A Pride & Prejudice and Little Women retelling
Farrah Hussain spent a lifetime hating Salman Bashir. At least that's what she liked to believe. When one fateful summer Salman changes his bad boy ways and comes back a new man, Farrah can't stop the l...
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Dahlia Ahmad returned home with her feet aching and limbs heavy.
Wedding season was approaching - and even the thought of that drained Dahlia out.
At the engagement party tonight, as the parents of the bride and groom helped exchange rings, Dahlia clapped along with everyone. There was a smile on her face, of course, but on the inside, she was feeling nothing but dread.
At weddings these days all she heard were, "you're next!" It was all fun and games, until one by one all the girls her age were getting married and she was actually becoming 'next' in line.
Dahlia took off her heels and held up the weight of her lehenga bottom as she walked towards her dresser, the train sliding after her. She let go of the heavy embroidered skirt and started taking off the pins of her head scarf one by one.
One of the elder helping hands of the house entered her room.
"There's a package for you, sweetie," she said, beckoning to the bouquet of roses sitting on her bedside table.
Dahlia quickly turned around and spotted the flowers she hadn't noticed before.
She uttered a "thank you" as the woman left. Furrowing her eyebrows, Dahlia walked towards her bedside table. She reached out for the flowers, questions racing through her head.
She scrutinised the bouquet, wondering who it was from. The soft pink of the rose was the exact shade of her preference, the neat wicker basket told her it was expensive, and her initials on the gold ribbons holding the stems made it obvious it was custom designed. There was a gift basket besides the flowers.
She found a cream-coloured card nestled right into the middle of the roses. The seemingly expensive piece of paper felt like satin against her skin. The moment Dahlia saw the name written in cursive, her heart dropped to her stomach.
Kaveh Fayyad.
There was an envelope sitting besides the card. She picked it up, slid out a larger paper from it and unfolded the letter, her heart thumping wildly against her chest.
Dearest Dahlia,
It read. It was written in the same hand writing as the card.
I have been thinking about what you said. I have been thinking about you a lot, in general.
The other day, when we ran into each other in front of your grandmother's house, I was out of line. I couldn't say sorry enough to make up for my behaviour. However, before I dive deeper with my apology, I would like to tell you why I acted the way I did.
