Hiraeth

19

HE frantically pushed the elevator buttons, sensing another call of hers. A whirlwind of different emotions began to rise in his chest as he could hear the doors open with a ding. 

That woman was driving him insane. He saw himself as nothing but a pathetic man for letting their relation progress in ways that he had never longed. He could physically feel his insides twist and turn in pain, whenever he'd think about what he had eventually done. 

He couldn't stand looking at her face anymore. He didn't want to hear her again. He could only wish that she'd go away. 

He had told her that he'd never perceive in that way. It was one of the first things that he had addressed to her. He still remembered how he had felt so burdened and drowned at the same time on that day. 

He had betrayed Aira again. 

Pushing the lump building up his throat, he saw the small frame kept by his workspace. That five by seven picture frame resting upon his desk had only made it difficult for him to breathe this morning. 

It was their wedding picture, almost a decade old. He never had the heart to remove it. It was wrong of him to do so, considering he was now married to someone else but he could never bring himself to eradicate whatever traces of hers that were left behind with him. 

He could never look at another woman again. He would never look at Sitara. He could never give himself to her or anybody else. He didn't have that strength in him. 

He couldn't betray Aira. He had made her a promise. 

He felt like a fool, repeating those words in his mind like a broken record; again and again. It hadn't taken Rehaan Azhar long enough to realise how much he had failed as a friend, as a lover, as a husband and now eventually also as a father sometimes. 

The love and longing that he had seen in her for that woman would always initiate mixed emotions within him. At one end, he could be relieved for her. He was at solace with her happiness. But also, a crippling feeling of despair would wash him down, making him aware that he had only been cheating her. 

He had very easily replaced her mother with someone else. She didn't know this for now, but she would eventually and she would never forgive him for that. 

Ayla would hate him, perhaps deeper that he himself did. She would always despise him for wronging her mother. 

He deserved every bit of those. They were his crosses to bear. Ever since he had held that baby in his arms that night, he had realised that the loss he had just experienced didn't belong to him alone. His mistakes had costed his daughter a lifetime of despair. 

He didn't know how to console her. He was numbed from the death of his wife. He could hear nobody, but it were only Ayla's cries that had filled his ears. His mother would repeatedly say that the seven month old infant had never cried like that. It was almost like Ayla knew. She was aware of her mother and it made his soul shiver. 

He had prepared himself for a time when she'd discard him. The loathe filled within her would hurt him and it would break him eventually, perhaps way more than he was already experiencing but he knew that he deserved every ounce of it. 

But with Sitara, he couldn't shrug off the guilt that would hollow him. He had created a world of fake truths, fake love and hope for Ayla. He had done things for her betterment, but also had been playing with her naivety. He couldn't deny this feeling clouding up within him, no matter how many times he had tried to shun it. 

-

She fiddled with the ends of her delicate emerald green saree, nervously sighing at the sight of him giving her a cold shoulder. She had messed up this morning and also a night before. It was nothing unknown.