The days that followed were like walking through a fog, a purgatory of waiting and worry. Murtasim had never known helplessness like this. His life, once filled with certainty, power, and control, now felt like it was slipping through his fingers, no matter how tightly he tried to hold on.
He sat by Meerab’s bedside every day, hardly moving except to shift the uncomfortable cast on his arm. The hospital room was cold, sterile, and filled with the constant beeping of machines. Each time one beeped louder, his heart would stop, only to race again when nothing changed. Meerab lay there, still and silent, her head wrapped in bandages, her body as fragile as porcelain. She didn’t stir. The world outside the room moved on, but for Murtasim, time had frozen.
His mother, Maa Begum, would come by with food, urging him to eat, but he would always refuse. She stayed strong in front of him, trying to keep the family’s spirit alive, but when she thought he wasn’t looking, her eyes would cloud with worry and her hands would tremble as they rested in her lap. She would pray silently, lips moving in soft supplication, asking God to bring her daughter-in-law back from the brink.
Anwar chacha came too, standing at the door, watching with quiet resignation. He had always been distant from Meerab, always too stern, too withdrawn, but Murtasim could see the guilt and regret that now lined his face. Anwar was a man of few words, but his eyes said everything. He blamed Murtasim, even if he never said it aloud. The accident had been the result of Murtasim’s reckless anger, his inability to control his emotions. And now, his daughter was lying there, fighting for her life because of it.
Mariyam would visit too, slipping in quietly, her soft prayers barely audible over the machines. She was the one who brought hope into the room, the one who refused to give up. “She’ll wake up, bhai,” Mariyam would say, sitting beside her brother. “Meerab is strong. She’s a fighter. She’ll come back to us.”
But the most unsettling presence was Haya. Her visits were frequent, her expressions carefully composed, her concern almost too perfect. She would sit with Mariyam, sometimes laying a hand on Murtasim’s shoulder, offering words of comfort that he didn’t want to hear. But her eyes betrayed her. There was something there, a glint of satisfaction, hidden beneath layers of practiced sympathy. Haya wanted Meerab out of the way. Murtasim could feel it, though he didn’t have the strength to confront her. Not now. Not with everything else crumbling around him.
In the quiet moments when he was alone with Meerab, Murtasim would whisper apologies into the sterile air, the weight of guilt crushing him. His anger had driven him to make one reckless decision, and now the love of his life lay between life and death. If only he hadn’t driven so fast. If only he had kept his temper in check, had listened to her pleas for him to slow down. This was his fault, all of it. He didn’t deserve forgiveness.
“I’m so sorry, Meerab…” he would murmur, his hand resting lightly on hers, afraid to hold it too tightly, as though she might break beneath his touch. “If I could take it all back… If I could give my life for yours, I would. Just… just come back to me.”
His nights were sleepless. He would sit by her side, watching her chest rise and fall, the only sign that she was still with him. The doctors had warned him that her condition was critical, that they had done all they could. Now it was up to her. Murtasim had never prayed more fervently in his life. He had never needed God more than in those desperate, quiet hours when the hospital felt more like a prison than a place of healing.
Anwar chacha was quieter than usual, and Murtasim noticed how he avoided meeting his gaze. There was an unspoken blame between them, a tension that thickened the air in the room. Anwar didn’t need to say it—Murtasim knew that he blamed him for the accident. His daughter, his only child, was lying there, comatose, because Murtasim hadn’t been able to control his temper.
