I would split open my heart with a knife, place you within and seal my wound, that you might dwell there and never inhabit another.

— Ibn Hazm

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It is a strange feeling, to have someone be so sincere with you that you cannot escape the reality of a situation. It is strange to have someone be so close to you all too soon. Tenderness is a strange feeling-- either of a touch or a look. But being called lovable is a good feeling. Being called lovable is special.

Banafsha stares into Mikael's eyes for as long as she can, borrowing every second and bargaining with time, trading her heartbeats for this moment with him. Her hand grips the swing-chain above where his hand rests, alongside each other but not touching. She hasn't felt this way ever with anyone else-- no one ever has expressed themselves with such earnestness to her. She hasn't ever trusted anyone's empty words either, but Mikael makes her believe him. Mikael's words are not trivial-- they home her heart.

"Now who says you cannot be loved?" His voice is a hoarse whisper. She doesn't dare inch nearer to him to listen better. "There's always God if no one else, and then there are people who will love you selflessly. You know what does it require to get there, doctor?"

Her own voice is a murmur as she asks, "What?"

"You seek love, you find it. When you find it, you treasure it. But if you give up on it before the search, what do you find?"

"What?" she asks again and his lips twitch upwards.

"Despair, and it takes you away from God-- the one true love. That's why we're left alone, doctor. But we don't have to be." He holds her swing with his other hand too, twisting both of their swings so they're facing each other. "There's always a heart out there loving even when broken, because it's hopeful. Give yourself a chance. Maybe you won't be disappointed."

"Maybe," she replies weakly, their proximity doing inexplicable things to cardiovascular system. She warns her brain to behave and not release unwanted hormones that could effect her in odd and unwanted ways. She fails as her pulse starts jumping.

Mikael smiles as he tilts his face closer to hers and she instinctively leans away. He notices this and chuckles.

"Doctor?"

"Yes?"

"The hate that was thrown at you, you didn't deserve it. No one does. So don't make anyone think that you're not enough. Don't belittle yourself."

She wants to tell him she never has, at least in front of the people. But how he sees through her, and how easily he has made her open up to him, she knows he has already unveiled her secret: how insecure she is on the inside. And she's surprised at how she has found him a trusting company and revealed to him what she has been hiding all her life.

She gazes into his eyes wordlessly and he lets her, watching her, before he speaks to her softly again, "This clay, so strong of heart, of sense so fine, / Surely such clay is more than half divine--" he searches her face for something she cannot figure as he finishes, "'Tis only fools speak evil of the clay, / The very stars are made of clay like mine."

Banafsha smiles at him, getting the essence of the poem, letting him find what he's looking for as she lets her guard down. "Beautiful."

"Of one of my favorite poets, Omar Khayyam," he tells her and releases her swing so now they've distance separating them again. "You say you submitted to your parents only for your dreams, doctor. Your dreams must be dear to you then."

"Of course," she stresses.

"But what if you're given a chance at true love? What if I ask you to choose between the two?"

She ponders over his question. She has always fought for her dreams, and love has been a foreign country to her. She isn't sure if she's ready to risk her heart anytime soon. Maybe for now, it's her dreams. Or maybe it will always be her dreams. She has sketched her whole life upon them. How can she surrender to something unpredictable and lose everything in the process? Maybe she wants to be loved, but not at the cost of her dreams. Only if she can be so courageous to try the possibility-- to know what this intense love Mikael has told her about feels like. After all, she knows the intensity of passion. How different both can be?

Mikael looks at her against her silence and asks again,

"Dreams or love, doctor?"

"Dreams. You?"

The stardust strokes his irises where the moonlight shines over them, slipping over his cheekbones and meeting the corners of his mouth as they pull upwards. He grins, the dip in his cheek flaring an irresistible urge within her to touch his face, trace his features, run her fingers over the trail her gaze is leaving everywhere in failing attempts of searching his eyes, but tumbling around all over him instead. The unearthly hue of his orbs looks both paranormal yet phenomenal under the blanket of the night. Something about him interferes with her intellect.

"Love," he answers.

"Love?" she repeats. "Why?"

