She fell in love. She couldn't be with him. She married someone else. She fell in love again. Then she fell apart.
•••
Iraj Kazmi knows only one thing, that she's always right. Then life proves her wrong...
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"Don't water it too much." Iraj raised her head higher as she peeked at Azfar watering the juniper plant. She was sitting over the grass in the garden, it was early morning.
He turned to her with a confused look, "Why?"
"It will die." She just gave a plain reply.
"What?" Azfar was shocked at the revelation, "How can a plant die because of being watered more?"
"It can. Not all plants are the same." And it reminded her of herself, how she was all imperfect unlike her husband, father and brother.
Azfar set the pipe down and turned off the water. "Oh, right. I mean of course you know better about these things, Iraj, why don't you take care of these here? I always get confused what to do." He just wanted her to get involved in her favorite activity which was why he was trying to behave like he wanted to take care of the plants that made the gardener stand in shock at the fence staring at his boss the whole time.
Iraj blinked remembering that she was not ever going to touch things that belonged to him, including his plants, "I—I don't think, I don't want to."
"Jaan. Kya hua?" He immediately walked over to her and held her hands as she was on her way back into the cottage, "Mien bohat bura shohar hoon na?"
(My love. What's wrong?
I'm a really bad husband right?)
His comment tugged at her mind, "Aap aisay kyun baat kar rahay hain?" She knew her husband wasn't the kind to say such things about himself like that.
(Why are you saying such things?)
"I've caused a lot of irreparable pain and suffering for the one person I love the most." He passed a broken smile at her, "Iraj, you can do everything, even better than me, in fact, you're always better than me, my jaan."
She shook her head, "You never said that I was good at anything."
Guilt took over him and he held her face in his hands, "Sorry. I'm sorry. Very sorry, meri jaan, aisa bilkul nahi hai. It was my fault, all of it."
(,my love, it's not like that at all.)
One deep breath and she released it with much exhaustion, "You're saying this because I have a medical problem now. You wouldn't have said this if I wasn't diagnosed."
"Sorry, sorry." He didn't want to say anything that wasn't true only to give her satisfaction this time, he wanted to be honest, if only she would believe him now, "Shayad, haan, mien nahi bolta aisa meri jaan, par mien jaanta tha aur hoon hamesha se that you were never beneath me in any way as a person. And I'm sorry for not ever letting you know, but I only ever had any kind of emotions and excitement in my life because of you which is the most important thing in anyone's life, without you, I was just blank and empty. Maybe order and sensibility are as important but life isn't worth living if you can't even smile through it. You're my reason to smile. You were always the reason jaan. Always."
