Adar

Days passed their last meeting, nights whisked into a new dawn as the sunrise rippled across the rich hues of crimson and orange spraying through the ocean of dark, navy blue, a portrait of the sky that once covered the sins of villagers awakening into a new start, a new day to repent for their mistakes. Unfortunately, Adar would have to be foolish to believe these villagers even cared. 

His pen scribbled black ink across his paper, eloquent words crafting to cathedrals of events, towering moments of the revolution and the village drama, highlighting every aspect of society that he could vaguely remember. He was writing to Miraj, assuring him that when the time was right, he would join him in their escape plan, their safe exit. 

Time ticked, and the world around him blurred as his sanctuary would soon be under scrutiny. It was only a matter of time before news of his letters reached generals and politicians, and when it did, Adar would have to be one step ahead. He would run. 

But how can I leave Rabiya?

Pain erupted from his nasal passage to his cranium, a pounding against his skull that clattered along with his thoughts, clamoring for a solution. He was unsure about the future tidings or the potential chaos, however, Adar placed his trust in Allah. His Lord tested patience and faith in many ways, and this was just one. If Adar stayed calculative, heedful, and righteous in his deeds, he knew a plan would form. 

Dropping the pen, Adar massaged his knuckles as a cramp began to wind around his joints, cold and coarse. He sighed, leaning against his chair. His bruises were starting to heal, and there was a peaceful quiet in his house these days. 

Something was off. His family was never that quiet.

Adar contemplated deeply, trying to think ahead, putting himself in their shoes, and walking with their morals, yet the exercise seemed a lot harder. Although he knew of his family's sins, it was hard to hate them when they were the ones who shared his blood, the ones who brought him and raised him. His mind wavered while his heart lingered for a moment of change. 

I'm a fool, he thought, chuckling to himself. They've beaten me, threatened me, and abused me over the years, and I still chase after their approval. 

As Adar felt suffocated by his darker thoughts, a soft whimpering was heard outside his room, startling him. He shifted in his chair, glancing behind him at slightly ajar barrier between him and the intruder. Quiet, muffled sobs rocked against the frame, a sign of the trembling body against it, heart wrenched in sorrows. 

It was barely Fajr (dawn) prayer, and someone was awoken by their fears and nightly torments. Instinctively, Adar arose from his seat, a sense of familiarity overtaking his senses as the cries resembled ones that he heard at Abdul Jalil's estate, the sound of a broken child begging for her father. 

He rushed to the door.

Upon opening it, he was met with the shaking body of Zaina, her knees pulled to her chest as her arms wrapped around them. She buried her head into the security of her arms, tears soaking her dirtied dress, a simple frock colored in reddish pink flowers, daisies, roses, and hibiscuses, an epitome of childhood fantasy and innocence. 

His chest felt heavy staring at the small girl, barely above the age of six, whimpering for all that she lost and all that she continued to lose.

At one point, the world was in the palm of her hands, and the woman who gave it to her stole it back with a violent force. Her own mother stripped Zaina of her right to family and property. Without a thought towards her children, her mother welcomed misery with opened arms, praised suffering if it brought her the wealth and power she need. 

These were the types of people Allah warned Muslims of, the types of people Adar's family joyously mingled with. He understood Zaina's pain to some degree. Her mother divulged in her selfish desires just as his parents pursued theirs. Both Zaina and Adar were only products of another's painful ministrations, pawns in some sick, twisted game that had to end to its agonizing consequences. 

In this regard, they were more alike than he thought.

When Adar was a child, he had no one to turn to except Allah. His family were all one of the same, except him. They lusted after greed. They contemplated damnation for affluence. In every generation, there were miracle children who strived in the face of filth. Children like Adar came from broken homes, yet with Allah's mercy he found the word of God on his own. He was guided by old villagers who saw a light in his path and advised him.

Those men from the masjid all those years ago were buried deep in rich soils, wrapped in white cloths and secured by wooden blocks, protected and separated from the land they once walked upon. Their journey ended, but Adar carried their legacy. Just as they nurtured his future, Adar kept their memory alive by remembering all the morals that they taught him. 

They were strangers to him, yet their constant presence in the masjid made those men a part of his family. His heart constricted at the thought of their children turning astray. Those elders would have been so disappointed at the state of their nation and its people.

Adar sat beside her, gently touching her shoulder. "Zaina?" he whispered into the thick, dense air. 

Her shoulders shook as she glanced at him with red, puffy, tearful eyes. Her breaths were short, choppy, and inconcise like the raspy tune of broken strings, sound cut abruptly in her mist of conflicting emotions, a burden Adar understood too well. It was the feeling of helplessness, the feeling of neglect, the feeling of loss. 

"Was it your mother again?" he asked gently, kind brown eyes welcoming her with his affectionate gaze. A sad smile touched his lips when her silence answered on her behalf. "Looks like you and I both are stuck here, huh?"

She nodded, sniffling. 

He stared at the child beside him, at her short, uneven black hair that shimmered in the moonlight even though dirt dug deep into her scalp. Dark purple and red bruises covered her body like battle wounds, scars of abuse at the hands of a woman that claimed to love her. Her eyes lacked vigor for knowledge and curiosity.

Instead, they were dimmed with clouds of darkness, void of the bright, illuminating innocence that followed every child.

Adar's body mourned for her. If Rabiya was there, she could have wiped all of Zaina's tears with the pads of her fingertips, smiling warmly at the child with her grace and ease. She would have reassured all her doubts because that was Rabiya's innate ability. She could heal the wounds that were blind to many eyes.

"Do you miss her?" his hoarse voice cut through them. 

"Who?" 

