Renderings Of A Mute Heart

An Ambigous Love

The autumn came down with the strangest rumor, Gazwaan Riad the notorious successor of the country committee house of religious affairs separated from his parents. The wildfire engulfed the whole town, he had such an impeccable character that all the whispers contributed as streaks of lightenings.
"He separated with his wife"
"oh his mother was so proud of him"
"Oh he was so pious, where is his piety now?"
"His wife... she must be so cunning"

There were some who felt really bad for the nobleman but few and even fewer were there to console him. Two handful of years past when the leaves where yet to be yellow, the daylight had witnessed the happiest of Gazwaan, he had been working hard and gathering all the money for his own wedding. He was the eldest in his family, the first of the third generation to be married in a house where his uncles were yet to see their first child. He brought himself up with a face of responsibility and sensibility. He was what he was because he never looked back to feed himself anything before he had fed the family. He was always like that, his mother was proud of him, his grandparents loved him dearly. They said he was less bone and muscles but more humility and sacrifices.

So when that summer wedding crashed tragically on the floor and his beloved fiancée ran away on the day of the wedding, he did not know what to do. Her parents came with joint hands, begged him to marry some cousin of the runaway bride to save their honor and save his own from a laugh of the cruel world awaiting to shame them for their situation. He agreed naturally, he could never put his feelings first, nor cry or curse. He took some strange women as the bride and walked in his home. He stayed silent for two days and did not speak much for a week, he took a job in the Middle East and did not return for eight months.

Now the eavesdropping had stopped, the rumor of the exchanged bride fell dull but people never stopped asking Gazwaan's mother if this girl was any worth of his son or if he was happy of her.
His mother felt terrible for only a week with his bride. She was prettier than the girl he was engaged to, she spoke intensively less, she was rather quiet but compassionate. She was quick to learn, did not ask of anything,she wore the same few dresses plainly and never groomed herself like the girls her age,her hair was always messy,her clothes creased,her eyes always heavy like she has been crying,she had a raspy voice,some drunk in love or life accent. She spoke so less than half of the family never witnessed her talking but she smiled, she smiled always.

Now his mother called him and told him tales of how wonderfully this girl has worked her way into the family's heart, he oddly would laugh and tell her "ma' I'm happy if you are happy"
And no matter how many times we rehearse this phrase we never are happy because somebody is happy; we are only happy for them but sad, terribly sad for ourselves.
What his mother did not take notice was Gazwaan's feeble heart was incapable of returning to his home.
What she thought was a sudden trauma of the girl he loved leaving was not so, he was not unhappy of only being married to Aynun-Nahr, but more of the terrible secret behind this unfortunate marriage that worried him excessively.

The days like all days piled up, the Eid-ul-Fitr was celebrated without him in the house, he was close to old and young, they all missed him. He missed them as well but the secret swelled inside him, how long was he supposed to bear it?

The cold December he finally made a return, his hands were full of gifts. The whole house gathered to observe a great feast at his return. Aynun-Nahr was dressed in white and gold, his favorite color to please him, however nor a single smile was spared from both of their solemn faces as they met.

Aynun-Nahr had become so rooted in the house that now Gazwaan felt stranger. She was up and about in everyone's need. He hated how she was so welcomed yet he understood that nobody else would wash her grandmother's clothes in which she defecated,not anybody else would change her diapers and still smile at her,he's been in this house for years,his own mother was tired of the odd jobs that his bedridden grandmother had asked for years now.

She seamlessly blended into the household. He wondered if Saima, the one who should've been here could do the same? He did not know the answers, there was a pool of doubt. There is a scarcity of people who do things without complaining; this he knew well.

The glad tidings showered the house, all was happy and hearty those two people in one bedroom were the silent sufferers of the night.

Aynun-Nahr was strange for one thing alone, she never visited her maternal home. They never asked of her and often Gazwaan would cover for her.

One year passed, the second was on the coming. Gazwaan's misery spoke out in sighs, then turned into glances, those glances turned into gazes and gazes into stares.

His wife, so little in the frame so thin but so beautiful was alarming toxic feelings in his heart he wondered what she said to him on the first night was ever true?

Oh, they underestimate affection. Oh, Love is quick and stupid. They both fell for each other.
The first talk was the word 'listen' then it turned into sentences ' I'll be home late' then they began to help each other. Two kind souls.

First, he asked her to stop sleeping on the floor, then he asked her to sleep beside, then he asked if she would make love to him. All the answers were yes.

But they were useless.

He was plain, she was simple but these patterns that love make are complex.
Gazwaan would cry his anguish heart, his strength failing him, this love drowning him, this animal instincts wining...oh they always win...

Aynun-Nahr would cry on the other side, scared, small and quiet. The fear of dejection, of separation, of humiliation...of all the colors of Love.

The circle ended one day with them confessing their love. 'No matter what I would always love you' said Gazwaan gallantly.
Men make promises and they sound almost true. Aynun Nahr knew the world more than it was required, in her reply she smiled.

That was the only day Gazwaan was happy and confident both that his Nahr would go nowhere, he was exuberant "I do not even know what I was thinking Nahr, I mean we were making a big deal about it. We both love each other and my family loves you, we are married there is nothing to lose"

It was seldom she ever would reply to him " but how long?" he turned in surprise to her voice.

"they will throw me out once they find out who I am," Aynun-Nahr said.

Gazwaan was surprised "they love you so much I cannot even imagine them thinking what you said"

She smiled but life walked on those words. One Sunday Morning a phone call brought Aynun Nahr on the road of shame. The girl who revealed the secret was Saima, she said she felt sorry about what she did but she couldn't watch Nahr spoil Gazwaan's life. A life was definitely spoiled prior or post only the difference was in the eye of the beholder.

They screamed they slapped, they cursed, the fret, they cried, they could not untie the knot between the good man and a half woman

A half-woman? An ambiguous gender...

An immensely beautiful soul in a body outside a fixed mold.

They pushed her out of the house, 18 months of labor in a house that showered her with appreciation and love suddenly evict their affection no longer can they even be humans.

Gazwaan recalled what she said and took her hand and separated from the family. Now the gratified man lives a life of disgrace. They taunt and torment him but it seems like some men make promises that are not almost but entirely true.

And now the Autumn has seen the most righteous of Gazwaan who has held the promise made to Love.
Truly.