Ambient Light

Ghazal looked at the page in her hands with somewhat confusion. She was shocked and all types of words that could describe her surprised state of mind. It felt odd seeing those words from Haaris Yousuf.

Time spent with Adam.

She was still not sure, it was her Adam or anyone else, Haaris was talking about.

"Adam? Your friend?"

Ghazal asked, composing herself. Haaris nodded with a small smile.

"Yes, my new found friend. He's just behind you."

Haaris motioned at the place where Adam was busy with his drawing book. Ghazal was now beyond surprised, she didn't know why? As a mother, she was happy that her son was the reason for someone's smile. She was feeling happy hearing this about Adam after the tiring incidents of her house. But as a woman, Ghazal had difficulty trusting anybody in any small thing. She just nodded silently, pushing back her tears didn't know when they came out of their hideout.

"No reply, doctor. I just praised your son."

"Yes, it is his brilliance that he's such a great company. "

Ghazal answered gathering the papers and her notebook. Haaris just smiled at her way and she looked away from him. By that time, Adam came beside her.

"Ma, shee I have made a duck."

His excited voice made her smile, she kissed his cheek. "Aw, that's beautiful. But a green-colored duck."

"Yesh ma, it livesh in grash."

Ghazal giggled, her son had a creative imagination and she adored him for that. Now, Adam came towards Haaris to show his drawing. He helped Adam to sit beside him on the bed.

"How ish it?"

"It is good."

"Nexht time, I will make a horsh and will show you."

Adam said bobbing his head. Ghazal was getting uncomfortable with Adam talking to Haaris. It was not good, how could they both get so well? Haaris was a rude, arrogant, snobby man who never talked with anybody. But here he was talking to Adam, so politely as if his tongue never uttered a single rude word in his entire life.

"But Adam, I will not be here." Haaris's voice came and she looked between them, where Adam was sitting with a confused face.

"Then, I will meet you in the garden." Adam's innocent reply brought forth a chuckle from Haaris.

Haaris pinched his nose. "I will be not in the hospital, dear. I will be at my home."

"Why, ma?" Now Adam had asked for her help and pulled her in their conversation.

"Adam, Mr. Haaris is now fine. His bug has gone so he will go back to his home. " Ghazal tried to make him understand and saw Adam's changing expression. He nodded and looked at him for a moment. His next act was a surprise for both Ghazal and Haaris.

"I will mish you.", Adam said placing a kiss on Haaris's cheek.

"I will miss you, too," Haaris replied ruffling Adam's hair.

"Come, Adam, time to go." Ghazal said holding Adam's hand, "Mr. Haaris, I will send the prescriptions. Also the list of important precautions you have to take."

Haaris nodded looking in her eyes and she again looked away. He couldn't look in her eyes. It was very intimidating. Whenever he looked in her eyes as if he was finding something in them and Ghazal didn't want to show him anything.

"Thank you."

Ghazal said and left the room. She wasn't sure why she thanked him. Maybe due to his help the other day or the way he behaved with Adam or due to the fact he wrote Adam's name as his happiness.

***

He took a long sniff of the powder which was in front of him. It was numbing his senses, slowly. His harmful thoughts began to leave him, he was happy that his mind was feeling light, empty of anything.

Holding someone's hand, he came towards his car and took the driver seat. His eyes were getting blurry by every passing second and he couldn't properly make out what was in front of his eyes...

Haaris sat up and looked around him. The darkness was enveloping the whole scene, his breathing coming short and difficult. He swayed his hands around him in a hurry and switched on the lamp. He was present in his own room, in his own house.

The jug at his bedside was full of water and Haaris didn't waste any minute to gulp it down in one go. He was shivering, his hands were shaking and he knew what it meant. He opened the drawer and found that white powder which he needed the most at these times.

Haaris opened it making a heap on his flat palm, not feeling any earlier happiness. Instead, he felt like he was betraying someone like he was doing something wrong, very wrong. He shook his hand and the powder fell on the floor.

What he would do next? Because those moments of his past were clearly increasing his anxiety and he was taking long breaths in order to calm himself down, but all was going in vain. He put his head between his bent knees, a method Ghazal had shown him to overcome his panic attacks. Haaris was unable to concentrate, he needed something more than that.

His shirt was drenched in his sweat as he felt drops of perspiration forming on his forehead, too. Haaris coughed profusely and picked up his cell-phone from the bedside table. He needed to talk to Ghazal, maybe he needed to hear her voice because she was always present with him during his panic attacks.

"Hello." He heard her voice just after the first ring.

"Hello, Mr. Haaris."

"I think, I am having a panic attack again."

Haaris managed to say, cupping his mouth so as not to cry with worry that was taking over his mind.

"Ok. Just calm down. Keep the phone on speaker and do as I say." He nodded but replied in affirmative as she couldn't see him.

"Keep your head between your bent knees and take long breaths."

Ghazal's voice echoed in the dreadful silence of the room. He did as she said.

"Mr. Haaris. It's just in your mind. You can overcome it."

Haaris took another long breath and blinked his eyes several times to get rid of the images of his past.

"Mr. Haaris.."

"Yes."

"Are you feeling better?"

"Yes, somewhat. "

"Good. Repeat it once again and try to just concentrate on the present. I know you can do it. "

Haaris heard her encouraging voice and first time in his life he found someone who was trusting him with something, who was believing in him. It acted as a boost to his shattered confidence and presence.

"Dr. Ghazal."

Haaris said taking his cell-phone in his hands.

"Yes."

