A walk on thorns

Chapter 27| Unsolved

Sabrina's POV

Thereupon a monumental war waged within the depths of my soul, I made the decision to check on her, not for her gratitude, for I knew it existed nowhere within her hardened heart, but for the sake of my own sanity, for the semblance of peace I desperately sought amidst this torment. My steps were hesitant, my resolve fragile, as I moved toward her room, each step weighted with trepidation and sorrow.

When I entered, there she was, lying heavily asleep, her form frail and barely clinging to life's essence. I stood there, torn between retreating and staying, but the pull to be near her, to truly see her, was too strong to resist. Instead of leaving, I sank into the chair beside her bed, my gaze fixed upon her.

This was no longer Anisha. The woman lying before me bore no resemblance to the sister I once knew. She was a hollowed-out version of herself, stripped of the traits that once defined her, robbed of the strength and vitality that had made her who she was. My eyes traced the hauntingly dark circles under hers, the once-bright eyes now dulled and sunken. Her nose, broken and discolored, told a tale of brutality, while her neck and face, marred by livid contusions, spoke of a war waged against her body, a war she was losing.

I couldn't look away. I couldn't move. My heart shattered as an uncontrollable wave of rage and self-pity rose within me, threatening to drown me in its ferocity. Before I knew it, tears were streaming down my face, hot and relentless, carving paths down my cheeks as I reached for her fragile hand.

"Anisha," I whispered, my voice trembling with a pain too deep to name, "is this you? Is this what you have become?" The words escaped me in a broken sob, my heart cracking open with every syllable. "You don't deserve this, Anisha, you don't. How can I make you understand, make you see, that you are withering, that you are losing everything and anything that you are made up of? You were never this... this overwrought, this broken." My voice faltered as the sobs wracked my body, my tears falling onto her lifeless hand.

"At this point, I am not just afraid for you, Anisha, but for me as well," I continued, my voice cracking under the weight of my emotions. "If you can lose yourself to this extent, then who am I not to follow? You are my only sister, my elder sister, the one I have always looked up to. You were my anchor, my guide, my shield. I won't lie to you, it has always been you. Everyone knows I was never proud of Mama. She was never my mother in the ways that mattered. You were. You were the mother I never had, the mother I desperately needed, even though you left so early."

My tears flowed heavier now, unchecked and unstoppable. "I lost you the moment you began to submit to their will. You stopped being the Anisha I knew and became a shadow of yourself, a prisoner of their cruelty. And now... now here we are, with you lying here, only partially alive, and me, crying over what remains of you. Do you even understand what you are doing to me, to us?"

I took a shaky breath, gripping her hand even tighter. "Anisha, you are not just hurting yourself, you are hurting us, you are hurting Rubina. She is terrified, Anisha, she is just a little girl, and this... this life, this house, it is destroying her. Yesterday, she stayed with me all night, clinging to me like a lifeline. She cried in her sleep, Anisha, she cried until her body gave out. And then, in the middle of the night, she had a seizure, a seizure, Anisha, and I was all alone, trying to save her because you were out there being punished for something you don't deserve. Do you understand what that did to me? What that is doing to her? She is traumatized, Anisha, and so am I. This life is not just breaking you, it is breaking all of us."

I felt the weight of my words pressing down on me, my chest heaving with sobs. "I love you, Anisha. I love you so much, and I am begging you, don't let them take you away from me. Don't let them kill the sister I love, the sister I need. If you let them destroy you, I swear, I will never forgive you. Never."