Imperious

Chapter 3

Anyone who earns a sin, earns it to the detriment of his own soul. God is Omniscient, Most Wise (Quran, 4:111).

Carefully, Mehrisa wrapped a small piece of paper around her fountain pen, adjusting it a little at the sides. She had just finished tracing the outline of a Rajasthani bride she had been drawing, for leisure. Inked in blank, she hoped to sketch the finer details with felt pens and a charcoal pencil, before framing it and gifting it to Falak's mother-in-law. Her sixtieth birthday was soon to come, and it was the only interesting event for this year.

She smoothed her dupatta and flicked her fringe before raising her head to scan the grounds again.

She hummed a tune quietly to herself and stared out in the distance, desperate to find any sign of her cousin, Sahm and younger brother, Juwad.. The heat was dripping over the campus now, streaming over the outstretched lawns, smothering the faces of departing students.

It was emptying fast.

Her eyes trailed over the countless stone bridges and gravel pathways that connected all the institution's sectors together, and then the ornate windows of the four, very grand but daunting, grey buildings. Two of these prolific buildings contained the secondary school and college for boys; the other two were equivalent in purpose but accommodated girls. A large pathway divided the sections and each building was entitled to its own garden and sport facilities.

Mehrisa walked over to a fountain nearby. She stared at her reflection and sighed. The pressure of the mock exams had drained the redness out of her cheeks. She began to pace around a fountain, running her fingers over the rims, hoping this stupid act would possibly consume time. The boys' campus had seen serious acts of vandalism for which a detention was seen the suitable punishment. Mehrisa hung her head low. The best she could do was annotating the Arabic proverbs that had been set as homework.

"Well, Miss Jatoi?" Mrs Jabbar looked down on her, "Doing your homework are you?"

Mehrisa looked up, bewildered by the sight of her Science teacher, "Oh... I was just waiting for my brothers and I thought I may as well do something useful."

"Aah, homework? Work set, to be completed at home?"

"Homework...housework... as long as it is done, who gives a damn about how you did it..." channeling the distasteful expressions of her teacher, Mehrisa added, "That is what my stepmother says anyway. Look, I have almost done it. Sir is going to be very pleased with the immensely rich depth of my understanding for such a beautiful language."

Mrs Jabbar laughed at the subtle verboseness in her speech, "When students hurriedly do their work during school hours it is obvious that they do not understand the work."

"Arabic is not hard. We read it in the Qur'an everyday."

"Yes, but reading the Qur'an and understanding it are two different things."

Mehrisa shrugged her shoulders, "Daadi Maa says I must read it every day in the morning. And I do."

The teacher shook her head in disapproval. Further conversation would lead to conflicting religious views, a topic pointless to discuss with Mehrisa who was clueless as to what her belief really was, and blindly followed her family elders, "May I ask when your sister plans to return? Her exclusion period ended yesterday."

"Tomorrow, definitely," promised Mehrisa.

Nafeesa would not continue her avoidance strategies for long. Staying at home beyond the exclusion period was solely to prepare herself for the battles that would ensue when she returned. Time-out from a negative situation was important in order to recharge oneself. The Jatois were not the kind to bury the hatchet. More so, to bury the person.