He gives her a crooked smile and shrugs, looking away from her up to the sky, appearing way younger to her than he is, subtly deceiving his age. His long dark locks fall over his eyes, now concealing where she aches to roam and be lost. The desires of the world suddenly seem to fade but this moment with him remains. Her principles tremble, so does her heart. A rational woman like her isn't supposed to fall into the trap of emotions and be fooled. Especially by a man so simple as him who always manages to turn things complex for her. Then why?

"Because dreams are infinite and to be chased forever, but true love comes once in a blue moon."

She is rendered speechless by his reply as his pupils swallow the moon in the sky, reflecting it back.

"What if you both are each other's once in a blue moon lovers?"

Banafsha follows his gaze and stares up at the moon too. They sit quietly besides each other in the empty park, letting the wind create the only sound as it rustles through the branches, and the distant sounds of cars honking.

"I've tried everything to escape my husband," she utters lowly. "Made excuses about how he's not rich enough to support me even though I don't need his money. Said how I wasn't okay with him having a child even though I probably wouldn't have to look after them. I don't even know their gender or age. I know my parents will take care of everything before I start my life with him. And I said how I wasn't okay with him taking a wife before me even though I don't have any feelings for that man. Or how his family has disowned him despite being secretly happy he wasn't associated with politics, but afraid he would've to submit to my family's demand of reconciliation and taking over his party. I just made excuses, you know? But nothing worked. Is that fate?"

They turn to look at each other again. He has an unreadable expression coloring his features. Banafsha continues guiltily.

"The night of our nikah, he asked me to meet him so I met him. But before he could say anything to me, I told him that I didn't want to be married to him-- that I wanted divorce. And I know he was deeply hurt because he left without saying a word to me, and I never got to see his face or hear his voice. Not that it mattered though; we don't love each other." She swallows, fidgeting uneasily with her fingers as if making a criminal confession. "And I turned that against him and told my brother how he probably didn't want to be married to me instead, hoping it would somehow provide a solution to my problem."

"You did what?" Mikael asks in disbelief, eyes widening.

"I messed up." Banafsha bites her lip. "Didn't I tell you I'm not good enough for it?"

"But lying is never a solution. It will only make things more complicated."

"I know, but I was desperate." She pinches the skin between her eyebrows in frustration. "How can my husband trust me after all this? And how can I convince my heart he's a good man when I've just learnt that his first wife was a prostitute? He could be my greatest fear."

She isn't sure if Mikael has suddenly gone stiff like a corpse or she has mistaken him tensing up and going rigid. But for some insane reason, she spots a storm rising in his orbs and it unsettles her.

"Mikael?"

"I suppose you should listen to his side of the story before assuming anything," he replies sternly. "Isn't that foolhardy when you haven't even known him but you accuse him?"

Banafsha doesn't understand his change of demeanor from calm to closed off. Has she said something to offend him while expressing herself? She steals a glance at him before busying herself with her coat buttons, at once feeling apprehensive at the shift in the air between them. Maybe she has rambled to him too much in the heat of the moment. Regret washes over her and she stands up abruptly.

"It's late. I should get going."

She turns on her heels but Mikael is swift to stop her. "Wait, doctor."

Banafsha turns back to him.

"I apologize, I didn't mean to be rude."

"No, you're probably right. Besides, I think I've said too much for one night."

"Nonsense," he politely dismisses her worry and gestures towards her swing. "Please sit back down."

She hesitates a moment before taking the swing besides him again, folding her hands in her lap.

"Remember when we first met on the airport?" she asks him.

"I do."

"I told you back then how we could be running into each other again and I shouldn't be spilling my secrets to a strangers, because life is unpredictable like that."

"But we aren't strangers anymore," he points out.

"Yes, but I've still left myself pretty vulnerable to you for my liking."

"Well, how about I tell you about myself too to make us even then?" he suggests.

She turns to him, suddenly all ears.

"When I was eleven, and my sister nine, my parents got divorced," he begins and Banafsha notices the slight quiver of his fingers before he locks them between his knees. "Larmina, my sister, stayed with my mother here in Dublin, while my father took me with him to Pakistan. But we still visited them occasionally, just that my mother wasn't really fond of my baba anymore, understandably. In fact, she hasn't been happy with his ways for a long time before it got to their separation. My father is a man of many women," he says bitterly.

She realizes how his story is similar to her own parents. But where her mother had to stay with her father despite being miserable, because divorce would be defying the norms of their society, Mikael's mother rebelled.