"I am feeling quite better now, thank you. Sorry to disturb you. "

"No problem. "

"Mr. Haaris..", he was about to cut the call when Ghazal's voice stopped him, "There's an antidepressant in your medicines, take it. It will be helpful. "

Ghazal said telling him the name of the antidepressant. He fetched it from the bedside drawer and confirmed it with her by repeating its name. He quickly gulped it with a full glass of water after bidding his goodbye to the doctor and laid down to sleep with Ghazal's voice still echoing around him.

***

Ghazal freshen up and left her new room, fixing her dupatta properly on her head. It was really a nice place, good and cozy. Mrs. Rabiya Hassan's house was beautifully built, it was elegant in all manner from inside to outside.

It was present in the outskirts of Bhopal not far away from her working place and Adam's school which became a plus point for Ghazal. Entering through a small white gate, the first sight of the house had calm down her thudding heart. A small lush green lawn, various types of trees surrounding it and a white cottage house which was standing between them in its full beauty.

Her room was also nice, like she needed at that time. It was not very large or very small, just enough for the mother-son duo.

" Khala, let me make today's dinner."

Ghazal told Batool khala, who was a caretaker and an old friend of Mrs. Hassan. She was living with her since the time when Mr. Hassan left this world.

" No, child. Take some rest. I will manage. "

She replied with a smile. Khala was a carbon copy of Mrs. Hassan in all manners, in politeness, in caring. Ghazal returned her smile and began to help her by giving ingredients. Adam came running to her with something in his hands, he was more than happy in his new surrounding as he was getting a large place to play.

" Ma, shee. What ish thish?"

His palm was holding a cone-shaped shell. Ghazal smiled sitting in front of him.

" It's a shell, Adi."

"A shell?"

Adam repeated, seeing the shell with awe filled eyes. " Can I put it in my treasure? ", he asked and Ghazal nodded.

Khala ruffled Adam's hair and he ran off with his new found treasure.

" Haaris baba was same in childhood. He had two boxes full of all his collectibles. "

She informed her with a smile plastered on her lips. Only five days would have been paased since her arrival but not a single day gone when she didn't heard about Haaris and his incidents.

" What my child is doing here?"

Mrs. Hassan's voice boomed in the kitchen who was asking Ghazal, " Assalamualaikum mam."

" Walekumassalam Ghazal. I think I have told you that I don't want any formalities. "

Ghazal looked at her in confusion, what she was talking about?

" No mam, madam or anything else. Call me Nanna."

" But ma-m, how ca-n I?"

" Just like everybody else calls me. "

Ghazal nodded lowering her gaze. This lady was like her angel in disguise, who had helped her in the very toughest times of her life. Also Mrs. Hassan behaviour was so soft and polite with her and Adam like they were some part of her family.

Strangers are becoming my family while my family has become stranger to me. What's this, Allah?

***

Haaris drank the glass of water and looked up, his mind and heart was giving him an idea to just look back at his life, once and only once. That door which was easily visible from the dining room lead to the period when he used to be happy, but it also had his life when Haaris used to be pathetic.

Ascending the staircase, he entered the room, a talking space of his past. It was as it was, when the last time he had seen it. The room was huge to say the least and it was a gift from his father at the time of his fifteenth birthday.

" Where are we going? "

" You don't understand the word 'patience', do you?"

He could easily feel the hint of amusement in his father's voice. He was blindfolded and his father was helping him in walking to a place which only his father know.

" Ok, so here we are."

He heard his father, opening the door of some room. "Can I open this blindfold now?"

He asked agitated and got excited as he got a reply in affirmative. A gasp was only response he could muster seeing a room so big, he was sure that room could fit a small village in itself.

" Now, that's your Den of Passion."

" What's that?"

His father smiled and took him towards a glass cabinet which was holding his musical instruments and in one corner of the room was his easels and various types of paints and brushes. It had also his gym equipments. His father seriously noted his every activity.

That room surely was his Den of Passion because in his dark times, when his mother left him he used to get here to blackened out everything. Stacks of his paintings could be seen around the room and he knew what it contained. Paintings of his mother, in various profile. Smiling, laughing, in surprise and every mood in which he would like to look at his mother.

Haaris set the easel in the middle of the room and took out all his essentials. Today, he wanted to paint something, he was craving to hold that brush in his hands, to see the paints mixing in each other, he wanted to smell that burnt aroma of oil paints as they would grease his hands.

" Ok, so do you believe in God?"

A silence was given as an answer from him to Ghazal.

Strokes of paint brush swelled his heart with calmness. His mind was elsewhere but his hands felt like having mind of their own. Haaris didn't know what he was making, but he was enjoying the feeling which he got, by standing making various colorful strokes on the blank canvas, thinking about only..

No, I can't think about her. How can I?

But why I am not able to remove her from my mind?

Thinking about her feels like I am cheating..

" So, I take it as a yes or no?"

" Do whatever you want to do. I don't mind."

He said somewhat frustrated because that doctor, Ghazal didn't accept her defeat so easily. She was still poking him with the question of his believe in God.

He didn't know, whether he was a good Muslim or not but one thing he was sure of was he believed in God, truly. Haaris knew somebody was there, with Almighty power who could do anything with anyone's life. Even the problems in his life was given by that Ultimate power because it wasn't a human work.

Suddenly, his thinking stopped as he witnessed the work in front of him, his eyes weren't ready to trust that it was work of his own hands. A shy and timid girl with her eyes cast down was present on his canvas. Her light brown hair were enhancing her divine beauty. He wasn't sure why he painted her hair light brown because the color was still unknown to him but not the lady.

Ghazal...