Dhaagey: The Ties that Bind Us

1. the three musketeers

"Does he usually smile like that?" Rumi asked Meerab, narrowing her eyes on the screen as Meerab repeatedly pressed the command and plus keys on the keyboard to zoom into the image on the screen.

Three pairs of eyes were trained on a sole laptop.

If someone were to walk into Meerab's bedroom, they would be curious as to what had engrossed Meerab Khan and her two best friends so. Meerab was laying on her stomach and leaning on her elbows with her MacBook in front of her. Rumi Ahmed, the adopted daughter of Meerab's Waqas chacha and Anila chachi, and Ajiya, their best friend from college, lay on either side of her in similar positions.

Rumi and Ajiya's eyes moved from the image on the screen to Meerab's face which was marred with a frown.

Rumi cringed as she watched Meerab practically abuse the keyboard, she seemed to be taking out all her anger on the poor keys.

It had been going on for some time now and at one point, Meerab had zoomed in enough to see every pixel. Ajiya was just as engrossed, albeit a lot more animated than the other two, she had made multiple plans to murder everyone in the picture and expressed them verbally and loudly for all to hear.

"She's really pretty – isn't she?" Ajiya said as she zoomed into the face of one of the females in the picture. "And her arm is wrapped around him."

"She's a cousin and - " Meerab started to say but was interrupted by Ajiya before she could even finish the sentence.

"HA! All men are like this-"

"I don't think my Murtasim-" Meerab started to say but stopped short when Ajiya started speaking again.

"He doesn't look like your Murtasim from any angle in this picture." Ajiya exclaimed while rolling her eyes and flopping her head down onto the pillow with an angry hmph.

Meerab zoomed out of the picture and took it all in again – like she had been for the previous hour. Her eyes strayed to the man standing in the middle of the picture and she let out a sigh.

Murtasim looked so handsome, and so different. She hadn't seen him in well over two years, she practically had to beg Maryam to ask him to get Facebook and then had to beg her to get him to upload a picture. She had thought he would enjoy Facebook, he had always loved taking pictures. But he uploaded only one picture of himself in two years, a headshot.

A picture that she had opened thousands of times.

Which is why Meerab had been so excited when she saw that Murtasim was tagged in some pictures by their cousins from a wedding they recently attended, one she hadn't been able to attend due to her classes. Meerab had gone through most of the pictures with a happy smile on her face, with both Rumi and Ajiya giggling about how handsome all of her cousins were.

Meerab only had eyes for Murtasim though, who looked so utterly handsome that it took her breath away, she admired the full beard that blended perfectly into his hair, and how broad his shoulders looked.

All until she got to the picture that she was looking at right then.

Murtasim stood beside Maryam (his sister, and her favourite cousin), Haya (the bane of her existence, and least favourite cousin), and Zara (a cousin from Maa Begum's side of the family that they weren't too close to). The picture was innocent for all intents and purposes, she had only clicked on the picture to admire how good Murtasim looked in the white suit, she didn't even care about how close Haya stood to him. Meerab knew she was clingy and that Murtasim found her annoying.

Everything was fine until she read the caption, Zara – often dubbed as the prettiest woman in their family - had chosen. It was just a white heart and a green heart.