A flame in the Storm

Chapter 44

Aunt Asma, Farah's mother was sitting in our living room with my mother as I entered our home. After few failed attempts at contacting Farah, she had left the chase and Farah acted as if nothing happened. The attitude of Farah, in this case, baffled me; she always wanted to be close to her mother like I was, with mine. She had openly declared that she envied our bonding as she knew she would never have it in her life. But when her mother tried to contact her, she wasn't the same Farah anymore.

Aunt Asma had lost tremendous weight and looked nothing like when I had seen her last time, she had become pale and had a scarf wrapped around her head, my mother's hands were in hers, in a tight hold. I cleared my throat to gain their attention as they were absorbed in their conversation, looking desolate. Before I could do that, Farah barged in the room "You missed so much fun, Maria."

She had gone to the Istanbul Modest Fashion week in Turkey, where our brand was invited to showcase our collection, as in these two years it had become an international business with stores in gulf countries as well.

Upon seeing her mother, Farah dropped the bags she was holding and her mother stood up. They both stood looking at each other, with neither of them uttering a single word. All of a sudden Farah turned back to go and her mother called her, "Farah."

She froze where she was, without turning back.

"I am dying."

A long silence engulfed the room, Farah glanced back without turning, "you were dead to me on the day you abandoned me."

Mom supported aunt as she broke down in sobs on our sofa and I ran behind Farah to stop her. This wasn't the way she should have reacted.

"Farah!" I shouted but making me unheard she sat in the car.

She drove away seeing me approach her car, but not before I saw a tear running down her cheek.

Calling Salman, I informed him everything, he said he would take care of it.

I went back inside, the aunt was still crying as my mother sat rubbing her back. Sitting beside her, I promised, "I will get her to talk to you."

"Thank you, Maria," she said hugging me, "I want to spend my last days with my daughter."

"What happened?" I asked putting my hand on her shoulder while looking at my mother for answers.

"She has got cancer," my mother said with tears wetting her eyes, "last stage."

I sat there frozen as I realized that Farah's dream of being with her mother was being broken in the worst way possible.

After aunt Asma left, I drove straight to Farah's home. It turns out; aunt was diagnosed with cancer two years ago during the time she tried to get in contact with Farah. After the diagnosis, she stopped, as she thought it would be less painful to Farah if she never knew about it, but as the days of her end came near, she grew desperate for her daughters. After the incident with Farah, her elder sister Sara also had shifted to the US for higher studies and never came back till a few months ago. She had fallen in love with a native there and got married but the marriage didn't work out. Aunt Asma suffered from depression as her husband also was away most of the times at business trips. She began to neglect her health until she lost consciousness and fell down from the stairs and was taken to the hospital by the servants. The report came out as a Brain tumor.

In the world where people make money everything, aunt Asma had suffered from it, the most.

Farah sat on her bed in her large, empty bedroom, knees drawn close to her chest, as tears silently fell on her cheeks. They had now shifted into a plush bungalow with an indoor swimming pool. Unlike their previous apartment, this house was on par with her dad's bungalow.