After I do's

Chapter 6

When a girl cries, it's not usually over one thing. It's built up anger and emotions that she's been holding in for too long.  

Just when I was getting used to the Peerzada household, I realized the honeymoon phase of our marriage, if I could call it that, was over. It was one week after our wedding that I received an unexpected parcel in my name at Peerzada's House. I eyed the suspicious large envelope that had come in the noon. Surprisingly, it didn't have any stamps or address. And the sender had sent it manually, which meant that the messenger knew the person who had sent it.

I contemplated, if I should tell Hamzah about it, or open it in front of him for safety reasons. But then I got reminded that I was a strong, independent woman, who didn't need no man, so I opened it, with my phone recording me. Making sure the video captured the envelope before I opened it, and shaking it in all directions to show that it was in fact closed.

I opened it with a scissor and carefully peeked inside. What I found inside was a white paper and another small white paper envelope lying at the base of the large brown envelope. What a waste of paper, I thought. I hesitantly pulled out the white paper, to find it completely blank. I turned the paper around to find a light stain of tea on base of the cup, stamped on it. The situation puzzled me even more. I picked up the white envelope to find it slightly open, but the vigorous shaking inside made me scared. There was something live inside, because the vibrations weren't periodic. 

I put it back in the large envelope. I looked at the clock to see that there were still five hours left in his arrival. I sat down taking in the whole situation. I couldn't call him and worry him for nothing. I was curious, but the thought of a living being inside the little envelope scared me to death. It was not fat that it gave away it's shape from the envelope. It was then an idea struck to me, I switched on the tube light in our room and put the envelope in front of it. 

The revelation shook me to my core. A silent cry left my mouth, my hands started shaking and my heart was beating at unhealthy pace. I almost let go of the envelope. Dashing to put it back into the big envelope it had come in with shaking hands, I sealed the big envelope as best I could and focused on calming myself down. The breathing picked up, and I started hyperventilating. I couldn't be in the same room as the envelope. I called the maid with a shaky voice, still gasping for air. 

Asking her to pick up the envelope, I told her to put it in the drawing room where no one went. After seeing to it that the maid did as she said. She calmed down her breathing, convincing herself that it was no longer in the room. She spent the rest of the day, hanging around her mother-in-law, helping her in cooking, or just listening to her rant about how bad the up to 70% sale on Khaadi was today.

The day was very slow to pass by, for Zaib-un-Nissa. She took it upon herself to pick up Hanya from school. She brought Hanya to her favourite ice cream parlour, which by the way took an hour to reach because of the large traffic. We were sitting for the past hour, so we decided to walk around the nearby park while eating ice cream. The sun didn't seem so bad on a January's afternoon, we talked randomly. She told me about her friends and how they were planning to meet somewhere away from school after their final assessments. 

After our ice cream was finished, and we were starting to get heat up from prolong exposure to the sun, we decided to go back home. The journey back didn't take long, and we reached home around 4 pm. Hanya fell asleep on the ride back home. Luckily, Haris was home, so he picked her up from the car and tucked her in bed.

I went to the kitchen to get something to eat. I ate the Karhi* with rice, I had helped my mother-in-law with, the taste of the Karhi was significantly different from the one my mother made. I was still getting used to the taste of mother-in-law's cooking and Sindhi dishes, but I sort of figured that they were holding back most of them for me to get used to them gradually. One thing I particularly noticed was that Sindhis eat a lot of pickles and they have different types of pickles.