.

𝙉𝙤𝙤𝙧'𝙨 𝙋𝙊𝙑

It was ridiculous. The cap was too big. The hoodie swallowed me whole. My braid was hidden under layers of cloth. And the sunglasses? Way too large for my face. it was Zaid's plan to dress me up like this, it's been a month to our fake dating.

But I had never felt freer.

For the first time, I wasn’t Noor, the daughter of strict parents, the one promised in marriage, the girl who speaks only when spoken to.

I was just… a face in the crowd. A stranger in a bazaar full of noise and colours.

And I was with him.

Zaid.

He had laughed so hard when he saw me at the corner of the street, leaning casually on a bike like some teenage movie hero.

Zaid: “Bhai saab... aapko kahin dekha hai. Noor naam ki ladki ka dil churaya tha na?”

Me: “Woh toh mujhe bhi nahi pasand aayi. Badtameez thi.”

We both burst out laughing. The kind of laugh that made your ribs hurt and eyes water. And it didn’t stop. For hours. I cracked jokes, poked fun at vendors, commented on people’s dressing, and even bargained like a pro aunty.

Me: “Bhaiya, aakhri daam bataiye warna yeh bhai (pointing at Zaid) sadak par protest shuru kar denge.”

He played along every time. His eyes, those kind, warm brown eyes, kept watching me with a softness I hadn’t seen before.

—

Later, as I sat in his car, legs curled up, sipping from a cheap cold drink bottle, reality came back.

This wasn’t normal.

Not for me.

It was my first time in the bazaar…

First time alone…

First time without Mama, Baba, or Saad shadowing me.

First time sitting beside someone who wasn’t family, yet didn’t feel like a stranger.

The window was half open. The wind played with the strands of my hair that had escaped the hoodie. My laugh had quieted down now. And so had his.

Zaid: “Tum aise roz nahi hoti, hoti?”

I looked at him.

Me: “Nahi. Aise kabhi nahi hoti.”

Zaid: “Mujhe toh lag raha tha koi aur hi hai mere saath.”

Me: (smiling faintly) “Wahi toh thi... koi aur hi thi.”

There was silence. Not the uncomfortable kind. The kind that lets you feel the weight of what was just said.

I turned my face to the window again. The sun was beginning to set. The bazaar behind us slowly faded into smaller shops and quieter streets. Inside, though, something stirred.

Was I really going to let this become a memory?

Just one reckless, beautiful memory?

—

𝙕𝙖𝙞𝙙'𝙨 𝙋𝙊𝙑

I had seen Noor smile before.

But I hadn’t seen her exist like this.

Like a storm bottled for too long had finally poured down, and all I could do was stand beneath it, drenched in awe.

She was loud, expressive, sarcastic, wild. A child who had been told to stay quiet all her life finally decided to speak, and she didn’t stop.

And I didn’t want her to.

I wanted to hear every word, every laugh, every dramatic retelling of how she once got locked in a cupboard at age ten and screamed for three hours straight.

Her eyes were glowing. Her nose scrunched when she got excited. Her hands waved when she spoke fast.

I didn’t realise when I stopped listening and just started watching her.

My heart?

It sank.

She wasn’t just someone I was spending time with anymore.

I was falling.

Badly.

And it terrified me.

Because she still had that ring of silence around her, the kind that comes from belonging to someone else’s decisions.

But I’d take today.

This one day.

Where she wasn’t someone’s daughter.