Part 3: Goodbye, Zareen
"I'm not changing her. Or feeding her." Ayaan clarified as soon as he walked into the house.
"Yeah, I know, you're not. Just give me all the stuff. I know how to change her." Humaira replied.
"You sure? I mean, she doesn't really - well, she doesn't seem to like you." Ayaan looked at Zareen, touching his nose on her little one.
"Of course she does!" Humaira cried out. "Come here, baby Zareen! We'll go get changed." Humaira took all the supplies to her washroom, while Ayaan grinned behind her.
"Good luck with that! It was nice knowing you!"
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Humaira was covered in baby powder from head to toe. She was sure she had baby food stuck in her hair and baby oil all over her dupatta. Ayaan walked into her room, assessing her condition.
"Yeah, you know that thing I said about having kids earlier? I'm going to change my answer to none again." Ayaan laughed.
"Not. In. The. Mood." Humaira replied with clenched teeth. Ayaan continued to laugh, picking up a clean-smelling Zareen this time.
"Hey, gorgeous! You're so clean and nice smelling now!" He kissed Zareen's chubby cheeks. Humaira shut her eyes, expecting Zareen's giggle and sure enough, there it was. It had taken her another 15 minutes to change Zareen's disgusting diaper. She didn't know how mothers did this. She didn't know how people had more than one child! What about twins, she thought! She groaned. She hurt all over and to think that all she did the whole day was take care of one little toddler.
"Her mom called your phone. You left it in the living room. She said she'd be here in 15ish minutes. They got late because of traffic." Ayaan said.
"Oh, thank God!" Humaira said out loud.
"Not too keen on kids now, are we?" Ayaan smirked.
"Can you just put her stuff in her bag, please, Ayaan? I'll go wash - whatever's on me off." Humaira walked slowly to the bathroom.
"What bag?" Ayaan asked.
"Her pink bag? Where she had all the stuff?" Humaira replied.
"Oh, right. The one we lost at the park?" Ayaan asked, sarcastically.
Humaira groaned even louder. "Oh God. Ayaan, can you help me, please?"
Ayaan sighed. "Fine. I'll go look around for some pink bag in the house. That woman has so many kids. I doubt if she'd notice it was a different bag. She has other things on her mind."
"Okay, thanks, Ayaan." Humaira gave him a weak smile.
"Come on, Zareen, let's go get you a pink little bag!" Ayaan carefully lifted Zareen and walked out of the door.
Humaira sighed in relief as she shut the washroom door. Thank God for Ayaan, she thought.
Humaira fixed her yellow anarkali that she changed into after peeling off her nasty one that Zareen had thrown everything on. She rushed to open the door, tired of Ayaan's furious knocking. "Darwaza todhna hai, kya?!"
Ayaan examined her mustard yellow anarkali. "Arre wah, Humaira begum! Arz kiya hai."
"Oh God, no." Humaira put her hands on her ears.
"Aaj mausam mein kuch ajeeb sa suhanapan hai,
Bekabu si humari yeh dhadkahne hai,
Jee chahta hai ke aapko churale hum apni nighahon se,
Par ammi kehti hai ki chori karna buri baat hai."
Humaira shook her head in defeat, smiling at the terrible shayari. He would never change. Ayaan passed her a purple bag.
"The bag was pink, Ayaan, not purple!" Humaira pushed Ayaan's purple bag away.
"Pink, purple, whatever! They're the same thing! Your hair still has some powder in it, by the way." Ayaan replied.
Humaira shook her head vigorously; try to shake off the white stuff. "Just because you're colour-blind, doesn't mean everyone else is! Let's try Nikhat's closet! She loves pink stuff!"
"Her mom will be here any minute, Humaira. Just tell her you lost it. It's okay. We bought all the stuff back right?"
"Yeah, we did..." Humaira sighed. It was so stupid. Ayaan had spent his money to buy the baby things and now she was going to get money for taking care of Zareen. She felt guilty about not telling him about this but she reminded herself that she was doing all this for him, after all. So it wasn't really that bad, right?
"Okay, don't give me the sad face. Let's go look into our old playroom!" Ayaan smiled. "You used to love pink when we were small. Pink clothes, pink barbie houses, pink room, pink everything! You probably have a pink bag in there somewhere!"
"Our playroom?" Humaira couldn't help but break into a smile. "Ayaan. That's so old! Is that part of the house even clean now? Ammi locked it because we would never study when we were in high school!" Humeira giggled.
"There's only one way to find out!" Ayaan grabbed her hand and pulled her away.
