Your Imperfections

Chapter 17

My breath seems to get stuck in my throat. My heart seems to stop beating. Adian notices this, so he quickly slips his hand in mine, and squeezes tightly. Telling me in his way that I am not alone. That I have him.

“Ever the beauty,” Uncle Sohail repeats. His heavy footsteps trailing inside the kitchen.

“Father. Long time no see,” Adian replies sternly. “We were just waiting for your arrival. What would a dinner be without your presence?” he sounds mad, definitely his hatred and dislike for that man has increased since I told him everything.

Sarah notices my unease, but keeps her curiosity to herself. To reassure me, she gives me a small smile. I fail to give one in return.

“Lets go into the dining room. Sarah, we have cooks that can do the job.”

His voice makes my skin crawl with disgust. I wish I could kill him with my bare hands, at least that would be a better way, instead of just a painless death.

We all follow him into the dining room where Aaryaan is already sitting. He gets up, pulls out a chair for Sarah, asks her to sit in, and then does the same for me.

“I’ve got this,” my husband barks at him.

Why does Adian love to make things so awkward? Why is his over-protectiveness bothering me?

“I’ve got this,” I mutter, pulling out the chair myself. He just stands there gawking at me, as if I have committed the biggest crime on Earth.

Once we are all seated—I’m sitting between Adian and Sarah—while Uncle Sohail sits at the head of the table, calling out to the servants to serve the food. When Sarah makes a move to get up and help them, Uncle Sohail stops her, much to my annoyance.

“You don’t have to work when I have servants just for this purpose,” he narrows his disgusting eyes at Sarah, who immediately lowers her head.

Is she scared of him?

I place a reassuring hand on hers, where she has joined her hands nervously in her lap.

The fact that he called them ‘servants’ and not helpers, just makes me want to break his face. These people are no different than us, except for how or where they live, or what they earn. We are also servants, servants of God. And we being servants have got no rights to call other people our servants.

One of the men comes beside me, and puts the dish of fried fish on the table. He doesn’t look at me, rather he does a quick work of putting it down and almost runs away when I stop him.

All ears and eyes turn to me.

“Why don’t you dine in with us?”

“Aaleyah.”

I turn to Adian. “What?” Giving a shrug, I act like I am the innocent one here. “We have four seats, won’t hurt anybody if two more people join us. Right, Uncle Sohail?”

His eyes shoot to mine, but he can’t look at me for longer than two seconds before they look away. He is ashamed. He damn well should be. What he did to my sister is inhuman, unacceptable, just heartless. I want him to go through what I went through when I lost my sister in my arms. I want him to know what it feels like to see your loved ones in pain. I want to kill him.

“So, Dad, how is the business going?” Adian changes the topic, prodding the food with his fork. To my announce, Uncle Sohail waves a hand and the helpers hurriedly walk away from us.

I grip the spoon hard, it’s steel digging in my palm.

“We’ve been facing some issues with the American trades, but apart from that everything is great.”

Adian nods his head, glancing sideways at me. One of the cooks comes to his side with a wine bottle in his hands.

As he begins pouring some in my husband’s glass, fear tugs at my heart.

“Stop!” I yank away the glass Adian was about to touch his lips to, throwing it to the floor. It shatters to a pieces, the red staining the white rug. “Are you crazy? That is wine! Adian, WINE!”

His eyes turn red with anger. As he continues to stare at me, my breathing becomes shallow, not because of those stupid butterflies, but because I was thinking he might hit me. My eyes close on their own, quickly, and I wait for the blow. I wait. It never comes.

“I would never hit you,” I open my eyes to his whisper. He looks at me in shock, horror, disbelief. I have hurt him.

“Adian—“

He cuts me off. “Bring me a new glass.”

I stare at him in horror. He is gonna drink? He is going to do something that is forbidden in his religion? I can’t seem to shake off the feeling of hurt, the blow to my chest he just gave with his actions. The whole room is pin drop silent, but I bet everyone could hear the hammering of my heart against my chest.

I am helpless. I don’t know how to stop him. And then a new thought grows inside me; what if he drinks before as well? When he finishes the glass, I try to swallow my sob. My hands shake on the table. Then, I feel Sarah put hers on my own, silently calming me down.

I just want to go home, back to Pakistan.

After Adian dropped me off at the apartment, I thought he was gonna come with me, but he went away. I didn’t even reach the doors when I burst out crying. My stomach coiled with pain, and bile rose in my throat. Fumbling with the keys, I finally managed to get inside and run to the bathroom without throwing up in our room.

I retched and retched.

“You’re going to be fine.” Two hands held me scarf away from my face as was being sick. I wanted to yell, scream at Adian for hurting me like that. But I couldn’t stop puking.

I motioned with my hand for him to go out, but he shhh’d me, taking my scarf off and placing a damp towel on the back of my neck. It calmed me for some time, I stopped getting sick.

“You hadn’t eaten anything there. Now, whatever was inside you before is swimming in the toilet.”

I flush the toilet. “You are disgusting.” He helps me stand up.

We’re both silent now. Looking at each other as if years and years of time has passed since we have talked. Whenever we try to get back on the road of happiness, there’s always a bumpy speed breaker than shakes our foundation.

“I’m sorry.” His head dips, and locks off deep brown hair fall over his forehead. “Please forgive me. I won’t ever drink again.”

He is guilty. And regretful.

“How many times did you drunk before?” I question, crossing my arms over my chest.

“I have lost count.”