"By the way he's happy with his newlywed bride now. His third." He chuckles bashfully. "She's twenty-four, younger then you," he adds jokingly. "I hope I don't receive any news of becoming an older brother anytime soon."

Banafsha clicks her tongue. "That would be weird."

"Yeah. Don't even wanna imagine the horror of it." He rubs his palms together, apparently jittery from recalling the events which she gathers must not be pleasant for him. "So well, when I was twenty-three, my father bought himself this girl from brothel. She was young and very beautiful, and baba had paid a big amount for her. She was brought to our home and ironically my father's work trip out of the country was extended, thus he couldn't return home on due time, and instead it turned into an opportunity for me know her. I was young too and very curious. My father's conduct wasn't hidden from me," he huffs in both shame and disgust. "I wanted to see his new conquest-- they were always the finest-- even though I wasn't allowed too. But I was determined, and somehow I sneaked into that girl's quarter. Her name was Shirin and was something else."

Banafsha catches the nostalgic longing in his voice as he narrates his past to her. She doesn't know what to think of it.

"Back then I wasn't as I am today though. We started spending time together, more and more each day. I learnt that she hadn't been with a man before, an innocent and helpless girl forced into the dirty business for money, and that she desperately needed to be saved. And so before I knew it, I found myself falling for her, until I decided to marry her to protect her from my own father. You can imagine the hell that would've broken loose after it."

Banafsha finds herself flabbergasted, jaw hanging limp and tongue at loss of words. She stares at Mikael bug-eyed, taking a good while to digest the information.

"The woman in that photo with you, your wife, is this girl Shirin?"

"Yes."

"She was a prostitute?" Banafsha blurts.

"Only labeled as one, but never one," he defends her.

And suddenly her head become a beehive looking at the man sitting beside her. Suddenly he's all too familiar. Suddenly his story sounds like a retelling. Suddenly he's everything she has been running away from. Why is everything about Mikael the same as Aurang? From their surnames to their lives. Those topaz eyes. Or are these her dilemmas and doubts haunting her? She feels being sucked up by the whirlpool of her thoughts. Her heart drops to her feet.

"Despite everything, we stood by each other. An year later God blessed us with Zimal, and another two years later she was pregnant with our son before they both passed away in an accident," he winds up. "It has been ten years since I first met her and seven years since her death, but she was the most amazing woman I've ever met and she changed me in many ways for my good." He takes a deep breath as his body relaxes. "After her death, I moved here to Dublin near my mother and sister. My mother passed away shortly afterwards too and since then, it's only Mina as my family."

Banafsha debates in her head, scolding herself over and over for drawing absurd conclusions. How can Mikael be Aurang? Why would he play dumb with her and pretend to be someone else instead? Maybe their similarities is one of those miraculous coincidences brought to real life from movies. Is karma paying her back for all her tantrums and schemes? She feels her head exploding. And before she can stop herself, she reaches out to touch his face, her fingers barely grazing the skin of dimpled cheek.

"Aurang?"

Mikael goes stunned, paralyzed as he stares at her. Every second becomes so painful the Banafsha cannot keep her arm still and it starts trembling. She breathes labored breaths, dying every breath as she waits for his response. Then, Mikael arches both eyebrows ingeniously, seemingly bewildered and lost.

"Pardon me?"

As if electrocuted, Banafsha snatches back her hand, her heart going delirious like a mad horse in her chest. She shakes her head frantically.

"I'm sorry."

"Are you okay, doctor?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." She clears her throat, collecting herself as she wraps her arms around herself. "Aurang is my husband."

"Ah." Mikael smiles a mischievous smile. "Did you just call me that?"

"I wasn't thinking straight," she excuses, feeling embarrassed.

"Well, I think I was wrong." He grins at her. "He isn't so unlucky after all, is he? To be on your mind so much so that you see him in me."

Banafsha smiles and looks away, to the moon still brilliant in the sky. Her once-in-a-blue-moon love may or may not find her, but she convinces herself that Mikael is not Aurang, despite their eerie similarities. His reaction just proved it. What troubles her is the realization of being wickedly drawn towards this man who is not her husband. And she's afraid the chance everyone is asking her to give Aurang, she may not be able to give it to him.

☾

Why so heartless, doctor?

Is she now?

Let's add spice to the drama. Can you guess what is to come next?

☾