blinding fury that threatened to destroy everything in its wake.

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Chapter 12: Page 45

Also, do check out Razia's spin-off OS based on this chapter: here

Thanks again, Raz!

Nice superise the kleenex are ready 😭

That was indeed a very heart wrenching update hema.

Indeed one of beautifully written chapters. I could imagining this happening in front of me. Finally mother son united though for the last time. Nice to know somthing about sahirs childhood. Glad to know that alvira gota a supporting and loving husband pervez.