Besabriyan

9|NINE

Bittersweet. That was the word he wanted to use for his relationship with Maheen. He loved her and he had come so far after admitting it to himself. He pictured her face- inscrutable gaze that usually settled on nothing, her always tinted nose and cheeks. That woman was the embodiment of his desires and wishes. Earlier that day when he found her with Taimoor in the printing room, his blood simmered. The closeness and the laugh with someone else doused him as he stood there on the doorway, stalking her and his employee before Taimoor walked out of the room to find Zaviyar freezing him with his gaze.

"What department does Maheen Kamran work in?" He asked Maha as she typed hastily on her computer. Lifting her glasses to sit it crookedly on the bridge of her nose, she looked above them to find her brooding boss perched on the glass frame of her cubicle.

"Logistics."

"And Taimoor Khan?"

Sensing something akin to disgust in his tone, her hands stopped and she stood up. Maha had grown out of her fear for her boss since the day he stood up with her against his colleague for harassing her and her respect increased a hundredfold so much that discomfort flew away from her. And to her, Zaviyar was like a friend. A friend that she didn't meet at the university and the friend with whom she could be herself with a mask. And he let her have her way because if it was anyone else, they would have run away and never looked back because Zaviyar was not easy to handle.

"He works for logistics too." She blinked, making sure of her statement.

"Put him in some other department. Preferably in one where he can't survive more than a month." He grumbled and left her on her own to ponder on what just happened.

Scratching the base of her neck in distress and noting to inform Taimoor about his demotion later, she decided to follow Zaviyar to get some papers signed and to ask him about Taimoor's new job within the company. And after being yelled at for eight minutes straight and having gotten the papers signed, Maha walked out of his office but on her way to the HR manager to get Taimoor's demotion papers. It was horrific even for a person like Maha Samad that Taimoor wasted his last warning and got himself screwed.

"Rayyan aur phupho har saal chale aate hain aur unka irada joh hai woh unka raja beta aur Maheen ke ilawa sabko pata hai."

Zaviyar was suddenly reminded of Daniyal's words from last night and his throat throbbed with unadulterated helplessness. No matter how many steps he took closer to her, it was his own insecurities that held him back and the fear of having a failed marriage clawed at his flesh. How different would his life have been if he were from a normal family. The tip of his index finger jabbed against the wooden desk as he pondered over the decisions he had been taking for the past few weeks- his mind losing its function entirely when she was around. His decisions weren't mostly wrong. He couldn't be engaged to someone whilst being in love with some other. That would be so sick and unfaithful of him.

"Sir?" Roused from his spiral of thoughts, he looked at his assistant, who had come back to get the demotion papers checked, standing there with an inexplicable expression. He knew that look, for it was the one he had been receiving for the last few days.

"You may be dismissed," As the words poured out of his mouth, Maha sprinted out leaving him to hibernate in his own silence.

He let his eyes roam around the walls of his office- painted in wooden brown with a modern falling ceiling and other modern accessories and decor to highlight his position in the company. He remembered visiting the office as a child, where he would play with his toys and go back home after a few hours of lectures. His father made him sit in the meetings and observe how it worked and how they functioned. His father reminded him that he was born to carry the company on his shoulder at every given chance and like that he only focused on the company and nothing else. And like that Meraki became so dear to him that he would even go to the end of the world to protect it.