The Nearest Heaven

Part 41 - Letters (a)

Part 41 – Letters

"Faraaz,

My daft, my brain addled, completely dim-witted half-brother,

This letter may bring you insurmountable joy to know that the biggest threat behind your life is dead. Why would you not rejoice over the fact that your half-sister, your slightly demented sister, is dead? The half-sister that had only ever brought you pain and torment in your teenage years took her own life.

Does that not make you happy?

Are you not overjoyed to know that you will be freed and live without burdens and worries and that you and your completely mental wife can live life without looking over your shoulders?

Knowing you and your insane ways, you would probably feel bad over the fact that I had committed suicide. You would find stupid ways to blame yourself for my death, but you forget, little half-brother, I will never listen to you. I have never listened to you and I will never listen to you. You have no sway over my choices.

Committing suicide was my choice. My decision. And I would do it again and again than to sit here and rot in this faeces-infested cement block. I live my life according to my rules. No one gets to dictate my life, Faraaz. Not you, not your father, no one. That is something that you need to get into your head.

I wish that as I sit here and write this letter that I could say that I am sorry for everything that I have put you through, Faraaz, but really, that would be a lie. I am not sorry.

Not one ounce.

I hate that my mother had remarried. I hate that she married your father. We were happier alone, at least when we were together.

And then your father came along.

It was the worst time of my life. He tried to be nice to me. He tried to be my father, he tried, and he tried and every time I resisted, he worked his way in until I relented. I hated him then, and I hate him now.

He took away my peace and he took away my mother from me.

He turned my mother into a blithering idiot. She became someone who was happy only with her stupid husband. And then... they had you.

My life had gone from horrible to dismal in a space of a few minutes as they told me I would become a 'big sister'. As if your birth was something to be excited over.

You were, you are, and you will continue to be, a horrid mistake. An abomination of sorts. You, Faraaz Ali had taken away any love that I received. You relished in the spotlight and hogged all the love and light in my life. You were a seed of darkness and as you grew up, so did the darkness. You overtook any light that I had. You sucked the happiness from my life. You stole what was rightfully mine.

Are you happy knowing that you have killed any seedling of my happiness? Are you happy living with yourself while you have dimmed every iota of my light?

Well done, little half-brother. Good job! I bet your father is proud with the knowledge of raising a happiness killer.

You want to know something, my little half-brother? Your stupid wife is no saint. She is just some stupid slut that felt pity over your weak, loathsome body. She does not love you; she never did. She is only playing nice to you for your money. She is worse than I am. I told you that I wanted what you took from me. I want to be the heir of the Ali fortune.

How could I not want to be heir?

After all those polished lies that your father told me, why would I not inherit his money? Should I not be compensated for all those years of misery?

As it is, you are nothing. You are not worthy to even be called an Ali. What right have you to the name?

The irony of the world lies in the fact that you thought by marrying your spineless wife, you would safeguard the fortune, well, my useless half-brother, nothing could keep the money safe from me.

I am Ilham. I will get want and I want all of it.

My death does not end here.

Your nightmare is not over.

With ropes and knives and blades,

Ilham."