| Secrets to Solace | A Medical Romance

| Dying Hearts |

Author's Note:

Some Urdu is used in this chapter.

Betay: Daughter

Meri jaan: My love/a very loving term of endearment.

Six Years Earlier

August 2018

Vestavia Hills, Alabama

Words were easy to say. Words didn't require capital, assurance or even any kind payment. They were free to be used by all and used in ways which made a situation seem utterly simple to the person hearing speaking or hearing them. Words didn't need to be carried out, and they didn't even hold anyone to them; not really. Words were just that; spoken noises that vanished into the air as soon as they emerged from one's mouth, maybe never to be heard again. The only ones who really knew the weight, the soul crushing heaviness that words could bring with them were the ones who had been tethered to words that had been spoken for them on their behalf and with the intention to be carried out no matter what.

Meerab had thought the mind piercing silence of her shell-shocked parents had been unbearable. Finding out your teenage daughter is pregnant is something rarely any parent wants; American, Muslim or otherwise. Meerab's were the same. The house had been shrouded in a stinging silence since, almost like a tragedy had happened. She had seen her parents look at her like they were seeing her for the first for the first time, and when Meerab had looked at herself in the mirror over the last few months, she hadn't recognised the person she had become either.

Who was that lifeless, pained being whose eyes were dull and heart even duller?

Her parents had shouted at her; not too much anyway. They hadn't punished her nor had had they threatened her with any punishment. Her mother had quietly come to her on the evening of the day she had told her, terrified and with a pregnancy test in her hand, and sat down next to her.

'Betay, what have you done?'

Meerab had been silent; tears seeping out of her eyes as she sat huddled on her bed, her life in tatters.

Then, her mother had placed something on the bed. A large brown envelope. Meerab's eyes had widened as she'd seen the logo at the top of the brown rectangle, her heart racing and her tears now coming out faster because of what it meant. Her mother slipped out the papers from within the envelope, placed them in front of her and exhaled heavily.

'You can still have it all.' she'd said, nodding to the envelope. 'Bas, it will take some sacrifice and some pain.'

Meerab had been silent, shaking with tears as she stared at the envelope in front of her, the words swimming behind the veil of tears.

'The next few months will be tough, meri jaan. It's not easy but there is no other option. You need to have the baby first. After that...we can move forward.'

Meerab had looked up, teary and confused as her mother's lips had quivered and she'd also had tears in her eyes. It had killed Meerab to know that she had broken her parent's hearts. All because of wanting some fun and thinking she could go home and repent in private. 

All because she had thought she had found 'the one'.

Her mother had spoken in Urdu after that, her words shaky and her eyes teary, and as Meerab listened, she finally understood what her mother was saying. As warm arms had come around her, pulling her into a heartbroken hug, Meerab had let her head drop and sobbed into her mother's shoulder as her suggestion echoed in her mind.