One week until Eid.
The house was no longer a home; it was a logistics hub. Every surface was covered in swatches of chiffon, lists of caterers, and jewelry boxes that looked more like shackles than ornaments. My mother and Auntie Warda were in the middle of a high-stakes negotiation over the floral arrangements for the Nikkah, their voices rising and falling like a tide I was drowning in.
I couldn't breathe in there. I grabbed my sketchbook—the only thing that still felt like mine—and slipped out the back door.
The backyard was the only place the wedding hadn't touched yet. The air smelled of damp earth and the jasmine bushes that my father had planted years ago. I sat on the old stone bench, the cold seep of the rock grounding me. I opened my book, but the page was a mocking, pristine white. My creativity had been replaced by a low-level, constant hum of anxiety.
The gate creaked.
I didn't look up. I assumed it was Salar coming to pester me about dinner. But the footsteps were too heavy, too deliberate.
"The jasmine is blooming early this year," a voice said.
I froze. I knew that voice. But it didn't have the sharp, clinical edge of the CEO. It sounded... weary. I looked up and felt my breath hitch.
Zayn was standing by the trellis. He had discarded the armor. No suit jacket, no silk tie. His white button-down was rumpled, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and his hair was a mess, as if he'd spent the last hour running his hands through it. He looked like the boy who used to jump the fence, but with the eyes of a man who had seen too much of the world.
"What are you doing here, Zayn?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper. "Don't you have a 'merger' to finalize?"
He didn't flinch at the jab. Instead, he walked closer, stopping just outside my personal space. He didn't look at me; he looked at the house, where the lights were blazing and the shadows of our mothers moved against the curtains.
"I found something," he said quietly. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, folded piece of paper. It was yellowed at the edges, looking fragile against his tanned fingers.
He stepped forward and laid it on the bench beside me. I didn't pick it up at first. I just stared at it.
"I've carried that in my wallet for five years, Alayna," he said, his voice dropping an octave. "Through every meeting in Islamabad, through every flight to Dubai. It was the only thing I took with me that didn't have a price tag."
With trembling fingers, I unfolded the paper. It was the charcoal sketch I'd done of him when we were eighteen. He was leaning against this very bench, looking at the horizon with a look of pure, unadulterated hope. I had captured the light in his eyes—the light that I thought he'd extinguished the day he left.
"Why are you showing me this now?" I asked, a lump forming in my throat. "To remind me of what you threw away?"
"No," Zayn said, finally meeting my eyes. The intensity in his gaze made the air between us feel electric. "To remind myself of who I was before I started pretending that I didn't need anyone. I told you in the park that I didn't know which man you were marrying. I lied."
He took a half-step closer. I could smell the faint scent of cedarwood and the rain that was threatening to fall.
"The CEO... he's a suit I wear so the world doesn't see how much I've missed this," he gestured to the garden, to me, to the silence. "But the boy? He never left. He was just waiting for a reason to come back. And I realized today that if I don't find him now, I'm going to lose the only person who ever saw him in the first place."
I looked from the sketch to the man standing in front of me. The mask wasn't just slipping; it was shattered.
You're late, Zayn," I said, my voice breaking.
"I'll be at the library at 8:00 AM," Zayn said, his voice dropping to that quiet, plea-like tone again. "No 'consultants.' No spreadsheets. Just us. We have a library to finish, and I think... I think we have a lot more to talk about than marble polish."
He started to turn away, but I spoke before I could lose my nerve.
"Zayn?"
He stopped, looking back over his shoulder, the moonlight catching the hope he was trying so hard to hide.
"I need time," I said, my voice small but firm. I gripped the edges of the old sketch, the charcoal staining my fingertips. "You've had five years to figure out who you are. I've had five minutes. You can't just drop a memory on the bench and expect the last five years to vanish. I need time to decide if the boy I knew is actually back, or if this is just another 'management strategy' to get me to the altar."
Zayn's expression shifted. The "CEO" might have been annoyed at the delay, but the man standing in the garden looked like he'd been hit by a physical blow. He stood in the silence for a long beat, the only sound the rustle of the jasmine leaves.
"You're right," he said finally. It wasn't a corporate concession; it was a quiet admission of guilt. "I took five years of your time without asking. It's only fair I give you whatever you need now."
He looked at the house, then back at me, his jaw tightening.
"I'll be at the library at eight. If you show up, we talk. If you don't... I'll be there again the next morning. And the morning after that. I'm not running anymore, Alayna. I'll wait as long as it takes for you to see that."
He didn't wait for me to respond. He walked away, disappearing into the shadows of the Malik estate. I sat there for a long time, the old sketch clutched against my heart. The charcoal was smudging my skin, leaving a dark, messy mark—a reminder that life wasn't clean, and growth wasn't easy.
The "I don't know" was gone. But in its place was something much more terrifying: a choice.