It Is A Beautiful Day…

…to break a heart

It’s a beautiful day. You’ve not gone outside but from the light forcing its way through your dark enclave, you know. You know but you want to remain there.

Your phone is on airplane mode and you wish you are actually on a flight, probably going to reunite with your long distance husband in Ireland, Australia or wherever. You are just thinking because you do not have a long distance husband. What you have is an attention seeking somebody that is always telling you what you can and can’t do. Narcissistic bastard. Does he think you came to the world because of him? Does he think he is doing you a favor? Does he even realize you are hotcake? You will break up with him because he is mad and you will not be dragged into madness that is not your own. He would apologize and you will want to take him back for the 15th time because he is such a cuteface but you will no longer tolerate disrespect and the foolishness you’ve been exhibiting in that facade of a relationship. For crying out loud, are you not loved at home?

You suddenly remember a dress he’d bought you. You have not seen it in a while so you jump out of bed and turn your room upside down looking for it. It was probably stolen on the line when you hung it out to dry and you hadn’t even noticed! That says something. The sooner you started forgetting about him, the better.

You are not going to spend your whole day thinking about someone that thinks only about himself. What would that make you? So, you call Sadiq. Sadiq is your go-to guy when you are having a mental breakdown. You are not exactly having one now but you call him anyway.

“Hey, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”

Why is that the first thing he asks? Is he really just someone with whom you share your frustrations, someone to vent to? You want to tell him about your plan to leave Rahim, to unboyfriend him. But in the moment, it just doesn’t seem right.

So instead, you say nothing is wrong. And in all honesty, you don’t actually think anything is. You just want to talk with him and for once, be the one to listen. But he keeps on talking about you, asking you what you’ve done all day. You tell him it’s just 11:13am on a Saturday, you don’t have to do anything and you will only eat when you are on the verge of passing out.

You feel so much better after talking with Sadiq. You call your mom because you ‘missed’ her call two days back. You receive an earful, something about forgetting her like you brought yourself into the world. She goes on about how you would forget her completely if you got married. You want to tell her when, like when you get married. But it will only mean more talk, which you are trying to avoid. After about an hour half, concluding with, “a word is enough for the wise”, she let you go.

Your eyes mistakenly stray to the mirror and you don’t like what you see. You look like a mad woman with your disheveled hair and kohl smeared face. You are definitely not in competition with Rahim on who is more insane so you set out to go make your hair.

“What hairstyle would you like?”

You want to say all back because you don’t like sitting for hours to braid your hair only to unbraid it after a week. You opt for something different. Locks. You’ve always wanted to try that. You begin to wonder what Rahim would think about it. Why does it even matter? You are leaving him. Just then, your phone starts to ring. It’s him. You don’t pick. He calls you several more times.

“Nana, why are you ignoring my calls? Why haven’t you even called me since yesterday? You know you haven’t apologized for embarrassing me in front of your friends when you refused to wipe that makeup off your face and …”

“Can we meet?”

The last thing you want to hear is somebody whining over the phone.

The meeting is 4 pm. You would be done and ready to face him by then.

It’s a beautiful day. It really is but as you get ready to meet Rahim, the sky begins to rumble.