"Rabiya."

"Yes," she croaked, a river of anguish streaming her eyes once more. 

His heart softened. "She really loves you," he continued, smiling kindly. "If she could, she'd do anything to bring you happiness."

Zaina sunk her head deeper into the crook of her arms. "That's why it hurts even more," she mumbled. 

"Why-"

Zaina shook her head furiously, crying into her arms. "You don't understand!" she yelled. "Apu (sister) is just another person who can't love me. She's just another person who's going to be taken away from me just like Abbu (father)!"

Adar was taken aback by the sudden outburst. 

She heaved heavily, slowly lifting her head and staring blankly ahead of her. "I want my Abbu," whispered Zaina in a small voice. "Abbu could protect me. He always did."

He contemplated his next words carefully. "Is that... what scares you? You're afraid that Rabiya would leave like your... father?"

Mutely, she nodded, eyes glistening with her biggest fear, her life horror. At such a young age, Zaina experienced reality's cruel taunts and whispers. She lived under the shadow of her mother, a woman who's sanity dissipated with her grief, who lost herself to madness, and her villainous wake, her daughter suffered. 

Adar leaned back against the wall, head lifting to the starry night sky, watching the glittering dots shine through clouds of darkness with ease, a luminescence to their turmoils. Blue turned to black, white turned to gray, a storm brewed, yet the Allah's creations did not fetter. They only brightened at the sight of danger. 

An idea occurred to him. 

"Zaina, look at the sky."

She listened. 

"Do you see the stars that lined that coat of black?" he asked, pointing above them. "Do you see how brightly they shine through the mist of fog and clouds?"

She nodded. "So what?" she said, tilting her head curiously at him. 

He smiled. "That is what hope should always be like. That is what faith should be. Even in the darkness, your faith in Allah's plans should never diminish."

Her tiny brows knit together in confusion. "What does 'diminish' mean?"

Adar chuckled. "Ah, I forgot that I was talking to a child," he joked. "It means disappear or decrease. Your faith should not disappear whenever you face a struggle. When you keep your faith, you keep your hope."

"S-So, if I keep my faith, then I shine like those," she pointed at the stars that continued to glimmer in a blinding light, burning through the dense, gray fog that hovered their homes like a looming fate. Zaina scrunched up her nose. "That doesn't seem real."

Adar threw his head back in a throaty chuckle. "Trust me, little one. Allah is capable of all miracles, so when you put your faith in Him and you continue living your life with open eyes, then all will work out well," he told her softly, eyes affectionate. 

She met his gaze with a fearful one as if afraid of the answer. "Did it for you?"

Adar paused briefly, reflecting back on his life. So many calamities befell his life, chased after him with swords of steel and machine guns of death. So many days lined with darkness among the light of his talent, his writing. Adar came from nothing, and he planned to leave it all away. He planned to escape when the gates of opportunity opened. He would take advantage of distraction, and he would run far from a life of pain and misery. 

He would start anew. 

But now he had a girl worth fighting for, a girl worth all the obstacles he faced, a girl he would never leave behind. She stole his heart the day he first saw her. She had him wrapped around her finger before she even knew his name. 

Adar was defenseless against her breathtaking smiles, her bubbly laughter, and her heartwarming voice that dispelled all his worries away because when he heard her call his name, he knew everything would be alright. 

"Alhamdulillah (thanks to God), it did."

A faint smile touched her lips in the moonlight. "Was it Apu?"

"How did you know about that?" he teased her. "That's a secret, little one." 

"You stare at her funny."

"I do not," he refused, although the giddiness of love fell across his lip in his blatant lie. 

Zaina giggled, tears dry and eyes bright with elation from their little talk. Adar tried his best to keep her mind off the terrors that surrounded them. He erased her worries like a father would to his child, like a teacher guiding his student.

She had the courage and intellect to change their village, to make a difference, but someone had to ignite the spark within her, someone had to encourage Zaina to persevere even at a young age. 

Until someone else could raise her, Adar intended to fill that role. Zaina was Rabiya's pride and joy, her beloved cousin, so Adar would help her at all costs. 

How did one girl change his plans so quickly? 

His heart burst with anticipation at seeing Rabiya again. All he wanted was to hold her close in his arms, to protect her from the slander of others, to kiss her fears away with sweet nothings, to whisper his dedication. Adar was crazy for his love, and he never felt more alive. Even a child like Zaina knew about his feelings. 

Although he was still in a light-hearted conversation with Zaina, both instantly froze at the cold voices nearby, icy and calculative manipulators lurked nearby like vultures searching for leftovers. 

Fear captured Zaina's laughter as she gasped and shook upon hearing her mother among the voices. Adar placed a finger to his lips, signaling her silence as he turned his body to hear the intruders carefully. They were a couple rooms down from where Adar and Zaina were, completely oblivious to their wandering ears. 

"Bhaiyah (brother), I'm scared," she whimpered. 

"Shh," he hushed, gathering her in his arms. "You have nothing to fear. I'll protect you."

"B-But Ammu will be m-mad."

Adar shook his head. "She will not hurt you if you stay near me," he assured, glancing back down the empty hall where a light slipped through under a closed door. "Shh. We need to know what they are planning."

The words that followed right after seemed to crush upon his shoulders much more rapidly than he expected like a burning ballast thrown against him and scorching through his stability and ease. The next attack on Rabiya's family was far more closer than he anticipated. 

This time, however, Adar refused to sit in silence. 

----

When guys are sweet to kids, idk but it's so hawt. Like *fans myself* love it when they're great with kids.

Oh, Adar, your girl is waiting for you, my mans. You gotta make her proud. 

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