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"Wow." Humaira coughed through all the dust.
"I know, right? It's been locked up here for so long." Ayaan opened up an old window to let some fresh air into the stuffy room. He was only a kid when he'd started playing with Humaira everyday in this room. They were best friends even before they'd knew what that meant. He'd always felt protective towards her and never let her play in the park with other kids after school. He pulled her chubby hands after school and they would both run hand-in-hand to play in their special room.
Humaira giggled. "Ayaan, did you steal this book from the library?" She blew the dust off from a picture book, holding it up for Ayaan.
"Oh, yeah I did! That was your birthday gift!" Ayaan smiled.
Humaira rolled her eyes but couldn't help breaking into a smile. "How did you steal it from the library?"
"Oh, I let out crickets."
"In the library?!" Humaira's stood open-mouthed.
"Yeah." Ayaan replied, matter-of-factly.
"Why?!"
"Um. The library's too quiet and crickets are too loud. I dunno. I was a curious child?" Ayaan shrugged.
Humaira laughed, standing on her tip toes to shake his hair. "You were a wild child." She paused. "Actually, you're still a wild child."
"Humaira!!!" Nikhat's distant voice filled the room.
"Oh, her mom must be here!" Humaira looked up at Ayaan, worried.
"Okay, just go with Zareen. I'll try to find a pink bag." Ayaan urged her towards the door.
"And if you can't find one?" Humaira asked.
"Then we have a purple one?"
"Purple isn't - !" Humaira began to say but Ayaan cut her off, pushing her out of the room. "Goo!"
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"Was she troublesome, Humaira?" Ayshya asked her as walked through the front door.
Troublesome? Her middle name should be troublesome, Humaira thought. "Oh, no, of course not! She's lovely. We went to the park and played in the sandbox and the slides. It was great fun!" Humaira quickly handed Zareen to her mother.
"Humaira, where's Zareen's diaper bag?"
Humaira cleared her throat. "Actually - " Humaira shuffled her feet uneasily.
"Humaira! You left Zareen's bag in your room!" Ayaan jogged up to Humaira. Humaira's eyes widened as she saw a pink bag. She gave Ayaan a quizzical expression.
"Here you go, aunty." Ayaan handed the pink bag placed inside the baby carrier.
"Thank you, Ayaan. And thank you, Humaira! I'll give you your-" Humaira's eyes widened.
"Uh- why don't I help you to your car? Here, let me grab the carriage!" Humaira pulled the carriage outside. Ayaan couldn't know she was being paid for this.
"Bye, Zareen," Ayaan yelled as they left. Zareen giggled once again as her mother held her, waking out of the house.
Humaira plopped herself down beside Ayaan, who was now watching some bad reality show on TV where a bunch of women were fighting to win the "heart" of a rich man and marry him. On every season, it was the same thing again and again and eventually, after a few months, the couple would break-up and the wife was paid a handsome reward in some court settlement.
"Tired?" Ayaan asked, eyes glued to the television screen.
"Urgh." Humaira groaned, "Exhausted." Humaira pulled her feet up on the sofa and hugged herself. "Wasn't the Nadia girl eliminated?"
"Yeah, but she came back through a wild-card round. So apparently, she had an affair with the producer and now they called her back probably to get more TRPs and they're having this special 2 hour episode where all the girls in the house are bitching about her!" Ayaan's eyes were still on the TV.
Humaira scowled at him. Normally, she would have argued with him and fought over the remote control to change it to something she liked instead of watching the ridiculous nonsense. But she was so tired right now that she would even watch Ayaan's stupid reality shows. She yawned loudly and rested her head on Ayaan's chest.
"Still want to have kids?" Ayaan whispered.
"Totally."Humaira smiled. "Hey, Ayaan?"
"Hmm?"
"I'm sorry for pulling you into this, making you watch the baby and all. I know you had- um, other plans."
Ayaan smiled at her. "Anything for you, Humaira begum." Humaira smiled up at him, resting her head on him and closed her eyes shut. Ayaan watched Humaira fall asleep on him. He turned the TV off and carefully placed her head on his lap first, then pulled her up on his lap. He lifted her up and walked to her bedroom, gently placing her down on her bed. He finger-combed her hair away from her face and brought his face close to her's.
"Good night, Humaira begum." He hesistated and hovered above her face for a few seconds and then he leaned in and placed a kiss on Humaira's forehead before pulling the covers on her.
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Part 4
Edited by .Anamika. - 11 years ago
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