Dhaagey: The Ties that Bind Us

43. before he wakes

Author's Note: Hellllooooo! I am so glad so many of you are enjoying the recent chapters so much. I really enjoyed reading through the reactions, analyses, and thoughtful comments so much. Moving onto the next chapter, it's quite long, see you on the other side. It's still "safe for Ramadan"!

Trigger Warning: We revisit Meerab's kidnapping chapter here, along with the plight of the women that get taken/trafficked in this chapter.

------------------------------

The hum of the machines was constant now – an unrelenting lullaby of blinking lights and quiet beeps that charted time in pulses, not seconds. It echoed softly in the sterile corners of the hospital room, becoming the only rhythm she lived by. Dusk crept in slowly, seeping into the whitewashed walls, bleeding gold and grey into the edges of her world. But Meerab didn't move. She hadn't for hours.

She sat curled at the edge of his bed, her shawl wrapped tightly around her like armor, her eyes trained on the steady rise and fall of Murtasim's chest. It was the only thing anchoring her – proof that he was still here, still breathing, still fighting, even in his silence.

Her legs throbbed, her spine ached from holding the same position for too long, but she ignored it all. The ache in her body was a small price to pay for proximity. To leave this room, even for a moment, felt blasphemous. Unnatural. As though stepping away might somehow weaken the thread that tethered him to life.

They didn't understand.

None of them did.

They came in shifts, each bearing good intentions and borrowed wisdom. Armaan with his firm kindness. Hamza with his restless worry. Maryam with her soft pleading. Even Maa Begum, who looked more like a ghost of herself than the steel matriarch she had once been, had knelt beside her and whispered gently, "Khwaish called, beta... you were supposed to start this week."

Khwaish. The NGO. The job that had once felt like a doorway to purpose. A dream she had chased for years, the version of herself she had carefully built over the years. She was supposed to be working part-time, just a few hours a day, all while she worked on planning her wedding. She had forgotten it entirely. Like so many things now, it belonged to a life that felt impossibly distant.

Maryam had called to excuse her absence.

Rumi had tried coaxing her into sunlight, pointing out the roses in bloom, the birds nesting again in the courtyard trees. "Spring is here," she'd said, with hope stitched into her voice.

Meerab had smiled, nodded once, and not moved.

They kept telling her to do something. Anything. As though motion alone could salvage the stillness of grief. As though it was action she lacked – not meaning.

But she had done things.

She had left this room, truly left it, and returned with blood on her hands.

She had walked into the ancient lion's den of the panchayat and taken her husband's place, his empty chair, while the weight of generations glared down at her with disdain.

She had lied through her teeth and dared the world to challenge her, claimed a child she did not carry, just to shield the lands he bled for. To buy time. To protect what was his. Hers. Theirs.

And still, they had only sighed.

As if her battle was misplaced.

As if all her defiance was just a girl's stubbornness, not a woman's war.

As if she were a child throwing tantrums instead of a woman holding together a life unraveling at its seams.

"Do something that makes you happy," they said to her in gentle tones, like happiness was a switch she had forgotten to flip. As if joy could be manufactured without him.